The piece sounds like a petty personal revenge, where it's hard to detect any rational point.
She grew up in a family abusing screen time, centering the TV above anything and anyone. That was very bad, as she readily admits. How then does it make any sense to look away when a similar or worse issue is affecting young people?
Instead of preventing it from happening twice, you focus on "rubbing it in", because two wrongs make a right?
Further, from a pragmatic point of view, the comparison makes zero sense. Nobody cares how much TV the elderly watch because there's little to ruin at this point. They're past their productive years, so it doesn't matter from an economical point of view. For most it won't affect their dating chances or ambition to start a family. It matters little (or at least less) for their health, as they're already in winter.
For young people and society as a whole, these things matter far more. I don't know what the proper regulation (if any) would be for screen time but let's at least establish that the stakes are a 100 times higher compared to an old guy watching a stupid TV quiz.
The nature of the screen time is also incomparable. Digital is far more addictive, radicalizing, privacy-invading and exploitative compared to TV.
I don’t know if I can agree with you about “little to ruin” for older people and TV. As we get older we still work, have lives, learn, see family and friends, hobbies , etc.
Spending too much time alone or alone together in a non-interactive virtual realm like watching filler/garbage TV really has a huge opportunity cost. We lose so much time that way and time is the most important thing we so trivially waste. I’m doing it right now on a forum comment! That being said I’ll utilize my time in the real world after this short statement. Don’t forget the older cohort has the highest voter participation rate. What they watch and how much of it matters because it will affect your life.
Have a happy thanksgiving if you’re American. If not, happy harvest festival wherever you are!
1. This moral panic is either overblown or wildly inconsistent.
2. If it's impossible to imagine the same kind of government restriction being proposed for aging adults, why accept it for other groups?
> Digital is far more addictive, radicalizing, privacy-invading and exploitative compared to TV.
Or perhaps the unidirectional nature of TV consumption makes for powerful radicalizing propaganda--especially to an at-home group with fewer external connections to ground them--and the passivity of the consumption rots your brain and dries up critical thinking.
1. This moral panic is either overblown or wildly inconsistent.
As the issue at heart is young people's screen time, the article did nothing to demonstrate that it is not overblown. Old people watch TV is not a comeback that negates the young people's issue.
Is the moral panic inconsistent? Hell yes, and for very obvious reasons. The negatives matter a 100 times more for people at the beginning of their lives, as well as for our future as a whole.
2. If it's impossible to imagine the same kind of government restriction being proposed for aging adults, why accept it for other groups?
Because they're old. Old means you're close to death. Pretty much nothing matters anymore.
I assume this is snark but just in case it isn't, this is not how you should view aging adults. Potential is always limitless, only the possibility of realizing that potential reduces as one nears end of life. But then, who knows when someone's end of life is?
She grew up in a family abusing screen time, centering the TV above anything and anyone. That was very bad, as she readily admits. How then does it make any sense to look away when a similar or worse issue is affecting young people?
Instead of preventing it from happening twice, you focus on "rubbing it in", because two wrongs make a right?
Further, from a pragmatic point of view, the comparison makes zero sense. Nobody cares how much TV the elderly watch because there's little to ruin at this point. They're past their productive years, so it doesn't matter from an economical point of view. For most it won't affect their dating chances or ambition to start a family. It matters little (or at least less) for their health, as they're already in winter.
For young people and society as a whole, these things matter far more. I don't know what the proper regulation (if any) would be for screen time but let's at least establish that the stakes are a 100 times higher compared to an old guy watching a stupid TV quiz.
The nature of the screen time is also incomparable. Digital is far more addictive, radicalizing, privacy-invading and exploitative compared to TV.