“Screens That Eat Children”, a book warning about the dangers of new media, is being spread around Sai Kung free. We nicked one from a pile at the door of SingaLing (They are not free – you need to pay Sing!!). Author Ross Parker, Director of Technology at International College Hong Kong at Sha Tau Kok, warns parents that new technology does the most harm in childhood “where the damage seems to be most cruel, most permanent and least defensible”.
“In the all-out battle for our eyeballs, it is the smartphone that sits front and centre.” The monopolies pinging, buzzing and sliding notices at us 24/7 have to captivate you and your child or die. “In order to win, an app or game must demand all of our attention all of the time.”
When kids “are lying flat”, the Hong Kong term for opting out, what are they doing? Playing mobile phone.
Big Tech like Facebook proudly tells advertisers they can identify teenagers who feel “stressed”, “defeated”, “overwhelmed”, “anxious”, “nervous” and “useless”, so they can push products to the vulnerable. “I feel tremendous guilt, “said Chamath Palihapitiya, vice president of user growth at Facebook. “The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works.”
Ross Parker
Parker compares today’s tech to drug use. “. . . Where TV might be compared to alcohol and laptops to pot, smartphones are much more akin to heroin or crystal meth.” Smartphones, and the kind of internet usage they encourage, are one of the most destructive forces humans have produced.
We do have the option of opting out. Personally I quit social media four years ago. A friend banned me from WhatsApp group after I offered a bantering comment on a sports matter. It hurt. I said to myself I don’t need narcissism, selfies and knee jerk comments and haven’t looked at social media to this day.
Parker has done the same. ” . . . I no longer use social media: no Facebook, no Twitter, no Instagram, no nothing.” But still his smartphone goes everywhere with him. It pops into his hand unbidden. “I have worked to defang the beast.” After work on Friday he switches everything off and does not look at a screen again until Sunday morning.
Parker devotes a lengthy section to pornography. This may be a big help parents for worrying about their kid’s exposure to potentially perverting filth. He offers a memo “Dear Daughter/Son” which could be useful to a parents who feel it is time to talk to a child about the vast black and white difference between sex and porn.
The book closes with dire warnings. “The time has come for us to accept that further technological development is fundamentally incompatible with human flourishing and sustainability.” The alternative “is annihilation of ourselves and the many creatures and plants with whom we share our home”.
US$9.99 Kindle version from Amazon
ISBN-13 : 979-8362091064
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