I do love this but she had me at trampoline, hammock, hampster, and garage gym. That's a pendulum swung too far. Not for me personally but for the movement. This is digital luditism (is that a word?) and it's never going to work for the masses. That said, there are surely tons of great ideas and truths to be gained from this work. I will be buying her book. My fear is turning people off to the movement.
My approach with my kids has turned some heads and had some effect in my small orbit. I intend to take that further. It is just one of many approaches and to be clear, I do not disparage any approach! We are all trying and thank god for that.
Briefly my approach is to give my kids very stripped down (Troomi) phones at a young age. Tablets. And they have a computer they share. They learn to use them as tools. Period. They have a couple games on tablets. They watch tv on our biggish tv. We only have one in the house. They play duo lingo mostly. Their phones they only use when they go out to do something that requires money because their banking apps are on there, or if they require a pick up later. 80% of the time they dont bring phones with them. They use their tablets to connect to their friends via facetiime. Lastly, I control everything through the router. Anything over 3rd grade is blocked on the internet but also they dont know how to access that yet. We are currently teaching them about what they cant unsee. They are girls age 9 and 11. My oldest age 21 fell HARD with phones and all of the genZ stuff. Years in hospitals.
I thought about the luddite thing but here's where I landed... I will be a single mother soon. We are getting divorced. I have to negotiate my co-parent as well. At school and sports they WILL be required to have tech. Period. They must know how to use it properly. I am not sporty but I have my kids DEEP in sports already because its about the culture for me. I cant do this alone. I had to build a community of like minded adults. All their friends have tablets and smart watches (not my cup because they are tethered to their parents) but we are ALL in agreement about that being literally a communication tool.
What does that mean at the end of the day? We have banded together to give the kids a play based experience by each family carrying a little more weight in the "doing" arena. I took a group of 5 on a major beach adventure 2 days ago. Another mom did the sleepover a few days before. Another parent did the SUP adventure. We sent them to the same week long day camp. They all play sports together. Some dont like it but they do it anyway because thats where their friends who arent on phones are. Its about culture for us and I cant build that as a one woman show on an island.
I have been following this since 2017. I was at the depths of despair with my oldest. I vowed to never go there again. But I also KNOW you cant control everything. The worst of what she saw and did on the phones including porn etc happened on other peoples phones. In and out of school. She learned some of the worst in hospitals.
I just wanted to hilight this because what I have seen is parents in the middle getting lost in the conversation between all or nothing and we want to capture them because thats the vast vast majority us us. My kids are having a miraculous free playfilled childhood. With phines and tablets. But also with a keen understanding of what they are. Scary tools! Like butcher knives. Thats how we see them. My kids can use a butcher knife at age 9. They can use a phone.
Our own family is setup essentially like yours (absent the smartphones) and I teach homeschool seminars on how to use technology responsibly. (And you're doing most of what I recommend, actually.)
I'm not sure why you say this won't work for the masses though. Why not? What prevents absolutely anyone from doing what she's doing? Or what you and I are doing? She's a little more countercultural than you are, but only by degree. There are plenty of parents who would look at you and say, "she doesn't let her teenager have social media -- he'll be an outcast!" or look at me and say, "he doesn't let his teens have smartphones -- they'll be outcasts!"
I congratulate her on being willing to take her beliefs seriously and screw what everyone else says. Maybe it's the homeschooler in me, but I won't rag on someone else's countercultural choices because I recognize how hard they are to sustain in the face of mainstream opposition.
I wish I could have been more nuanced before. I was rushing (kind of still rushing).
Here's the thing. I want to hear EVERY story. I want to know ALL the ways people are tackling this. I'm not judging! But this is an ever evolving issue across many states and cultures and family value systems and school systems etc.. Plus, we are far from where we were in 2013 in almost every way including educating parents, educating kids, tech responses to the problem, and even school policy. AND we are still nowhere near through the woods on this issue. That said, there is a vast difference from community to community, situation to situation.
This is why I said what I said... Because Jonathan Haidt is so vocal, reasoned, polupar, and IMO just amazing. Ive been following his work on this since his original sam harris interview. Im an avid footnote reader. I have been reading and following Haidt and collegues deep in the weeds for a long time (on several issues actually) He has great authority on this matter. What he promotes matters. And of COURSE I think this kind of digital free childhood is a good idea and should be promoted. At the same time, the intro was a little tone deaf, IMO.
I dont like to say parents "can't" do the digital ludite thing (for kids) because of course we all "can". Its a choice, just a lot harder for some than others for a whole host of reasons. I also dont want to point out parents who "won't" do the digital ludite thing because thats judgemental in my view. Of course parents want the best for their kids. My thing is, call attention to the problem first, and when offering solutions be very clear to convey that there are a range of options, of which this is just one. I just didnt feelnlike this was clear. And I also dont know anyone, not one family in my affluent community of 20K near Boston who has done "no tech" successfully past 6th grade.
The landemic changed everything.
Side note:
I homeschooled my now 21 yo in 6th grade because she was having issues socially in school and problems reading. She had zero neurodivergence... they just weren't teaching phonics! I pulled her and took her to book conventions around the country for a year till she loved reading and was at grade level with fluency. I was totally prepared to homeschool all the way through. BUT what she was exposed to onlune in the homeschool community was just as scary as the school kids albeit slightly different (less porn, more drama, more creepy roblox type stuff). Socially the girls were VERY cliquish. Add snapchat and that got weird very quick. So 7th grade, back to public. Same thing there. Better for a time. Then in freshman year she fell in with the wrong crowd and I allowed her to quit dance. She had no sports. No scaffold. Its EVERYWHERE. Homeschool isnt a fix for many situations. Nothing is a panacea.
