This seems to complement Twenge's argument about children's lack of free play. Apart from school, when a child's primary means of connecting with others and developing social skills is through social media, where their frames of reference on how to treat themselves and others is presented in the most superficial and histrionic ways, how much of their growth is stunted thanks to these fast food substitutes?
If it's hard for a 32 year old like me to control my smartphone habits, I can't imagine how hard it is for young teenagers with developing brains who have lots more on their plates!
The major issue that very few talk about is that non-ionizing radiation from wireless, social media addictions aside, kills all life, and is damaging to children. This is the foundation from which we all need to start:
Processing “𝘴𝘶𝘣𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘨 𝘤𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘺 𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘶𝘢𝘨𝘦, 𝘧𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘷𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦…” leads to a lot more misinterpretation than interpretation. If people would put the actual content first we'd get a lot further.
“Fast food substitutes” is the perfect analogy to the modern social dilemma. We are seeing how actual fast food is not a healthy replacement for quality whole and unprocessed foods. Our social interactions online are similarly an unhealthy replacement for in person social interactions. The lack of richness makes our brains atrophy, among many other more obvious concerns.
I'd really love to see the spatial and environmental element to all of this, especially regarding your stated goal to "reinvent the play-based childhood for the 21st century." Playing requires safe streets, play spaces, etc. And I wonder how the urban development patterns in the US since the mid-20th century have contributed to and/or exacerbated our epidemic of loneliness. Another way of putting this inquiry is: Do walkable neighborhoods mitigate the harms from smart phones and social media?
Thats one issue but also, a huge consideration is school consolidation. We live in a VERY walkable affluent town 30 min from Boston. Because of state incentives based on "model" designs for "21st century", "sustainable", "equitable" schools, neighborhood elementary schools are being shut down in droves and replaced with new mega schools with fancy theaters and playgroumds and "efficient cafeterias". They are beautiful but kids have to be bussed now because the sites are chosen for cost and design efficiency NOT for children and families and their wellbeing. Its the biggest miscarriage of justice and a driver of so much family stress I cant even count the ways it has effected our way of life. All over the state neighborhood after neighborhood is being destroyed for sustainability. Our town traded 3 neighborhood elementary schools for a MASSIVE traffic catastrophe that already had one kid hit by a car. And every elementary kid now has a cell phone to manage pickups because an 8 year old cant walk home 45 minutes in 25 degrees. Thats absurd. (Only 2 miles out qualifies for the bus)
Life has never been safe now a good many of our fellow man are mind numbing safe and secure imprisoning others because of their own needs. I have a sibling with six children, he lined them up like puppies and sat them on the floor in front of the boob tube to eat their meals. They are a mess. Does any one talk with each other anymore? I am not criticizing you in any way, I send you sisterly love.
I had the good fortune and pleasure to briefly chat with Marshall McLuhan, when I was 15. It is to his lasting credit that he would willingly suffer a fool like me. One of his underlying beliefs is that a society shouldn't move on to any new technology until it has figured out what the current technology might be doing to it. Unfortunately, we live in a time when the impetus is to create and adopt new technology before we've even finished paying off the preceding things, let alone come to any insight about what it might be doing to us. It's an adolescent-dominated/driven society that demands new technology on the "hit parade", rising up the charts, constantly.
A friend of mine, who grew up in France, just yesterday suggested to me that America truly is an adolescent country compared to Europe. And some of our current behaviors indeed present themselves as hormone-infused adolescence. :-)
France has had 3 governments since WW II not counting the 3 during the war including a coup attempt by the French Foreign Legion. It regularly has large scale riots and cars burning in its streets. There are regular country wide strikes and protests. There are regular if small scale Islamic terror murders. If the ability to tolerate all of this with a Gallic shrug and a "C'est la vie," means that they are the post-adolescent country, I remain unimpressed. I'm pretty sure our feeling that they are assured and stable is because the number of people that care about French news enough to follow it is infinitesimal.
Maybe but France is willingly losing its heritage to the Muslim hordes that are overrunning the whole European continent and our worthless installed president has thrown open our border so the same thing can happen here.
"We must stop overprotecting children in the real world and underprotecting them online." An urgent yet simple message that every parent needs to hear.
I've read several books and loads of articles on this subject your writing is the clearest and best.
y’know, I never really understood McLuhan’s “the Medium is the Message” until the Smart Phone. since I grew up with TV, but not with Smart Phones until I was almost 40 years old, I can clearly see the effect it had. I imagine this was what television did to the Silent Generation.
