The greatest thing a parent can do for a kid in the modern world is not buying them a car or paying for college. It is never letting them see you use a phone, never buying them a phone, and ensuring access to social media is delayed as long as possible. Think of phones as cigarettes.

Sure, they will have a hard time connecting with brain-rotted peers, but in the long run their average attention span will make them superhuman in a world of peers who have none left at all.

It gets difficult in the teenage years, as not having a phone (or access to) effectively isolates them from their peer group and they become outcast.

Whilst this may be good to avoid brain-rot, it eliminates much of their social needs in many cases.

A balance is required, but that needs parents to actually pay attention and not just leave them to isolate themselves (with their phone) into their room.

I’d amend that to “never buying them a smart phone”. There’s nothing particularly addictive about texting with friends, and while there’s certainly still mischief associated with that, it’s not the kind of brain-fry that’s most worrying to me.

I hear this idea that not having social media will “isolate” kids from their peers, but will it? I’m not sure how you would use TikTok to interact with your classmates, given it’s a global app.

Hmm so they’re the weird kid with a dumb phone as a teen?

The answer is not as easy as much as we would wish it was.

I grew up as the weird kid. This was great as I learned it is okay to not be like everyone else. Why are we so obsessed with making kids that fit in with all the brain rotted masses.

This is like arguing that a kid will have more friends if they are allowed to smoke because everyone else does and it is a common social activity.

I do not have a phone and have lots of friends I see frequently, in person.

A kid will be able to form a small number of close friendships without a smartphone too.

Will they be able to have hundreds of "friends" in a parasocial relationship? No. Feature, not a bug.

I would never allow a minor to agree to the terms of service of any bytedance zuck products just as I would not give a kid cigarettes or vapes.

Knowingly exposing a kid to highly addictive harmful things is child abuse.

I'm absolutely convinced that with the exception of the most discplined and productive 5-10% of people smartphones are a massive net loss for most people.

Could a portable computer with all the radios sensors smartphones have be a net gain? Absolutely, we all knew this and it's why many of us were the first to replace our palm pilots with smartphones. The reality is though that all of the software (especially the system software) is designed to harm the user in pretty serious ways.

I don't own a phone and if I ever have kids they will be given a small laptop with Ethernet but no WiFi running Linux like my dad gave me when I was 10.

I started watching the documentary and it's surprisingly good but also very scary. Especially with regards to sexual abuse young girls have to go through on social media like instagram and tiktok