I also sent my 9 and 11 year olds (bith girls... all three, lucky me! 😬) to a private montessori in 2019 because of the same phonics/reading issue. We were just lucky they were dialed into a tech free school that didnt skip a beat. They were out of school for 2 months total during the pandemic. In 4th grade I sent my now 11yo back to public. They had to give us (me, hisband and daughter) literal classes on the online systems they had implemented. It is IMPOSSIBLE in our district not to have a computer for the kids. Its required. They HAVE to begin learning how to research online and touchtype and use google classroom etc BY 4th grade (starts in 3rd). I pushed back at the school and classroom level to no avail. So Im currently working on a proposal to the board of health and the school board to educate the community and raise money for cell phone lockers (its $100,000 but the district is almost bankrupt from racial lawsuits 🤦🏻♀️). But even then, the will isnt there because of school shootings. Plain and simple. Parents say NO!... But I havent made my case yet so we shall see.
Interestingly enough the admin and teachers want rid of phones. They want rid of watches during the school day. Parents still say NO. There have been school threat hoaxes here. We have a significant jewish population and people have been ripping down "we stand with israel" lawn signs. In one instance a family was physically threatened in their driveway and the men were arrested. Students are removing their stars of david jewelry for school. In this climate parents say the phines stay. I dont agree (wont flesh that out here) but I do have empathy for their POV and there is definitely a will to at least collect phones during class (again, not enough but its recognition of a problem).
To wrap up, in no way am I saying that post wasnt a great one. And I am looking forward to getting a more nuanced view from the book and the substack. But in this climate with the vast majority of families in tricky situations be it where they live, ideological differences, economic circumstances, school policy, lack of education on the subject, etc, for After Babel word things so strongly in favor of zero-tech is off putting, in my opinion. I'm interested in building community toward a reasonable bottom line for EVERY family. "zero" seems to be unrealistic bottom line Absolutely a worthy ideal, but reasonably unattainable for most.
Yeah, I didn't mean to rag on you either, sorry if it came across that way.
My wife teaches 3rd grade. Same dynamic. Teachers mostly want to ban electronics. Administration is 100% pushing Chromebooks / smart boards / Internet everything.
I can't even get my homeschool coop to ban phones!
There are certainly lots of families that would have difficulty homeschooling, and curtailing tech when your kids are in public school is almost impossible without taking charge of your kids' education. (Which is what you're doing even though you're technically not "homeschooling" anymore.)
"I do love this but she had me at trampoline, hammock, hampster, and garage gym"
AGREE! Reminds me of my childhood in the 50's (though I MAY be looking though rose colored glasses). Also we tried to stay away from mom & dad because they were always finding something for you to do that was NOT anything like Fun. No kid ever said OH BOY! I Get To Mow The Lawn!
Thing is every couple of hundred years some new piece of technology comes along a changes Everything (think Printing Press, Steam Engine). We're n the middle of one now, because of The Little Silicon Chip. Its gonna take some time to figure out how to live with it. Until then...Chaos.
Your thoughtful comments are a good addition to the conversation but I also think you short change the author who notes her children have devices for school and acknowledges the experience varies widely with families in large urban centres to remote areas. I didn’t have a TV when raising my young kids in the late 80s and 90s. People would ask “how do you make dinner?… The earliest years are particularly important to avoid screens. The issues shift with pre-teens and teens. Great to hear your approach - and success in finding other like-minded families!
Thank you! I replied to the first comment with a more nuanced explaination of what I meant. See what you think! Hopefully that clarifies my intention in the original comment. I did read the full post and do thing the author is nuanced about the issue. My worry is leading with the "almost zero" approach. Maybe it was just how she presented it. Most of my good liberal friends (i am admittedly more conservative these days) would stop reading after what they would perceive as a bit pretentious even though most of them have hammocksn, trampolines, boats, and all the things. I want people to keep reading thats all 😊
Thanks for sharing your experience. You're right that the maximal approach to minimalism (minmax?) is a bridge too far for some. Sounds like you've worked hard to give your kids great experiences. Stay strong!
Hi Katherine i was excitied to find your work through Jon Haidt’s Substack.
Im in Australia and have 2 daughters aged 10 and 12 who don’t have social media, phones, and only use internet with permission in a common area for research projects, etc. They do watch shows and movies and play minecraft (not online) together sometimes.
They are homeschooled so it’s relatively easy so far due to the lack of school peer pressure since most of their homeschooled friends don’t have phones either. They would generally prefer to see each other in real life.
I’m looking forward to reading your articles and book.
I’m sending this to all my nieces and nephews who have younger kids.
It’s too late for my kids- mine are 25, 24, 21 and 14. It was so different when the older three were given a phone that they all shared the way back in 2008. I did it because I had to drop the older one off in the middle of Durham for a soccer practice and then the second older one was running long distances and would make her take the phone with her and then it just snowballed from there, and now it is completely out of control.
When they first had a smart phone, There wasn’t “scrolling”— according to them, It’s the scrolling that gets you. They can’t stop scrolling and frankly sometimes neither can I and I’m not even on social media (unless Substack & Pinterest are social media?!)
My 14-year-old used to love to read and mess around in the yard build things & take them apart, he hikes in nature and called friends… Now he’s a shell of his former self.
The six of us are a family only in the spaces between staring at screens.
That's the thing that gets me. We rightly talk about the dangers for kids, but many of the critiques of the threats of phone-based life apply to us adults too!
Guilty as charged. I had made some improvements, and then I installed this Substack app... 🤣💀
Katherine, I'm so happy for your substack (which I've been reading for months)! You're documenting an alternative path that people need to hear about -- it's ironic, because we all grew up that way but somehow we've forgotten how to do it.
My own kids are 8 & 3 and have never done screens (other than on airplanes and long car rides where they get to watch kids shows created before 1990). My older child is getting occupational therapy and his therapist is always remarking about how curious he is. I was surprised and finally asked her, "but aren't all 8 year olds curious??" She said actually no, and that she can tell he had an early childhood without screen time and with open-ended play opportunities (we'd never discussed this before). Modern parenting norms and tech really are rewiring kids' brains, it seems.