Not only schools, but people need to be educated on the harms that screens are to very young minds. Keeping kids away from screens, ALL screens, including TV is recommended for infants to age 2. This is next to impossible with our busy lives, but it is a message that all new parents need to hear. If you track the increase in autism, diagnoses spiked as color tv, cable tv, computers etc came into households. There are studies regarding time spent in front of screens (TV included) that suggest a strong correlation.
I realize this goal is probably impossible but I’d like to see more awareness of this. I hope you can get the message out. We are in a period where millennials and Gen z are in prime childbearing years, it would be great if the children could grow up to be neurologically healthy, even if it means the adults in their lives have to restrict all types of screen access until the children are older.
This is a big project you are embarking upon, I certainly wish you the best of luck and hope the movement is successful.
Let's Go! Thank you Professor Haidt. Burke said evil triumphs when good people do nothing. We ALL have a part to play in this. It is a matter of JUSTICE!!!!!
I was a free range kid in the late 50s and through the 60s, before phones, and I wouldn’t trade my childhood for anything in the world. Good ideas, Mr. Haidt.
I’m currently at day 94 of going completely cold turkey on all social media and news. I tried in earnest for a year to cut down my usage; like only scrolling till the first advert, never clicking on the video “shorts”. My time online, which wasn’t much, took time away from me doing more interesting things for myself, even if it was something as simple as reading a new novel.
I started Substack and I thought it was fantastic as my attention span could get a workout, spending 30 minutes reading an essay without ad intrusions but still, my time was not mine.
It wasn’t until I went cold turkey late last year on all social media, all news, all YouTube, that I realized how anxious it had been making me feel. Like seriously, so fucking anxious about everything. In some ways it could be said I’m sticking my head in the sand, but no, I’m choosing now who and what I give my attention to; whether that be reading up on my next fermentation adventures, learning some new skills, spending time with my kids (and listening to them with full concentration, not with the thumb paused mid-scroll on the phone), online chatting with distant friends. Getting off social media can be isolating so I do make sure I keep connecting with online friends through instant messenger, asking random nonsensical questions just to reach out and connect.
I’m back here, to check in on a fermentation Substack about making tempeh (we’re using a bean that grows wild here and I wanted to contribute my results) and as soon as I open the app, I get distracted by THIS post. But heck this post is a great distraction. Thank you Jon for the critical work you are doing, I’ll be sharing this on my instagram stories in a month or so when I “post and run” (post a whole bunch of stories in one day, all about the farm, then close the app and not open it again for another couple of months). I have thought about returning one day to Substack only, removing all subscriptions that aren’t relevant to things I personally do, but at the moment the break from anxiety is literally life-changing. But you Jon, will remain on my list of subscriptions.
I’m 49 and I struggled to control my small amount of phone usage. How do we expect kids to?
Go to it, Jon! A "campaign to end the phone-based childhood and reinvent the play-based childhood for the 21st century" is music to my ears. It is the only sensible solution to the problems of childhood we are now seeing, as well as the large problems of declining literacy, which seem a disaster for a democracy threaten by both cynical and ignorant forces. I'm happy to help this campaign however I can, starting with buying your new book and recommending it to my friends. Thanks for your work! :)
This is so true. We have to get rid of the default to screens for kids. Three-year-olds should not be watching videos/games on their parents' phones as a primary mode of entertainment, and that is not easy to do. A bored three-year-old is going to beg for that phone, and it's easier to hand it over (and hilarious when the kid takes 8 pictures of her nostrils), but we are teaching our kids to default to screens for comfort, entertainment, and everything else.
I look forward to your book. I LOVED "The Coddling of the American Mind" and was vastly disappointed by your co-author's following book (The Cancelling..) which seemed to actually embrace many of the ideas it was supposedly criticizing. I'll be fascinated to see what more you have developed since Coddling.
I particularly agree with the idea here that simply being exposed to "influencers" stressing various "ideal" female qualities is taking us right back to the days of insistence that some things are girly and some boy-ly and never the twain shall meet. I wonder if some of the interest in teens in thinking of themselves as "non-binary" is a result of resistance to that message--"if I don't think of myself as female I don't have to live up to those standards." But as we all know from the tragedy of Nex Benedict, taking that route can actually lead to death by others, not just suicide.
I've returned the book to the library now and can't recall examples. It was my overall impression. He would set out principles that I agree with. Then he'd give examples from only one point of view as if that were the ONLY way the principles could be applied. I could think of lots that was left out.
