Swimming in the Pensieve

They really do!

Please read this BBC article about the development of RSI in children who engage in, among other things, too much SMS messaging (”texting” as it’s coming to be called).

The lines, in the above article, which stood out to me most glaringly were: ” ‘She got the phone when she was six and she’s constantly on it. I tried to take it off her but she started sneaking it to school. But then she started complaining about pains in her arms and hands a couple of months ago.’ Mrs Taylor has limited Isabelle’s texting to 30 minutes before and after school and she is doing exercises to alleviate the condition. “

What reasonably defensible reason does any 6 year-old have for having a cell phone?

What rational reason does any parent have for giving a 6 year-old a cell phone?

How spineless does a parent have to be, once they have given-into a 6 year-old on the matter of even having a cell phone, to allow the child such unfettered access to the device that she can ’sneak it off’ to school with her?

Why was the child even given the ability to engage in unrestrained SMS exchanges?

The balance of the article deals with RSI, a bit about it’s causes and remediation; yet, not one word about parents who are little more than children themselves–even at forty years of age.

What the article is really about is parents who have no common sense, and refuse to parent their children (much to the irritation and suffering of the rest of us); although I really doubt that the article author had enough on the ball to realize that this is the core issue that he or she was skirting around while hammering-away at the keyboard.

People don’t have the brains nor spine to parent their childern anymore!

Oh yeah…I can hear you now…“Your kids have cell phones!”

You bet they do, but there are some radical differences from the spoiled child in the article. Allow me to clarify.

We have 6 children.
The eldest is 30 and pays for her own wireless communication needs.
The second-eldest is now 18, and does not carry a cell phone.
· She cannot afford to pay for her own wireless ‘needs’ at the moment.
· She will carry a cell phone as soom as she can afford to pay her own bill.
Our 16 year-old and 14 year-old do carry cell phones outside the home.
· Under very restrictive conditions that I’ll go into later.
Our 10 year-old and 8 year-old are not permitted to carry cell phones at all.
· Certain, rare, in-home-only exceptions have been made.

We have 4 cells on a family plan that is quite reasonable in terms of cost (Don’t wax eloquent to me about Boost™. Boost™ users should be, as a public service, shot on sight.); and my wife and I each carry a cell with us (almost wherever we go).

Our 16 year-old and 14 year-old have been provided identical cell phones which do not belong to any specific child. You need to understand this quite well: There is no claim of ownership rights (“That’s my phone!”) on the part of either child; and their pseudo-entitlement to phone use is subject to instant revocation–without warning.

Our 16 year-old and 14 year-old may not add any non-family number to speed dial or the phone/address book on either phone. They are forbidden calls to and from non-family members. They are permitted to call the other 3 phones in the family plan, without limitation, and calls to non-family plan family members with express permission for each call made.

They may not give out the cell phone numbers to anyone (except immediate family members). They may not accept from, or make calls to, friends. They are held accountable for every second of on-air time, and must justify same in all cases.

SMS is forbidden to them under any circumstances.

The cell phones are paid for by the parents, and are a convenience only for the parents.

When our 16 year-old attains the age of 18, she will be in the same situation that our current 18 year-old is in now: SHe will have to obtain and pay for her own cell phone and air-time. The same, of course, will apply to our 14 year-old; when he reaches the age of majority.

Our 10 year-old and 8 year-old will, in time, attain the ages wherein they, too, will carry a cell phone; which is merely one of two possible phones that they may grab as they head out of the house. They will have no ‘ownership rights’, and the rules will be no different for them, than those heretofore ’suffered’ by their older siblings.

Friends of Our Children Take Special Note:
Do not call our cell phones…ever: You have no emergency or excuse that is good enough for us to pay for–at on-prime rates.
Do not ask (or expect) our children to call you from our cell phones…ever: See above.

While we, on a case-by-case basis, might make an exception to the above; you should never anticipate that any such single-instance exception gives you some sort of perpetual license to cost us money for what amounts to nothing more than impatient laziness. Such exceptional permission is given for a single occasion, within a reasonably-limited span of time (said ‘reasonably-limited span of time’ expiring daily at 20:30).

You have permission to call our children at home–you have the number–after 08:30 (8:30AM) and before 20:30 (8:30PM).

Unless you have 4 brothers and sisters, living with you at home, I’m relatively certain that you don’t understand the basis for the rules of our home. Suffice it to say that, those are the rules and, it’s our home; so we have the right to make and impose those rules without explaining it to death.

You will understand…when you are a parent.