I'm working hard on real world freedom for both kids, and it's so helpful to read about specific examples from other parents who are doing it -- thank you for all you do, both Jonathan and Katherine!
Katherine, wonderful that your work on The Analog Family has made this natural connection with The Anxious Generation! Your personal examples and concrete insights are needed ingredients to support families in breaking free from the dominance of tech in daily lives. All the best in your continued writing!
"What matters more is teaching them how to be human—how to have conversations, make eye contact, be attentive and alert, be thoughtful and considerate, feel their emotions keenly, be insatiably curious about the real world." We can't forget we are raising humans first!! Great article, I can't wait to check out your work, Katherine!
Thanks for writing this Katherine! I love your substack too.
I have a five year old and a one year old. We watch a movie with the five year old every Saturday, and occasionally we'll let her watch cartoons. (if she's home sick, on an airplane, and right after my son was born are times she's watched a fair amount of Little Bear, Snoopy, and Princess Sofia). I consider the tv to be an occasional helpful friend, but it's not on often in our house. Our plan right now is that she can have a flip phone when she starts being more physically independent from us, but she will not a have a smart phone (or social media) until she can buy it with her own money after she's 18. We're pretty adamant about that right now, but obviously it will be an ongoing conversation between my husband and myself, and I think culture is sloooowly swinging that direction, thanks in part to people like Katherine and Jonathan speaking up and normalizing it for the rest of us. We will allow access to a computer because I think the internet is an amazing tool for learning, and I have no issue with computer games, as long as they are a small part of a rich, full, life.
I think technology has so many benefits, but I also think smart phones in their current form are terrible for us. I see how addicting they are for my husband and myself, and am currently doing my own work on breaking my addiction. (I have a Light Phone that I try to use most of the week, but still use my iPhone to FaceTime grandparents). If I've been on my phone too much I'm more anxious, forgetful, judgmental, and my attention span is shorter. It's harder for me to read dense material.
TV and computers are different and WE KNOW THEY ARE DIFFERENT. We leave them at home. We use them for short, purposeful, designated periods and then we live our lives, making eye contact and conversation. I watched a ton of TV and movies growing up, but I also spent most of my free time playing outside with other kids.
I just worked a job with a large group of 17-21 year olds, who are all in the generation of kids who have been on social media since they were in middle school. They ALL agreed that cell phones and social media were terrible for kids, and that their own mental health had suffered from having them too young. Three of them had been in psychiatric hospitals during adolescence. THREE. Out of maybe ten. Not a single one of them felt benign about social media/screens and childhood. They all wish their parents had been stricter with their screen and social media use and less strict with their physical lives. No one was saying things like that about AOL IM in my generation.
I think for me the biggest thing to remind myself is that technology is a tool, and it is only useful when it is making our lives easier/better/more connected, not harder. At the end of the day we are mammals who require connection, safety, and play. For kids, most of all, PLAY. I will do anything I can to protect my children's right to play with other kids out in the world.
We are lucky in that our daughter has been at a school where the culture is very anti-screen time. There's a spectrum of interpretation for that, but there is support. (Although I question the parents who complain that they social pressures are too great to take screens away from their kids. Jesus. You're the adult! BE THE ADULT).
And, God, I go to the high school campus at my daughter's school and it's amazing. No teenagers on cell phones. Teenagers who look you in the eye and talk to you, who talk to each other, who are running and jumping and playing and making music. Teenagers who will still be able to use a computer in college because it's a fucking computer and they are really really easy to use.
I know everyone will fall on different places on what they allow for their own kids. Just like my childhood best friend wasn't allowed to watch Saved By the Bell when we were kids, and I was allowed to watch that, but not The Simpsons. Parents figured out their own boundaries. Sometimes boundaries were different, and we were all fine. No one died from the unfairness of it.
The important thing is that we're finally having this conversation. I see some kids I know who have had unfettered access to screens since they were toddlers, and they DO NOT KNOW HOW TO PLAY. It's wild. You take their screens away and they are completely dependent on adults to entertain them. And yes, they are nearly all anxious messes. Parents are making their life harder with screens. Say no. Take it away. Tell them to go play. No you cannot play with them, you are busy. GO PLAY KIDS! They will whine. They will cry. They will annoy you. Hold firm. eventually...they will play. And it will be a muscle they will build.
There are parents who don't have access to this information, who are making the easiest choice they can because they are poor, and stressed, and working full time. If it starts being normalized by the rest of us, if there are kids outside on the playgrounds, if there are kids riding their bikes in the neighborhood, if we get childhood off the screen and put it back out in the world, everyone will benefit.
I don't think parents like Katherine are going to be anomalies much longer. It looks like California will be having a ban on smartphones in classrooms soon, and hallelujah. It's time to give our kids back their education, their self esteem, and their joy.
Simply stunning. And practical. This can be done, and it can save our kids. As important as her words are, notice the tone of this powerful mother, who obviously loves her children without disappointment, anger, or controlling. She is the benevolent queen of the family, which is exactly what mothers must be to create a healthy framework for their growing children. I’m thrilled to meet her in print. Her ability to unconditionally love her kids while she teaches them is the key. Without loving them in this way, her directions would feel controlling, and the kids would then either (1) feel small emotionally or (2) rebel, both of which are very damaging. Most parents don’t know how to unconditionally love while they teach, but this can be learned at the free website RealLoveParents.com, which is the result of 30 years of research and practical application.