I agree with the basic idea that many kids are way too unwilling to listen to points of view that contradict their own. When I was their age, the idea was not arguing that speaker shouldn't be allowed to speak. We used "teach in" protests where we tried to tell students attending what was WRONG with whatever the speaker was saying. This was during Vietnam--there were a lot of teach-ins.
But the book gave the impression that ALL students and lots of faculty members agreed with "cancelling." For example, there seemed to be a generalization that because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations. That has not been my experience with most professors; for them "liberal" involves the play of ideas, not the preaching of them. (I was married to one, and still attend lectures under a senior program). In this is actually seems to be trying to "cancel" universities.
There was also very little discussion of "cancelling" by the right. Knee-jerk responses to ideas is a major feature of BOTH the right and left today. I kept wondering what the influence on the book had been of the definitely right-tending co author.
I am very much in favor of letting all points of view being expressed on campus so that they can be debated or--for extreme ideas, evaluated if their logic or premises are faulty. I very much liked the concept in Coddling of deplorable "safe spaces" from IDEAs, not just from physical harm. So I had looked forward to Cancelling as an elaboration of that idea. I was disappointed because it just seemed to condemn, rather than analyze .
Sorry I can't be more specific. Haidt's new book is arriving on my kindle Monday, I think. I am looking forward to IT, because I think the ideas in the first version were applicable to a lot of thought errors, whether on the left or right.
If you haven't read Coddling, try it. You might be able to see the difference I'm sensing.
I agree they didn't talk much about canceling on the right. I wish there were more but what did they miss? What else did you want?
"But the book gave the impression that ALL students and lots of faculty members agreed with "cancelling." For example, there seemed to be a generalization that because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations."
I guess I get the impression part, mostly from talk of many people involved in complaints but multiple times they explicitly stated it is a minority. As for "because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations." the authors not only talk about all the people who remain silent but they list many liberals who have been vocally against the cancellations.
Ok. You've read it more recently than I. I just know I LOVED Coddling and disliked Cancelling. I will say that the cancelling by the right is probably most focused on "online mobs" that pour scorn either on social media or reviews (as on Amazon) on books or comments they disagree with. The main cancel culture on the right vis a vis universities is legislation; against schools in general, book banning. I don't recall if those were much discussed. I frankly think those two things are MUCH more dangerous than simply trying to get a speaker uninvited to some lecture.
I do get short tempered by some kinds of "PC" stuff, though not all. I don't think it is particularly "PC" to accept other people's preferences, as with pronoun choice. THAT is getting the legislators in a freakin frenzy. Same goes for how a person from a minority wants to be called--Black? African American? Afro-American? Pretty sure not the n-word and its pals. This is all just personal courtesy.
On the other hand, I've always said that the only trigger warning I want to see about a book is "the dog dies." If a book starts making you uncomfortable, STOP READING. And if the book is required reading, explain to your teacher. Talking about traumas actually helps resolve them.
"The main cancel culture on the right vis a vis universities is legislation; against schools in general, book banning."
This is exactly what they discussed, though the chapter (and banning) is mostly k12. I thought they implied the k12 targets of bans were mostly appropriate, just ambiguous, overly broad (likely unintended), and just plain poorly written. They spoke against public university bans in entirety. We can all agree some material (porn, violence, etc.) isn't appropriate for kids. The problem is there is a fundamental disagreement on what LGBT, white privilege, etc. materials are appropriate for young kids and what becomes indoctrination that is not appropriate in public schools at all.
Maybe there's more to the online mobs than I am aware of but I don't see that as canceling.
I agree on courtesy part buy I'm not sure your position on "PC" of legislation. I don't know if you are referring required use, prevented use, or both.
I do recall one chapter. Out of how many pages in the book?
The legislation to control what university professors can say or do is the thing that bugs me most. The administrations in some places do the same kind of preventing of liberal speakers --there was at least one in Florida a while back, though I remember no details. As I recall it was someone from the federal administration, lower level? And then there was the cancelling of the drag show in Texas even when the university president said he KNEW it was illegal to do so.
I agree that porn should not be in the schools, and of course it never HAS been. School librarians aren't dumb. There are already laws preventing what is legally prohibited as pornography. Defining things they object to as "porn" is a classic reactionary response, leaving one to wonder whose prurient interest is involved in these charges. Do two male penguins turn them on? Of course, the prurient interest of an 8 year old is an as yet unidentified thing. As to violence, it depends on how it's depicted and whether it is something a high-schooler is likely to have to deal with. For sheer violence I give you Robert Heinlein and any number of "space operas" an older kid might love. As for rape or sexual violence it depends on why or how it is presented. The Bluest Eye, which I've taught, is about WAY more than a child rape, and that certainly isn't in it for the titillation.
