I hear a lot about excessive parenting on here but I wonder if it's just a segment of society. Can anyone but wealthy parents have time to occupy their kids 24-7? The freedom I and friends had as a kid was not a decision of my parents so much as a necessity. Parents dont get home from work until 6, school lets out at 2, we get at least 4 free hours of undisturbed freedom. Why would that be different now?
My son is playing with other kids. I wander off. When I check back, all the kids are watching a screen. I say “what’s going on?” And some parent says “the kids were getting roudy, so I put on a show to calm them down”.
Related: Every single one of my toddler's grandparents defaults to sticking a phone in his face (and has since he was a baby).
Like, they all managed to raise children into moderately functional adults without heavy use of smartphones, and have had explicit instructions not to do that. Why do they think it's the thing to do?
If you try to encourage non-screen time socially, their friends stop coming over.
At best, your kid will just want to leave the house to go watch tv/play video games over at the friend's house, but just as likely is that the kid stops having a friend because they're not mindshared in anymore.
> My son is playing with other kids. I wander off. When I check back, all the kids are watching a screen. I say “what’s going on?” And some parent says “the kids were getting roudy, so I put on a show to calm them down”.
Ooof this is me on Sundays - the only day allowed screen time, but man yea, if our girls are by themselves then a screen for them and a screen for me and we're all happy.