I grew up without TV or radio or pop music or video games because my parents believed that was a way to 1) rot your brain, and 2) catch demons (I mean it literally - bona fide Satanic Panic mode in my upbringing). Yes, I read a lot of books and learned classical piano as a kid. I was homeschooled and accelerated a couple of grades, finished my BA from a private college at age 18 and then FLOUNDERED for years. I had no clue how to relate to my peers, didn't have shared cultural experiences, and had been so buffaloed about the dangers of the real world that I struggled to get out on my own and build a career. A big portion of that was cultish religious fundamentalism, so I'm not saying that every kid who does a Luddite childhood will end up the same, but we know the reason the Amish do the whole Rumspringe (sp?) thing is so that their kids will go wild with their newfound freedom, FAIL, and come back to the farm. So there has got to be a way to thread the needle on keeping our kids from a phone-based childhood while also preparing them effectively for adulthood and the big messy world out there. The stuff on developing independence seems promising, but also the most frightening to parents these days.
"Modern Luddites: On Being a Digital Minimalist Family in a Tech-Saturated World"
A better approach would be the Digital Selectionist Family. This means we should not preclude all digital tech use, only useless digital endeavors such as gaming and overusing social media. Much useful knowledge can be quickly gained from digital media. Luddism slows or disrupts technology but never stops it. Gaining knowledge is paramount to humanity's ascent.
In a few of your recent articles you’ve mentioned gentle parenting. As someone who uses that term when it comes to their own parenting style- I understand that you will always have people that can lean far to one side or another of the spectrum. Growing up in the Bible Belt of America & still living here- my husband & I’s views of gentle parenting I assume are hugely different than those elsewhere.
For our family- it’s about offering our kids respect, not using corporal punishment and/or fear to coerce them into behaving.
We have still have rules, limitations, & expectations for them. Plus, we use our position as a parent to create a healthy family environment- where the parents limit the kids inputs of media & tech to that of what we choose is age appropriate for them. Based on our own research & the many books I have read on the topic.
Just wanting to offer a glimpse of gentle parenting for others to see! For us, it’s not about letting our kids just rule the roost… it’s about how we as parents treat & respond to our kids behavior with gentleness.
Thank you! It's clear to me that she uses gentle parenting but actually means permissive parenting. She does point out the difference between authoritarian and authoritive, but hasn't done the homework with gentle vs permissive. Gentle and authoritive are both great parenting styles, the other two not so much. I think most people want to be gentle *and* authoritive, but struggle with their lesser sisters bouncing from permissive to authoritarian.
Janet Lansbury's podcasts have been a great help for us in learning how to be gentle but firm, something that's hard especially when you weren't raised that way!
I'm not sure where the line is between providing a healthy environment for your kids and engaging in a kind of obsessive nostalgia that's entirely closed off to contemporary reality. Our kids are too young to have their own phone numbers, but they spend parts of their days in virtual space on various devices. They also participate in real life play quite a bit. They read books. They create stuff, both in physical and digital space (my 9yo daughter sews, and my 12yo son is learning to make music with Ableton).
Growing up, I knew Mennonite kids and other very religious kids who were deprived of various things that were common and normal parts of other families' experiences. Many of those kids swung wildly in the other direction once they were set free, sometimes to disastrous ends. I guess I worry about being too 'fundamentalist' in my parenting or imposing an ideology instead of equipping my kids with good emotional and psychological tools.
My son is 12, as I said. We live in a city, and he wants to start taking public transit like some of his friends do. I want to be able to see his location and call him if I want to, and I want him to be able to call me or reach the friends he's traveling to meet. So we're going to get him a phone. I'll do my best to lock down certain things on it, and where that's not possible, I will engage in parenting—as in, talk to him, establish ground rules and accountability, and of course be a person he feels comfortable talking to.
I'm a mother of a young toddler. For now, I've lucked out — my daughter doesn't seem much interested in the TV (unless she's sick and wants to snuggle), preferring instead to show me how she can put her stuffed animal in a box and tote it around. She is interested in my phone only when I am interested in my phone (attention is the greatest currency we have). I delight that she makes the relational choice 9 times out of 10. It reminds me that her drives and impulses to interact are deeply imbedded within her; she is instinctually human, relational. She delights in it.
I think this realization — that SHE prefers human interaction to a screen — is great encouragement to me as a mother as I consider how to approach the digitalization of our world and our children. Keeping technology minimal in the house isn't actually all that restrictive; our impulse is to be communal. To experience the world in reality. I'm not so much restricting as I am encouraging the natural tendency. I'm being a bulwark against the hijacking of her natural sensibilities.
"Encourage the good" is my motto. Put your attention there. Make it a goal that the delight of human, face-to-face interaction is so palpable that you both prefer it. So often, we turn to screens as an escape.
(Side note: Obviously, I am a mom of a toddler who has yet to truly battle the societal impacts and pressure of a tech-relational world. I am fully aware that I have yet to have these battles, and that the addiction mechanism from screens is a major factor here. I'm not trying to negate any of those very real facts. I'm just trying to point out that our instincts ARE to be relational in the real world with each other — and that we should be fanning those flames as large as possible as one solution to this gigantic problem.)
Katherine's piece demonstrates this beautifully through her real-life examples. A much appreciated article!
I'm the father of two children and really enjoyed Katherine's article. I'd like to know if I'm allowed to translate it to Portuguese and post it on my Substack's profile in order to achieve a broader audience. In this particular case, Brazilian parents who might be interested as well on how becoming a digital minimalist is possible.
I look forward to reading the book and learning more about your childhood and theirs. I have a question related to how you raise them in the context of Internet connection. There are astounding tools available now for building a powerful relationship with nature – Merlin comes to mind, opening us up to the world of unseen bird diversity by identifying bird calls in real time. As a family do you ever utilize such tools? The same goes for YouTube, if you need to fix something.
Strongly agree. You wouldn't withhold an encyclopedia because you thought a comic was full of stereotypes, and they're both literature, would you? Also you may call them your kids but they have to grow into their peer group and live with it. I am of course strongly in favour of outdoor activities and independence but would like to see kids choose them for positive reasons rather than because the alternative is banned
The case for a reasonable change in culture
I do love this but she had me at trampoline, hammock, hampster, and garage gym. That's a pendulum swung too far. Not for me personally but for the movement. This is digital luditism (is that a word?) and it's never going to work for the masses. That said, there are surely tons of great ideas and truths to be gained from this work. I will be buying her book. My fear is turning people off to the movement.