As to PC in legislation, don't think there is any so far on what you can call a minority group. Far as I know even the n-word. That was an example of common courtesy.
I'd also say not requiring but not preventing choice of pronouns. If a teacher wants to announce or strongly suggest s/he won't pay attention to students preferences, the kids will notice. That is a sign of an ineffective teacher and ineffectiveness is something for the school to police. Lord knows it is hard to keep track of all the pronouns--it is hard enough to keep track of student NAMES. Teachers are usually using "you" because they tend to be addressing the students, but if s/he slips up in referring to a third student, apologies would be the best thing to do. That's the courtesy part.
On online mobs, you should read "So You've Been Publicly Shamed" by Jon Ronson. It was written before the culture wars, but not before the use on online mobs. There have been stories of how Amazon has been trying to deal with onslaughts of negative reviews that have nothing to do with the quality of the book. Wasn't "Gamergate" an example? A bit of googling will get you specific recent examples.
As to the fundamental disagreement about appropriateness, well, sure. The question is who gets to decide what is appropriate. I might find it COMPLETELY appropriate that my kids understand about kids with two daddies or kids who feel torn about the attractions they are discovering as they pass puberty. Why should some irate parent tell ME that my kids can't read the books? All this "parental rights" abdicates parental responsibility. If you don't like a book, don't let your kid read it. They might sneak a look? I hate to THINK how many battered copies of Peyton Place circulated in my schools, falling open to THOSE pages. If your kids don't obey you, that's a problem with your parenting, not with the books.
There probably aren't that many "innocent" school children anymore in the sense those people want to protect. Even ads, much less normal TV show with LGBTQ characters, even much less the explicit stuff on cable TV, surrounds them. If some is restricted at your house, are you going to insist that other parents restrict it at THEIR houses. You don't "protect" kids by insisting they stay ignorant of the world they are growing into.
As for indoctrination, of course I don't believe in it. But it is a straw man; I doubt there is a teacher in the universe who tells kids that you HAVE to be gay or that Communism was a superior system. "Groomers" is even sillier. What is more indoctrinating that banning even the discussion of controversial topic? A good teacher wants the students to THINK about the issues and learn to evaluate them on their own. If the kid decides that there still is evidence of racism in society--or that slaves getting useful skills is stupid, that's their decision to make. And what is more indoctrinating than teaching kids "my country right or wrong?" That patriotism involves flag shirts and fireworks with no obligation to do more? Or, most sinisterly, that there are groups of Others out there that are OK to hate?
I really wish your campaign well..... to dig childhood out from under the crushing rubble of the Age of the Smart Phone. As a natural pessimist I cannot be anything but sceptical about the feasibility of holding back the tide of technological-social change. But I wish it well because the alternative - 'content moderation' 'misinformation' moderation etc - that has been generating a lot of politico-chattering class noise recently is an arrogant, pig-ignorant idea. As McLuhan would have told if he was still around. Anyone who gets tagged as a moderation 'expert' or self-tags as one will either be a self-important buffoon or a grifter of some sort or perhaps just a plain simple idiot. Because whereas the upside of the digital age was an explosion of information... the downside was an even greater explosion of tendentious, opinionated ignorance. This is just a fact to be faced. There is no such thing as an 'expert' who can do anything about it. Compared to this Orwellian social engineering 'information' project, restricting children's access to social media - at least in the schoolroom - is a sane ambition.
I shared this last year on one of Haidt's posts, but I think it's worth sharing again, from Cal Newport's "Digital Minimalism":
"𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘭𝘦𝘮 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘭𝘺 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘴 𝘶𝘴 𝘶𝘯𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘺...𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘪𝘴𝘴𝘶𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘢 𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘢𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭-𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘻𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵'𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘶𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦. 𝘈𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘨𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘶𝘥𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘺, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘢, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘦𝘷𝘰𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘰𝘧𝘧𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘴𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘶𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘧𝘪𝘤𝘪𝘵 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘴 - 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘷𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘷𝘪𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘢 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘮𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘪𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦...
𝘖𝘧𝘧𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘺 𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘩 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘳𝘦 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘣𝘳𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘭𝘢𝘳𝘨𝘦 𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘪𝘯𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘴𝘶𝘣𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘨 𝘤𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘺 𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘶𝘢𝘨𝘦, 𝘧𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘷𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦. 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘰𝘸-𝘣𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘸𝘪𝘥𝘵𝘩 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘶𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘥𝘪𝘨𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘭 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘰𝘰𝘭𝘴...𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘩𝘪𝘨𝘩-𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘯𝘦𝘵𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘬𝘴 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘥."
