The Dark Side of Technology...

CaveCreekRay

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Daren Todd

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Wife and I noticed that with our kids and grandkids. I grew up swimming in the summer, hiking, camping, and just playing in the woods. Had an old three wheeler and snowmobile when we got older. Skiing and sledding in the winter. Sugaring in the spring. Picking berries, hunting and fishing.

Kids grew up hunting and fishing, and the same as my wife and I. They got into high school and thats when cell phones and computers and gaming systems were really popular. You would have thought we were killing our daughter when she would get grounded and knocked back into the stone age :rolleyes: In an average month, she would have 10,000 texts sent on her phone. Once she got out of school, you could finally have a conversation with her. I had a big rule at the house. No phones when we are having a family dinner. Been known to go through and collect them if they come out while we are eating. Even snagged the wifes a few times :cool: only exception is if it's job related. If it ain't work, they can wait till dinner is over!!!

Grandkids get limited to 1 hour of device time. Whether it's the xbox, tablet, or phone. After that, it's time to get your but outside :D If they start throwing a hissy fit while using the device. They lost it for the remainder of the stay with us.
 

Grouse Feathers

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Fortunately the video does not represent all kids. Our granddaughters play soccer, ride bikes, peck blueberries (when with grandparents), go to the zoo, go fishing, paint pictures, write thankyou notes (with a pencil), and many other childhood and family activities. When up here with the grandparents they have never asked to watch TV or play on the computer as they much prefer to have grandma read them a book or play a game with grandma and grandpa. I don’t think the kids are the big problem they are just following the lead of the parents and grandparents. We have seen mothers at the playgrounds with their kids who can’t push them on a swing because it takes two hands to text. We have seen grandparents too busy taking pictures and selfies with the grandkids instead of reading and playing games. Who has the real problem with addiction to technology and why would you expect the kids to be different then the adults they model after?
 

CaveCreekRay

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Daren,

That is one of the biggest lessons you can teach a kid: Boundaries. you don't need to be doing non-family things during family time. Delayed gratification is good and healthy.

Larry,

Absolutely right. What are the kids of today learning by watching the mom try to take care of her kids and text at the same time? That is my worry for the next generation.

The kids of today, including the Millennials, have given up the traditional family in favor of their "online" FaceBook family. Problem is, when there is a issue, as there always is in life, who comes to your aid? Family or Facebookers? My daughter learned that the hard way when she moved. Zero friends came to help her move and her father-in-law and an older neighbor down the street were the only people who offered to help her. That was it. She commented to my wife, "Wow... I guess you still need family." DUH!

There are going to be a lot of hard lessons learned...
 
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skeets

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I do agree with so much of what has been said, my girls grew up running the woods with me camping and fishing and hunting shooting,, you get the idea ,, but they also grew with the NEW stuff, and thankfully they figured out at an early age , that all this stuff on line is fun, but when you need someone to love you and be there for you, it is the clan that is there, not your on line friends. Now the grand babies are growing in much the same way, and even at a young age understand the clan is the only ones that will love you and be there for you when you need them. I don't do facebook or tweet or what other kind of social media is out there, I guess because I simply don;t have enough time left to put up with the drama,,lol
 

ShaunRH

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My wife an I have agreed that our 5 year old cannot have a cell phone until he earns the money to pay for it himself. Before then, if we get him one it will have 2 buttons, MOM and DAD (there are phones for just this).
He has to earn video game time and TV time. If he has a rough day at school, he doesn't get either. Enough rough days at school and he doesn't get them on the weekends. It's fairly brutal but it's whipped him into shape and he's now behaving himself at school and actually buckling down an learning.
Never give in to your kids tantrums, tell them what they earn by doing well, and give it to them when they do. Keep your promises and tell the truth to them. They will respond.
 

BadDog

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Mine were both raised with real world involvement with music and sports as they were inclined. They both also grew up with full emersion in modern technology, but not run amuck as so many do, using videos and games as convenient babysitters. They both knew their boundaries (and chores) with various corrective actions including spanking when appropriate but never to injury, and far less than I knew growing up, and I don't (and didn't) consider myself abused. But as they grew, for spankings to register severity would need to increase to unacceptable levels, and technology was far more important to them, so that became the punitive corrective measure of choice. Each more than once BEGGED me to give them a spanking or something else instead. NOW I had the leverage I needed! <cue evil laugh>

I wasn't perfect, far from it, and hindsight would have changed things considerably, but you do the best you can in the moment. And I must say, I couldn't be more proud. My son always had an analytic mind that I recognized as working like mine. He was enamored with video games, and I tried to use that to get him into some programming appropriate to his age, only luke warm acceptance, too slow to get results that couldn't rival "real" programs. But the seed was planted, and it grew. After that, he and I would often dissect the games, how it might work, looking for the patterns, and the variable events, learning to spot and understand them. He might not code, but he understood the logic, which he was VERY interested in seeing. He still spent more time on gams than I would have liked, but at least it provided mental stimulation other than otherwise immersive alternate reality, because he was always gaming the game, and his friends thought he was a god of the games. I even noticed that he started applying it to real world interactions, primarily by looking at relationships from the perspective of evaluating a persons likely manifestation of "enlightened self interest" to predict responses and thereby control the interactive flow. Within every group that formed around him, he was always a leader. He's also very good a "working a deal" and cleans up on Craigs List and the like. He also got (almost) straight As, a full boat ride for a Masters Degree, graduated Magna Cum Laude majoring in CS with a minor in Math (as did his father) AND Business Management (not me). He's now a rising star making quite a name at one of the biggest technology companies out there, and he has a bright future.