My approach with my kids has turned some heads and had some effect in my small orbit. I intend to take that further. It is just one of many approaches and to be clear, I do not disparage any approach! We are all trying and thank god for that.
Briefly my approach is to give my kids very stripped down (Troomi) phones at a young age. Tablets. And they have a computer they share. They learn to use them as tools. Period. They have a couple games on tablets. They watch tv on our biggish tv. We only have one in the house. They play duo lingo mostly. Their phones they only use when they go out to do something that requires money because their banking apps are on there, or if they require a pick up later. 80% of the time they dont bring phones with them. They use their tablets to connect to their friends via facetiime. Lastly, I control everything through the router. Anything over 3rd grade is blocked on the internet but also they dont know how to access that yet. We are currently teaching them about what they cant unsee. They are girls age 9 and 11. My oldest age 21 fell HARD with phones and all of the genZ stuff. Years in hospitals.
I thought about the luddite thing but here's where I landed... I will be a single mother soon. We are getting divorced. I have to negotiate my co-parent as well. At school and sports they WILL be required to have tech. Period. They must know how to use it properly. I am not sporty but I have my kids DEEP in sports already because its about the culture for me. I cant do this alone. I had to build a community of like minded adults. All their friends have tablets and smart watches (not my cup because they are tethered to their parents) but we are ALL in agreement about that being literally a communication tool.
What does that mean at the end of the day? We have banded together to give the kids a play based experience by each family carrying a little more weight in the "doing" arena. I took a group of 5 on a major beach adventure 2 days ago. Another mom did the sleepover a few days before. Another parent did the SUP adventure. We sent them to the same week long day camp. They all play sports together. Some dont like it but they do it anyway because thats where their friends who arent on phones are. Its about culture for us and I cant build that as a one woman show on an island.
I have been following this since 2017. I was at the depths of despair with my oldest. I vowed to never go there again. But I also KNOW you cant control everything. The worst of what she saw and did on the phones including porn etc happened on other peoples phones. In and out of school. She learned some of the worst in hospitals.
I just wanted to hilight this because what I have seen is parents in the middle getting lost in the conversation between all or nothing and we want to capture them because thats the vast vast majority us us. My kids are having a miraculous free playfilled childhood. With phines and tablets. But also with a keen understanding of what they are. Scary tools! Like butcher knives. Thats how we see them. My kids can use a butcher knife at age 9. They can use a phone.
Our own family is setup essentially like yours (absent the smartphones) and I teach homeschool seminars on how to use technology responsibly. (And you're doing most of what I recommend, actually.)
I'm not sure why you say this won't work for the masses though. Why not? What prevents absolutely anyone from doing what she's doing? Or what you and I are doing? She's a little more countercultural than you are, but only by degree. There are plenty of parents who would look at you and say, "she doesn't let her teenager have social media -- he'll be an outcast!" or look at me and say, "he doesn't let his teens have smartphones -- they'll be outcasts!"
I congratulate her on being willing to take her beliefs seriously and screw what everyone else says. Maybe it's the homeschooler in me, but I won't rag on someone else's countercultural choices because I recognize how hard they are to sustain in the face of mainstream opposition.
I wish I could have been more nuanced before. I was rushing (kind of still rushing).
Here's the thing. I want to hear EVERY story. I want to know ALL the ways people are tackling this. I'm not judging! But this is an ever evolving issue across many states and cultures and family value systems and school systems etc.. Plus, we are far from where we were in 2013 in almost every way including educating parents, educating kids, tech responses to the problem, and even school policy. AND we are still nowhere near through the woods on this issue. That said, there is a vast difference from community to community, situation to situation.
This is why I said what I said... Because Jonathan Haidt is so vocal, reasoned, polupar, and IMO just amazing. Ive been following his work on this since his original sam harris interview. Im an avid footnote reader. I have been reading and following Haidt and collegues deep in the weeds for a long time (on several issues actually) He has great authority on this matter. What he promotes matters. And of COURSE I think this kind of digital free childhood is a good idea and should be promoted. At the same time, the intro was a little tone deaf, IMO.
I dont like to say parents "can't" do the digital ludite thing (for kids) because of course we all "can". Its a choice, just a lot harder for some than others for a whole host of reasons. I also dont want to point out parents who "won't" do the digital ludite thing because thats judgemental in my view. Of course parents want the best for their kids. My thing is, call attention to the problem first, and when offering solutions be very clear to convey that there are a range of options, of which this is just one. I just didnt feelnlike this was clear. And I also dont know anyone, not one family in my affluent community of 20K near Boston who has done "no tech" successfully past 6th grade.
The landemic changed everything.
Side note:
I homeschooled my now 21 yo in 6th grade because she was having issues socially in school and problems reading. She had zero neurodivergence... they just weren't teaching phonics! I pulled her and took her to book conventions around the country for a year till she loved reading and was at grade level with fluency. I was totally prepared to homeschool all the way through. BUT what she was exposed to onlune in the homeschool community was just as scary as the school kids albeit slightly different (less porn, more drama, more creepy roblox type stuff). Socially the girls were VERY cliquish. Add snapchat and that got weird very quick. So 7th grade, back to public. Same thing there. Better for a time. Then in freshman year she fell in with the wrong crowd and I allowed her to quit dance. She had no sports. No scaffold. Its EVERYWHERE. Homeschool isnt a fix for many situations. Nothing is a panacea.