This seems to complement Twenge's argument about children's lack of free play. Apart from school, when a child's primary means of connecting with others and developing social skills is through social media, where their frames of reference on how to treat themselves and others is presented in the most superficial and histrionic ways, how much of their growth is stunted thanks to these fast food substitutes?
If it's hard for a 32 year old like me to control my smartphone habits, I can't imagine how hard it is for young teenagers with developing brains who have lots more on their plates!
Spot on Donald. I talk about this phenomenon in my recent post, "How the iPhone stole our free time" https://bit.ly/496KVDY
The major issue that very few talk about is that non-ionizing radiation from wireless, social media addictions aside, kills all life, and is damaging to children. This is the foundation from which we all need to start:
https://romanshapoval.substack.com/p/how-does-emf-affect-children
Processing “𝘴𝘶𝘣𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘨 𝘤𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘺 𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘶𝘢𝘨𝘦, 𝘧𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘷𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦…” leads to a lot more misinterpretation than interpretation. If people would put the actual content first we'd get a lot further.
“Fast food substitutes” is the perfect analogy to the modern social dilemma. We are seeing how actual fast food is not a healthy replacement for quality whole and unprocessed foods. Our social interactions online are similarly an unhealthy replacement for in person social interactions. The lack of richness makes our brains atrophy, among many other more obvious concerns.
🙄🙄🙄😁😁😁
I'd really love to see the spatial and environmental element to all of this, especially regarding your stated goal to "reinvent the play-based childhood for the 21st century." Playing requires safe streets, play spaces, etc. And I wonder how the urban development patterns in the US since the mid-20th century have contributed to and/or exacerbated our epidemic of loneliness. Another way of putting this inquiry is: Do walkable neighborhoods mitigate the harms from smart phones and social media?
Thats one issue but also, a huge consideration is school consolidation. We live in a VERY walkable affluent town 30 min from Boston. Because of state incentives based on "model" designs for "21st century", "sustainable", "equitable" schools, neighborhood elementary schools are being shut down in droves and replaced with new mega schools with fancy theaters and playgroumds and "efficient cafeterias". They are beautiful but kids have to be bussed now because the sites are chosen for cost and design efficiency NOT for children and families and their wellbeing. Its the biggest miscarriage of justice and a driver of so much family stress I cant even count the ways it has effected our way of life. All over the state neighborhood after neighborhood is being destroyed for sustainability. Our town traded 3 neighborhood elementary schools for a MASSIVE traffic catastrophe that already had one kid hit by a car. And every elementary kid now has a cell phone to manage pickups because an 8 year old cant walk home 45 minutes in 25 degrees. Thats absurd. (Only 2 miles out qualifies for the bus)
https://www.massschoolbuildings.org/programs/model_school
Perhaps homeschooling is the best direction now for childhood development and family life?
We did that for a year. Now we are moving to Europe
That would be a problem if more than a tiny fraction of kids living only a few blocks away walked to school.
Life has never been safe now a good many of our fellow man are mind numbing safe and secure imprisoning others because of their own needs. I have a sibling with six children, he lined them up like puppies and sat them on the floor in front of the boob tube to eat their meals. They are a mess. Does any one talk with each other anymore? I am not criticizing you in any way, I send you sisterly love.
This is exactly the angle I hoped you would take. We need a Marshall McLuhan for the Social Media age. I nominate you, Jon.
I had the good fortune and pleasure to briefly chat with Marshall McLuhan, when I was 15. It is to his lasting credit that he would willingly suffer a fool like me. One of his underlying beliefs is that a society shouldn't move on to any new technology until it has figured out what the current technology might be doing to it. Unfortunately, we live in a time when the impetus is to create and adopt new technology before we've even finished paying off the preceding things, let alone come to any insight about what it might be doing to us. It's an adolescent-dominated/driven society that demands new technology on the "hit parade", rising up the charts, constantly.
A friend of mine, who grew up in France, just yesterday suggested to me that America truly is an adolescent country compared to Europe. And some of our current behaviors indeed present themselves as hormone-infused adolescence. :-)
France has had 3 governments since WW II not counting the 3 during the war including a coup attempt by the French Foreign Legion. It regularly has large scale riots and cars burning in its streets. There are regular country wide strikes and protests. There are regular if small scale Islamic terror murders. If the ability to tolerate all of this with a Gallic shrug and a "C'est la vie," means that they are the post-adolescent country, I remain unimpressed. I'm pretty sure our feeling that they are assured and stable is because the number of people that care about French news enough to follow it is infinitesimal.