My daughter loved video games, but had a very different mind, a different way of thinking. My son was easy, his mind worked much like mine, not so much hers. She could watch videos again and again back to back without loosing interest. But, I soon realized that each time she watched it, she was seeing new things, seeing the story from a different perspective, so I spent time talking with her and encouraging to spot the patterns that are almost always there (why I hate movies). Once you spot it, you can almost dictate the rest of the film, except for the stuff they throw in JUST to annoy the pattern watchers. While I could not have survived watching all those shows with her, we had great times going meta on the movies and analyzing the plot elements and pattern, as well as where they could have been improved and why. She's no programmer, and I think she would be miserable working as one, but she is 100% fully tech savy juggling and configuring for purpose tablets, phablets and smart phones as casually as anyone you will meet. But she wanted something different, a family, and she's done rather well in that respect. She's a great mother and fierce protector of her family, particularly my 2 young grandsons (oldest is just turned 2). Her husband is Army and gone a lot, so she basically runs the house. And at the same time, including brutal PCS from Ft Wainright to Ft Carson, she managed to get an online degree and certificate to be a "Vet Tech" focusing on larger farm animals like Cows and Pigs. She just showed me her final summary report that showed near perfect scores across the board, top of her class. And she did most of the class on her laptop or tablet while rocking or nursing one or both of the boys. Good thing she had those deep tech skills. Once she gets on an even keel, when the boys need her less, she intends to go further, hopefully becoming a licensed vet, again, focusing on livestock and such.

They both make me very proud. They made their own decision, made a few mistakes and recovered those situations by doing the right thing, no running to daddy to dig them out. I could not be more proud of them both. Technology isn't the problem. It's parents who either don't want to be or are not mentally equipped to be parents.
 

skeets

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Russ your right,, there are to many parents out there that should never have been, I have 2 step daughters in that boat, nice kids but should have never been a mother
 

lugbolt

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Last weekend I went fishing. Caught fish. Filled freezer. While on the lake, I managed to hang a decent sized catfish from deep; fought it to the boat, pulled it up and went to take a picture. Yep. Phone went swimming. 'Course the phone store was closed on Sunday. Ordered new one online. Well it wasn't so bad; I got through a whole 3 days of no cell phone. It felt weird but at the same time it was nice. Once the new phone came in, thursday, it got blowed up again with texts emails and "missed calls". In a way I thought about just turning it off for good.

It's no wonder some of my friends don't even own one.
 

SidecarFlip

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Last weekend I went fishing. Caught fish. Filled freezer. While on the lake, I managed to hang a decent sized catfish from deep; fought it to the boat, pulled it up and went to take a picture. Yep. Phone went swimming. 'Course the phone store was closed on Sunday. Ordered new one online. Well it wasn't so bad; I got through a whole 3 days of no cell phone. It felt weird but at the same time it was nice. Once the new phone came in, thursday, it got blowed up again with texts emails and "missed calls". In a way I thought about just turning it off for good.

It's no wonder some of my friends don't even own one.
Understandable. Mine is sitting here next to the laptop in it's usual repose, shut off. I only use it when I need to call and then it gets turned on.

My feeling is the world would be a better place without cell phones.
 

SidecarFlip

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It's not the phones, it's the social media.
I think we should go back to bag phones.
Still have my Sprint Bag phone in the attic and a couple Nextel Wakie Talkies too. I sure liked Nextel beep beep...
 

Magicman

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knotholesawmill.com
I don't do fb, but the text feature and pictures are almost a necessity in my sawmilling business. Heck, I can even make phone calls with it!! :rolleyes:
 

dlsmith

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I have a friend whose daughter is a social butterfly. ALWAYS typing, flipping or swiping on her phone, never seen her actually using it as a phone. I asked my friend if he ever looks at her activity on the monthly bill. He rolled his eyes and said one month she had sent over 2,000 SMS messages, and he had no idea how many tweets in addition to that. But she had made no calls whatsoever.

He's considering take a hammer to the phone when it's paid for. If she wants another one, she can get a job and buy it herself.

I like Whatsap's video phone feature, I can make or get video calls to and from the grandkids in Florida. It even worked when they were in the Netherlands a couple of years ago.
 

GreensvilleJay

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Don't own a 'smart device' or 'cell fone'. Been designing microcomputer based products for 2/3rds of my life(40+ years,sigh) and I KNOW what's 'under the hood'. Most 'aps' grab YOUR GPS data,list,pix, etc.,all legal as it's in the EULA or Terms of Use you click 'OK' on. Same will ALL 'wireless' devices unless YOU change ALL the passwords. Don't change to 'password' BTW, it's easily sniffed out and 'they' then have access to your device....