I also sent my 9 and 11 year olds (bith girls... all three, lucky me! 😬) to a private montessori in 2019 because of the same phonics/reading issue. We were just lucky they were dialed into a tech free school that didnt skip a beat. They were out of school for 2 months total during the pandemic. In 4th grade I sent my now 11yo back to public. They had to give us (me, hisband and daughter) literal classes on the online systems they had implemented. It is IMPOSSIBLE in our district not to have a computer for the kids. Its required. They HAVE to begin learning how to research online and touchtype and use google classroom etc BY 4th grade (starts in 3rd). I pushed back at the school and classroom level to no avail. So Im currently working on a proposal to the board of health and the school board to educate the community and raise money for cell phone lockers (its $100,000 but the district is almost bankrupt from racial lawsuits 🤦🏻♀️). But even then, the will isnt there because of school shootings. Plain and simple. Parents say NO!... But I havent made my case yet so we shall see.
Interestingly enough the admin and teachers want rid of phones. They want rid of watches during the school day. Parents still say NO. There have been school threat hoaxes here. We have a significant jewish population and people have been ripping down "we stand with israel" lawn signs. In one instance a family was physically threatened in their driveway and the men were arrested. Students are removing their stars of david jewelry for school. In this climate parents say the phines stay. I dont agree (wont flesh that out here) but I do have empathy for their POV and there is definitely a will to at least collect phones during class (again, not enough but its recognition of a problem).
To wrap up, in no way am I saying that post wasnt a great one. And I am looking forward to getting a more nuanced view from the book and the substack. But in this climate with the vast majority of families in tricky situations be it where they live, ideological differences, economic circumstances, school policy, lack of education on the subject, etc, for After Babel word things so strongly in favor of zero-tech is off putting, in my opinion. I'm interested in building community toward a reasonable bottom line for EVERY family. "zero" seems to be unrealistic bottom line Absolutely a worthy ideal, but reasonably unattainable for most.
Yeah, I didn't mean to rag on you either, sorry if it came across that way.
My wife teaches 3rd grade. Same dynamic. Teachers mostly want to ban electronics. Administration is 100% pushing Chromebooks / smart boards / Internet everything.
I can't even get my homeschool coop to ban phones!
There are certainly lots of families that would have difficulty homeschooling, and curtailing tech when your kids are in public school is almost impossible without taking charge of your kids' education. (Which is what you're doing even though you're technically not "homeschooling" anymore.)
"I do love this but she had me at trampoline, hammock, hampster, and garage gym"
AGREE! Reminds me of my childhood in the 50's (though I MAY be looking though rose colored glasses). Also we tried to stay away from mom & dad because they were always finding something for you to do that was NOT anything like Fun. No kid ever said OH BOY! I Get To Mow The Lawn!
Thing is every couple of hundred years some new piece of technology comes along a changes Everything (think Printing Press, Steam Engine). We're n the middle of one now, because of The Little Silicon Chip. Its gonna take some time to figure out how to live with it. Until then...Chaos.
Your thoughtful comments are a good addition to the conversation but I also think you short change the author who notes her children have devices for school and acknowledges the experience varies widely with families in large urban centres to remote areas. I didn’t have a TV when raising my young kids in the late 80s and 90s. People would ask “how do you make dinner?… The earliest years are particularly important to avoid screens. The issues shift with pre-teens and teens. Great to hear your approach - and success in finding other like-minded families!
Thank you! I replied to the first comment with a more nuanced explaination of what I meant. See what you think! Hopefully that clarifies my intention in the original comment. I did read the full post and do thing the author is nuanced about the issue. My worry is leading with the "almost zero" approach. Maybe it was just how she presented it. Most of my good liberal friends (i am admittedly more conservative these days) would stop reading after what they would perceive as a bit pretentious even though most of them have hammocksn, trampolines, boats, and all the things. I want people to keep reading thats all 😊
Thanks for sharing your experience. You're right that the maximal approach to minimalism (minmax?) is a bridge too far for some. Sounds like you've worked hard to give your kids great experiences. Stay strong!
Hi Katherine i was excitied to find your work through Jon Haidt’s Substack.
Im in Australia and have 2 daughters aged 10 and 12 who don’t have social media, phones, and only use internet with permission in a common area for research projects, etc. They do watch shows and movies and play minecraft (not online) together sometimes.
They are homeschooled so it’s relatively easy so far due to the lack of school peer pressure since most of their homeschooled friends don’t have phones either. They would generally prefer to see each other in real life.
I’m looking forward to reading your articles and book.
I’m sending this to all my nieces and nephews who have younger kids.
It’s too late for my kids- mine are 25, 24, 21 and 14. It was so different when the older three were given a phone that they all shared the way back in 2008. I did it because I had to drop the older one off in the middle of Durham for a soccer practice and then the second older one was running long distances and would make her take the phone with her and then it just snowballed from there, and now it is completely out of control.
When they first had a smart phone, There wasn’t “scrolling”— according to them, It’s the scrolling that gets you. They can’t stop scrolling and frankly sometimes neither can I and I’m not even on social media (unless Substack & Pinterest are social media?!)
My 14-year-old used to love to read and mess around in the yard build things & take them apart, he hikes in nature and called friends… Now he’s a shell of his former self.
The six of us are a family only in the spaces between staring at screens.
That's the thing that gets me. We rightly talk about the dangers for kids, but many of the critiques of the threats of phone-based life apply to us adults too!
Guilty as charged. I had made some improvements, and then I installed this Substack app... 🤣💀
Great last sentence
Few things make me sadder than when we go visit grandparents and everyone is sitting around quietly looking at their phones. It's so eerie.
Haunting last sentence would have been a better choice of words
Katherine, I'm so happy for your substack (which I've been reading for months)! You're documenting an alternative path that people need to hear about -- it's ironic, because we all grew up that way but somehow we've forgotten how to do it.
My own kids are 8 & 3 and have never done screens (other than on airplanes and long car rides where they get to watch kids shows created before 1990). My older child is getting occupational therapy and his therapist is always remarking about how curious he is. I was surprised and finally asked her, "but aren't all 8 year olds curious??" She said actually no, and that she can tell he had an early childhood without screen time and with open-ended play opportunities (we'd never discussed this before). Modern parenting norms and tech really are rewiring kids' brains, it seems.