Maybe but France is willingly losing its heritage to the Muslim hordes that are overrunning the whole European continent and our worthless installed president has thrown open our border so the same thing can happen here.
France is not losing its heritage to Muslim hordes but rather to secularism…
"We must stop overprotecting children in the real world and underprotecting them online." An urgent yet simple message that every parent needs to hear.
I've read several books and loads of articles on this subject your writing is the clearest and best.
y’know, I never really understood McLuhan’s “the Medium is the Message” until the Smart Phone. since I grew up with TV, but not with Smart Phones until I was almost 40 years old, I can clearly see the effect it had. I imagine this was what television did to the Silent Generation.
I didn’t understand it until this afternoon. (Not that I really tried, but you know what I mean.)
It's not just kids harmed by social media - you can see lots of the warning signs in adults too.
Not only schools, but people need to be educated on the harms that screens are to very young minds. Keeping kids away from screens, ALL screens, including TV is recommended for infants to age 2. This is next to impossible with our busy lives, but it is a message that all new parents need to hear. If you track the increase in autism, diagnoses spiked as color tv, cable tv, computers etc came into households. There are studies regarding time spent in front of screens (TV included) that suggest a strong correlation.
I realize this goal is probably impossible but I’d like to see more awareness of this. I hope you can get the message out. We are in a period where millennials and Gen z are in prime childbearing years, it would be great if the children could grow up to be neurologically healthy, even if it means the adults in their lives have to restrict all types of screen access until the children are older.
This is a big project you are embarking upon, I certainly wish you the best of luck and hope the movement is successful.
Let's Go! Thank you Professor Haidt. Burke said evil triumphs when good people do nothing. We ALL have a part to play in this. It is a matter of JUSTICE!!!!!
Love it, love Burke, thank you!
I was a free range kid in the late 50s and through the 60s, before phones, and I wouldn’t trade my childhood for anything in the world. Good ideas, Mr. Haidt.
I’m currently at day 94 of going completely cold turkey on all social media and news. I tried in earnest for a year to cut down my usage; like only scrolling till the first advert, never clicking on the video “shorts”. My time online, which wasn’t much, took time away from me doing more interesting things for myself, even if it was something as simple as reading a new novel.
I started Substack and I thought it was fantastic as my attention span could get a workout, spending 30 minutes reading an essay without ad intrusions but still, my time was not mine.
It wasn’t until I went cold turkey late last year on all social media, all news, all YouTube, that I realized how anxious it had been making me feel. Like seriously, so fucking anxious about everything. In some ways it could be said I’m sticking my head in the sand, but no, I’m choosing now who and what I give my attention to; whether that be reading up on my next fermentation adventures, learning some new skills, spending time with my kids (and listening to them with full concentration, not with the thumb paused mid-scroll on the phone), online chatting with distant friends. Getting off social media can be isolating so I do make sure I keep connecting with online friends through instant messenger, asking random nonsensical questions just to reach out and connect.
I’m back here, to check in on a fermentation Substack about making tempeh (we’re using a bean that grows wild here and I wanted to contribute my results) and as soon as I open the app, I get distracted by THIS post. But heck this post is a great distraction. Thank you Jon for the critical work you are doing, I’ll be sharing this on my instagram stories in a month or so when I “post and run” (post a whole bunch of stories in one day, all about the farm, then close the app and not open it again for another couple of months). I have thought about returning one day to Substack only, removing all subscriptions that aren’t relevant to things I personally do, but at the moment the break from anxiety is literally life-changing. But you Jon, will remain on my list of subscriptions.
I’m 49 and I struggled to control my small amount of phone usage. How do we expect kids to?
Go to it, Jon! A "campaign to end the phone-based childhood and reinvent the play-based childhood for the 21st century" is music to my ears. It is the only sensible solution to the problems of childhood we are now seeing, as well as the large problems of declining literacy, which seem a disaster for a democracy threaten by both cynical and ignorant forces. I'm happy to help this campaign however I can, starting with buying your new book and recommending it to my friends. Thanks for your work! :)
This is so true. We have to get rid of the default to screens for kids. Three-year-olds should not be watching videos/games on their parents' phones as a primary mode of entertainment, and that is not easy to do. A bored three-year-old is going to beg for that phone, and it's easier to hand it over (and hilarious when the kid takes 8 pictures of her nostrils), but we are teaching our kids to default to screens for comfort, entertainment, and everything else.
Go, Jon, go!!
I look forward to your book. I LOVED "The Coddling of the American Mind" and was vastly disappointed by your co-author's following book (The Cancelling..) which seemed to actually embrace many of the ideas it was supposedly criticizing. I'll be fascinated to see what more you have developed since Coddling.
