Janice Turner Is Crack For Parents - Xbox's Are Just Toys - FastSilicon.com

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Janice Turner Is Crack For Parents - Xbox's Are Just Toys

Saturday, 19 January 2008

After sitting through reading one of the most denial ridden, vitriolic and incoherent rants on the subject of the evils of gaming I've ever seen, I felt a need to respond to it. Not only as a technology website journalist, but also as a parent.

The journalist in question, Janice Turner , writes a weekly column for The Times Online , a british publication which unfortunately gets a lot more traffic than we do. I say it is unfortunate because someone dispensing little gems like this is the last person a parent searching for real solutions to managing their childrens time and behavior should consult.

Titled "Xbox is crack for kids - It's an impossible task to police our children's multimedia addiction" , the article is largely an incoherent rant about the problems with managing "screen time" for our kids in the digital age. Reading through the piece, and I strongly suggest everyone who reads this do so, it just seethes with frustration, anger, naivety, and denial. Hardly the sorts of behaviors I'd recommend emulating when parenting. Considering it's a piece about game consoles, iPods, cellphones and digital tv and the apparent evils of said mediums, such a reaction has to be taken as little more than denial and technophobia. Not to mention a healthy dose of fear mongering.

Being a parent myself with two daughters the issue of "screen time" is one I deal with routinely, but hardly in the angsty frustrated manner Janice seems to. My oldest who is 14, bless her, spends alot of her free time dishing with friends and going over to friends houses to do this and that when she can. She also spends some of that free time with her and her sisters PS2, Gamecube, iPod and Dell. My youngest who is about to turn 12 is similar in her habits, though I am a bit stricter with her extra curricular activities to keep her focused on schoolwork. She's just not the academic my oldest is (who takes after Dad...what can I say), so I adjust appropriately.

note: They would have a Wii by now too if I could find one but I digress.

The difference between me and Janice is a fundamental one, and a rather simple one too. Admittedly I do have a leg up from my own history. How many teenage kids have dads that built computers with soldering irons and breadboards when they were in junior high? But it's not just my interest in technology and all things geeky that lowers the barrier, not at all.

Try to look at it like this. Half a century ago parents were dealing with similar though perhaps less complex issues. Back then TV was childrens primary source of Janice's adolescent "crack". So were Lincoln Logs, Hula Hoops, and that evil rock and roll. Skip a decade or so and it was D&D and the arcade at the mall. How many parents overcame their skepticism and fear and tried to understand the appeal of these newfound pasttimes? Not nearly enough. Thankfully my mother was one of the exceptions. Heck, at 73 she still console and PC games, and these are entertaining diversions she adopted from her healthy interaction with me as a child. Through her efforts to relate to me as more than just her responsibility and understand my world we found common ground. The interaction was in both directions as well, as I adopted my lifelong passion for reading and writing directly from her.

I take the same approach with my children because I had a good teacher. The fact that today's world has different "stuff" doesn't change the process one iota. Perhaps the only real issue here is the fact that the number of distractions these days has increased. To be candid however it is the parents who are being distracted from parental responsibility by looking for scapegoats and boogeymen. The children aren't the distracted parties here. They "get it" and you dont, and it's not their fault.

No matter how many iPods, cellphones, and Xbox360s we have, interacting with other humans is still the same process it has been since we were wearing animal skins and living in caves, albeit with far less grunting and better hygiene. Also, your children are not some alien unknowable species, they're just tiny humans with impressionable minds that you have to educate, nuture, and raise. You're expected to realize this when you make them.

If you have issues regulating your childrens behavior, it's time to look in the mirror before you start blaming an electronics manufacturer that you paid good money to for the purpose of placating your children so they would be "happy." Happy in this context is akin to "shut up and let me get back to my little world" and a bit shameful.

Yes I game with my children. We also regularly go outdoors and do non electronic "stuff". I routinely help my oldest daugher with one of her hobbies which is editing her own mixed music videos . Being a geek doesn't mean I knew intuitively how to use Windows Movie Maker, Adobe Premiere (and now Sony Vegas 8), so guess what? I sat down and learned the application with her, and along the way we both learned a great deal...together.

I let my children browse the web freely, with periodic checks on their behavior and usage. They have had the "discussion" about how to react if they browse a little loosely and accidentally see a nipple or something a little more questionable. The world won't come to an end regardless. Have you done this? Or have you just installed "NetNanny" and stolen Nancy Reagan's cliche' "Just Say No" for your own personal use? It is a fools errand to think such things actually work.

I can get away with such frivolity because I've raised my children to be aware of the world around them. More to the point, I try to make myself aware of their world in equal measure. I sit down and ask what they are doing, genuinely interested. I offer them advice and guidance about the beauties as well as the dangers of the world, and believe me the dangers of the real world are far more important than the electronic ones no matter what spin doctors love to say to the contrary. Have you ever taken the time to sit down and talk to your children? Not as a "parent" per-se, but as another person who just happens to have more life experience to share? How about listening to them? Children have lots of interesting things to say, and they want you to hear and understand them. My children are far more eloquent in their words and thoughts than many adults I know, a fact I'm immensely proud of. Is this an indication that my children are somehow different or special, or merely a realization that they have worthwhile thoughts to share?

There are times for parental authority to be sure, but they should be balanced with equal effort put towards understanding your children and gaining their trust and respect.

Both my girls have interests that, quite frankly, I could care less about and would consider a chore to even grasp. Heck, they *are* girls after all. But you know what? I make the effort anyway. It's my job.

Ultimately it comes down to this. Whether the world is full of 220% more distractions than it was 10 years ago or 221.5% DOES NOT MATTER. You can decide to live in a nerf bubble, and try to drag your children kicking and screaming into it, but they will just think you're stupid for doing so. They might still respect your authority as a parent, but at what cost to their respect for you as a mentor?

The world is not going to change or become less complex simply because you feel you cannot cope. Coping is a parent's job. As a parent, it's your choice how to raise your children, and that is as it should be. Just make room in that nerf bubble for ventilation. I hear that crack smoke is rather nasty, and Janice is passing the pipe.

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