I'm working hard on real world freedom for both kids, and it's so helpful to read about specific examples from other parents who are doing it -- thank you for all you do, both Jonathan and Katherine!
Katherine, wonderful that your work on The Analog Family has made this natural connection with The Anxious Generation! Your personal examples and concrete insights are needed ingredients to support families in breaking free from the dominance of tech in daily lives. All the best in your continued writing!
"What matters more is teaching them how to be human—how to have conversations, make eye contact, be attentive and alert, be thoughtful and considerate, feel their emotions keenly, be insatiably curious about the real world." We can't forget we are raising humans first!! Great article, I can't wait to check out your work, Katherine!
Thanks for writing this Katherine! I love your substack too.
I have a five year old and a one year old. We watch a movie with the five year old every Saturday, and occasionally we'll let her watch cartoons. (if she's home sick, on an airplane, and right after my son was born are times she's watched a fair amount of Little Bear, Snoopy, and Princess Sofia). I consider the tv to be an occasional helpful friend, but it's not on often in our house. Our plan right now is that she can have a flip phone when she starts being more physically independent from us, but she will not a have a smart phone (or social media) until she can buy it with her own money after she's 18. We're pretty adamant about that right now, but obviously it will be an ongoing conversation between my husband and myself, and I think culture is sloooowly swinging that direction, thanks in part to people like Katherine and Jonathan speaking up and normalizing it for the rest of us. We will allow access to a computer because I think the internet is an amazing tool for learning, and I have no issue with computer games, as long as they are a small part of a rich, full, life.
I think technology has so many benefits, but I also think smart phones in their current form are terrible for us. I see how addicting they are for my husband and myself, and am currently doing my own work on breaking my addiction. (I have a Light Phone that I try to use most of the week, but still use my iPhone to FaceTime grandparents). If I've been on my phone too much I'm more anxious, forgetful, judgmental, and my attention span is shorter. It's harder for me to read dense material.
TV and computers are different and WE KNOW THEY ARE DIFFERENT. We leave them at home. We use them for short, purposeful, designated periods and then we live our lives, making eye contact and conversation. I watched a ton of TV and movies growing up, but I also spent most of my free time playing outside with other kids.
I just worked a job with a large group of 17-21 year olds, who are all in the generation of kids who have been on social media since they were in middle school. They ALL agreed that cell phones and social media were terrible for kids, and that their own mental health had suffered from having them too young. Three of them had been in psychiatric hospitals during adolescence. THREE. Out of maybe ten. Not a single one of them felt benign about social media/screens and childhood. They all wish their parents had been stricter with their screen and social media use and less strict with their physical lives. No one was saying things like that about AOL IM in my generation.
I think for me the biggest thing to remind myself is that technology is a tool, and it is only useful when it is making our lives easier/better/more connected, not harder. At the end of the day we are mammals who require connection, safety, and play. For kids, most of all, PLAY. I will do anything I can to protect my children's right to play with other kids out in the world.
We are lucky in that our daughter has been at a school where the culture is very anti-screen time. There's a spectrum of interpretation for that, but there is support. (Although I question the parents who complain that they social pressures are too great to take screens away from their kids. Jesus. You're the adult! BE THE ADULT).
And, God, I go to the high school campus at my daughter's school and it's amazing. No teenagers on cell phones. Teenagers who look you in the eye and talk to you, who talk to each other, who are running and jumping and playing and making music. Teenagers who will still be able to use a computer in college because it's a fucking computer and they are really really easy to use.
I know everyone will fall on different places on what they allow for their own kids. Just like my childhood best friend wasn't allowed to watch Saved By the Bell when we were kids, and I was allowed to watch that, but not The Simpsons. Parents figured out their own boundaries. Sometimes boundaries were different, and we were all fine. No one died from the unfairness of it.
The important thing is that we're finally having this conversation. I see some kids I know who have had unfettered access to screens since they were toddlers, and they DO NOT KNOW HOW TO PLAY. It's wild. You take their screens away and they are completely dependent on adults to entertain them. And yes, they are nearly all anxious messes. Parents are making their life harder with screens. Say no. Take it away. Tell them to go play. No you cannot play with them, you are busy. GO PLAY KIDS! They will whine. They will cry. They will annoy you. Hold firm. eventually...they will play. And it will be a muscle they will build.
There are parents who don't have access to this information, who are making the easiest choice they can because they are poor, and stressed, and working full time. If it starts being normalized by the rest of us, if there are kids outside on the playgrounds, if there are kids riding their bikes in the neighborhood, if we get childhood off the screen and put it back out in the world, everyone will benefit.
I don't think parents like Katherine are going to be anomalies much longer. It looks like California will be having a ban on smartphones in classrooms soon, and hallelujah. It's time to give our kids back their education, their self esteem, and their joy.
Simply stunning. And practical. This can be done, and it can save our kids. As important as her words are, notice the tone of this powerful mother, who obviously loves her children without disappointment, anger, or controlling. She is the benevolent queen of the family, which is exactly what mothers must be to create a healthy framework for their growing children. I’m thrilled to meet her in print. Her ability to unconditionally love her kids while she teaches them is the key. Without loving them in this way, her directions would feel controlling, and the kids would then either (1) feel small emotionally or (2) rebel, both of which are very damaging. Most parents don’t know how to unconditionally love while they teach, but this can be learned at the free website RealLoveParents.com, which is the result of 30 years of research and practical application.