I particularly agree with the idea here that simply being exposed to "influencers" stressing various "ideal" female qualities is taking us right back to the days of insistence that some things are girly and some boy-ly and never the twain shall meet. I wonder if some of the interest in teens in thinking of themselves as "non-binary" is a result of resistance to that message--"if I don't think of myself as female I don't have to live up to those standards." But as we all know from the tragedy of Nex Benedict, taking that route can actually lead to death by others, not just suicide.
" (The Cancelling..) which seemed to actually embrace many of the ideas it was supposedly criticizing."
I'm about halfway through this book and love it. Can you explain what I quote from you?
I've returned the book to the library now and can't recall examples. It was my overall impression. He would set out principles that I agree with. Then he'd give examples from only one point of view as if that were the ONLY way the principles could be applied. I could think of lots that was left out.
I agree with the basic idea that many kids are way too unwilling to listen to points of view that contradict their own. When I was their age, the idea was not arguing that speaker shouldn't be allowed to speak. We used "teach in" protests where we tried to tell students attending what was WRONG with whatever the speaker was saying. This was during Vietnam--there were a lot of teach-ins.
But the book gave the impression that ALL students and lots of faculty members agreed with "cancelling." For example, there seemed to be a generalization that because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations. That has not been my experience with most professors; for them "liberal" involves the play of ideas, not the preaching of them. (I was married to one, and still attend lectures under a senior program). In this is actually seems to be trying to "cancel" universities.
There was also very little discussion of "cancelling" by the right. Knee-jerk responses to ideas is a major feature of BOTH the right and left today. I kept wondering what the influence on the book had been of the definitely right-tending co author.
I am very much in favor of letting all points of view being expressed on campus so that they can be debated or--for extreme ideas, evaluated if their logic or premises are faulty. I very much liked the concept in Coddling of deplorable "safe spaces" from IDEAs, not just from physical harm. So I had looked forward to Cancelling as an elaboration of that idea. I was disappointed because it just seemed to condemn, rather than analyze .
Sorry I can't be more specific. Haidt's new book is arriving on my kindle Monday, I think. I am looking forward to IT, because I think the ideas in the first version were applicable to a lot of thought errors, whether on the left or right.
If you haven't read Coddling, try it. You might be able to see the difference I'm sensing.
I read Coddling. Good book.
I agree they didn't talk much about canceling on the right. I wish there were more but what did they miss? What else did you want?
"But the book gave the impression that ALL students and lots of faculty members agreed with "cancelling." For example, there seemed to be a generalization that because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations."
I guess I get the impression part, mostly from talk of many people involved in complaints but multiple times they explicitly stated it is a minority. As for "because professors tend to be "liberal" that they MUST agree to the cancellations." the authors not only talk about all the people who remain silent but they list many liberals who have been vocally against the cancellations.
Ok. You've read it more recently than I. I just know I LOVED Coddling and disliked Cancelling. I will say that the cancelling by the right is probably most focused on "online mobs" that pour scorn either on social media or reviews (as on Amazon) on books or comments they disagree with. The main cancel culture on the right vis a vis universities is legislation; against schools in general, book banning. I don't recall if those were much discussed. I frankly think those two things are MUCH more dangerous than simply trying to get a speaker uninvited to some lecture.
I do get short tempered by some kinds of "PC" stuff, though not all. I don't think it is particularly "PC" to accept other people's preferences, as with pronoun choice. THAT is getting the legislators in a freakin frenzy. Same goes for how a person from a minority wants to be called--Black? African American? Afro-American? Pretty sure not the n-word and its pals. This is all just personal courtesy.
On the other hand, I've always said that the only trigger warning I want to see about a book is "the dog dies." If a book starts making you uncomfortable, STOP READING. And if the book is required reading, explain to your teacher. Talking about traumas actually helps resolve them.
"The main cancel culture on the right vis a vis universities is legislation; against schools in general, book banning."
This is exactly what they discussed, though the chapter (and banning) is mostly k12. I thought they implied the k12 targets of bans were mostly appropriate, just ambiguous, overly broad (likely unintended), and just plain poorly written. They spoke against public university bans in entirety. We can all agree some material (porn, violence, etc.) isn't appropriate for kids. The problem is there is a fundamental disagreement on what LGBT, white privilege, etc. materials are appropriate for young kids and what becomes indoctrination that is not appropriate in public schools at all.
Maybe there's more to the online mobs than I am aware of but I don't see that as canceling.