I grew up without TV or radio or pop music or video games because my parents believed that was a way to 1) rot your brain, and 2) catch demons (I mean it literally - bona fide Satanic Panic mode in my upbringing). Yes, I read a lot of books and learned classical piano as a kid. I was homeschooled and accelerated a couple of grades, finished my BA from a private college at age 18 and then FLOUNDERED for years. I had no clue how to relate to my peers, didn't have shared cultural experiences, and had been so buffaloed about the dangers of the real world that I struggled to get out on my own and build a career. A big portion of that was cultish religious fundamentalism, so I'm not saying that every kid who does a Luddite childhood will end up the same, but we know the reason the Amish do the whole Rumspringe (sp?) thing is so that their kids will go wild with their newfound freedom, FAIL, and come back to the farm. So there has got to be a way to thread the needle on keeping our kids from a phone-based childhood while also preparing them effectively for adulthood and the big messy world out there. The stuff on developing independence seems promising, but also the most frightening to parents these days.
Couldn't love this more! ❤️ Yes, yes, yes.
"Modern Luddites: On Being a Digital Minimalist Family in a Tech-Saturated World"
A better approach would be the Digital Selectionist Family. This means we should not preclude all digital tech use, only useless digital endeavors such as gaming and overusing social media. Much useful knowledge can be quickly gained from digital media. Luddism slows or disrupts technology but never stops it. Gaining knowledge is paramount to humanity's ascent.
In a few of your recent articles you’ve mentioned gentle parenting. As someone who uses that term when it comes to their own parenting style- I understand that you will always have people that can lean far to one side or another of the spectrum. Growing up in the Bible Belt of America & still living here- my husband & I’s views of gentle parenting I assume are hugely different than those elsewhere.
For our family- it’s about offering our kids respect, not using corporal punishment and/or fear to coerce them into behaving.
We have still have rules, limitations, & expectations for them. Plus, we use our position as a parent to create a healthy family environment- where the parents limit the kids inputs of media & tech to that of what we choose is age appropriate for them. Based on our own research & the many books I have read on the topic.
Just wanting to offer a glimpse of gentle parenting for others to see! For us, it’s not about letting our kids just rule the roost… it’s about how we as parents treat & respond to our kids behavior with gentleness.
Much respect & thanks for all you write about!
Thank you! It's clear to me that she uses gentle parenting but actually means permissive parenting. She does point out the difference between authoritarian and authoritive, but hasn't done the homework with gentle vs permissive. Gentle and authoritive are both great parenting styles, the other two not so much. I think most people want to be gentle *and* authoritive, but struggle with their lesser sisters bouncing from permissive to authoritarian.
Janet Lansbury's podcasts have been a great help for us in learning how to be gentle but firm, something that's hard especially when you weren't raised that way!
I'm not sure where the line is between providing a healthy environment for your kids and engaging in a kind of obsessive nostalgia that's entirely closed off to contemporary reality. Our kids are too young to have their own phone numbers, but they spend parts of their days in virtual space on various devices. They also participate in real life play quite a bit. They read books. They create stuff, both in physical and digital space (my 9yo daughter sews, and my 12yo son is learning to make music with Ableton).
Growing up, I knew Mennonite kids and other very religious kids who were deprived of various things that were common and normal parts of other families' experiences. Many of those kids swung wildly in the other direction once they were set free, sometimes to disastrous ends. I guess I worry about being too 'fundamentalist' in my parenting or imposing an ideology instead of equipping my kids with good emotional and psychological tools.
My son is 12, as I said. We live in a city, and he wants to start taking public transit like some of his friends do. I want to be able to see his location and call him if I want to, and I want him to be able to call me or reach the friends he's traveling to meet. So we're going to get him a phone. I'll do my best to lock down certain things on it, and where that's not possible, I will engage in parenting—as in, talk to him, establish ground rules and accountability, and of course be a person he feels comfortable talking to.
I'm a mother of a young toddler. For now, I've lucked out — my daughter doesn't seem much interested in the TV (unless she's sick and wants to snuggle), preferring instead to show me how she can put her stuffed animal in a box and tote it around. She is interested in my phone only when I am interested in my phone (attention is the greatest currency we have). I delight that she makes the relational choice 9 times out of 10. It reminds me that her drives and impulses to interact are deeply imbedded within her; she is instinctually human, relational. She delights in it.
I think this realization — that SHE prefers human interaction to a screen — is great encouragement to me as a mother as I consider how to approach the digitalization of our world and our children. Keeping technology minimal in the house isn't actually all that restrictive; our impulse is to be communal. To experience the world in reality. I'm not so much restricting as I am encouraging the natural tendency. I'm being a bulwark against the hijacking of her natural sensibilities.
"Encourage the good" is my motto. Put your attention there. Make it a goal that the delight of human, face-to-face interaction is so palpable that you both prefer it. So often, we turn to screens as an escape.
(Side note: Obviously, I am a mom of a toddler who has yet to truly battle the societal impacts and pressure of a tech-relational world. I am fully aware that I have yet to have these battles, and that the addiction mechanism from screens is a major factor here. I'm not trying to negate any of those very real facts. I'm just trying to point out that our instincts ARE to be relational in the real world with each other — and that we should be fanning those flames as large as possible as one solution to this gigantic problem.)
Katherine's piece demonstrates this beautifully through her real-life examples. A much appreciated article!
I'm the father of two children and really enjoyed Katherine's article. I'd like to know if I'm allowed to translate it to Portuguese and post it on my Substack's profile in order to achieve a broader audience. In this particular case, Brazilian parents who might be interested as well on how becoming a digital minimalist is possible.
I look forward to reading the book and learning more about your childhood and theirs. I have a question related to how you raise them in the context of Internet connection. There are astounding tools available now for building a powerful relationship with nature – Merlin comes to mind, opening us up to the world of unseen bird diversity by identifying bird calls in real time. As a family do you ever utilize such tools? The same goes for YouTube, if you need to fix something.
Strongly agree. You wouldn't withhold an encyclopedia because you thought a comic was full of stereotypes, and they're both literature, would you? Also you may call them your kids but they have to grow into their peer group and live with it. I am of course strongly in favour of outdoor activities and independence but would like to see kids choose them for positive reasons rather than because the alternative is banned