I agree on courtesy part buy I'm not sure your position on "PC" of legislation. I don't know if you are referring required use, prevented use, or both.
I do recall one chapter. Out of how many pages in the book?
The legislation to control what university professors can say or do is the thing that bugs me most. The administrations in some places do the same kind of preventing of liberal speakers --there was at least one in Florida a while back, though I remember no details. As I recall it was someone from the federal administration, lower level? And then there was the cancelling of the drag show in Texas even when the university president said he KNEW it was illegal to do so.
I agree that porn should not be in the schools, and of course it never HAS been. School librarians aren't dumb. There are already laws preventing what is legally prohibited as pornography. Defining things they object to as "porn" is a classic reactionary response, leaving one to wonder whose prurient interest is involved in these charges. Do two male penguins turn them on? Of course, the prurient interest of an 8 year old is an as yet unidentified thing. As to violence, it depends on how it's depicted and whether it is something a high-schooler is likely to have to deal with. For sheer violence I give you Robert Heinlein and any number of "space operas" an older kid might love. As for rape or sexual violence it depends on why or how it is presented. The Bluest Eye, which I've taught, is about WAY more than a child rape, and that certainly isn't in it for the titillation.
As to PC in legislation, don't think there is any so far on what you can call a minority group. Far as I know even the n-word. That was an example of common courtesy.
I'd also say not requiring but not preventing choice of pronouns. If a teacher wants to announce or strongly suggest s/he won't pay attention to students preferences, the kids will notice. That is a sign of an ineffective teacher and ineffectiveness is something for the school to police. Lord knows it is hard to keep track of all the pronouns--it is hard enough to keep track of student NAMES. Teachers are usually using "you" because they tend to be addressing the students, but if s/he slips up in referring to a third student, apologies would be the best thing to do. That's the courtesy part.
On online mobs, you should read "So You've Been Publicly Shamed" by Jon Ronson. It was written before the culture wars, but not before the use on online mobs. There have been stories of how Amazon has been trying to deal with onslaughts of negative reviews that have nothing to do with the quality of the book. Wasn't "Gamergate" an example? A bit of googling will get you specific recent examples.
As to the fundamental disagreement about appropriateness, well, sure. The question is who gets to decide what is appropriate. I might find it COMPLETELY appropriate that my kids understand about kids with two daddies or kids who feel torn about the attractions they are discovering as they pass puberty. Why should some irate parent tell ME that my kids can't read the books? All this "parental rights" abdicates parental responsibility. If you don't like a book, don't let your kid read it. They might sneak a look? I hate to THINK how many battered copies of Peyton Place circulated in my schools, falling open to THOSE pages. If your kids don't obey you, that's a problem with your parenting, not with the books.
There probably aren't that many "innocent" school children anymore in the sense those people want to protect. Even ads, much less normal TV show with LGBTQ characters, even much less the explicit stuff on cable TV, surrounds them. If some is restricted at your house, are you going to insist that other parents restrict it at THEIR houses. You don't "protect" kids by insisting they stay ignorant of the world they are growing into.
As for indoctrination, of course I don't believe in it. But it is a straw man; I doubt there is a teacher in the universe who tells kids that you HAVE to be gay or that Communism was a superior system. "Groomers" is even sillier. What is more indoctrinating that banning even the discussion of controversial topic? A good teacher wants the students to THINK about the issues and learn to evaluate them on their own. If the kid decides that there still is evidence of racism in society--or that slaves getting useful skills is stupid, that's their decision to make. And what is more indoctrinating than teaching kids "my country right or wrong?" That patriotism involves flag shirts and fireworks with no obligation to do more? Or, most sinisterly, that there are groups of Others out there that are OK to hate?
I really wish your campaign well..... to dig childhood out from under the crushing rubble of the Age of the Smart Phone. As a natural pessimist I cannot be anything but sceptical about the feasibility of holding back the tide of technological-social change. But I wish it well because the alternative - 'content moderation' 'misinformation' moderation etc - that has been generating a lot of politico-chattering class noise recently is an arrogant, pig-ignorant idea. As McLuhan would have told if he was still around. Anyone who gets tagged as a moderation 'expert' or self-tags as one will either be a self-important buffoon or a grifter of some sort or perhaps just a plain simple idiot. Because whereas the upside of the digital age was an explosion of information... the downside was an even greater explosion of tendentious, opinionated ignorance. This is just a fact to be faced. There is no such thing as an 'expert' who can do anything about it. Compared to this Orwellian social engineering 'information' project, restricting children's access to social media - at least in the schoolroom - is a sane ambition.