Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1174 - Meta's Worst Nightmare: Kids Without Phones

Transcript

#1174 - Meta's Worst Nightmare: Kids Without Phones · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: At some point your children are going to say thanks,
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  Speaker 1: thank you for having boundaries around tech and screens, thank
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  Speaker 1: you for delaying my access to social media. Thank you
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  Speaker 1: for helping me to have a play based childhood rather
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  Speaker 1: than a screen based childhood. Today we tell you how
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  Speaker 1: to get there. Welcome to the Happy Families Podcast, Real
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  Speaker 1: parenting solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast.
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  Speaker 1: We are Justin and Kylie Coulson and Kylie. A couple
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  Speaker 1: of days ago, I had a great chat with a
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  Speaker 1: guy called Charlie Brown.
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  Speaker 2: Did his parents do that on purpose? Do you think?
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  Speaker 1: I asked him. We didn't record that part, but he
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  Speaker 1: said it was always Charles and that's what his parents
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  Speaker 1: still call him. But the Peanuts cutoon was around when
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  Speaker 1: he was born and everyone calls him Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown,
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  Speaker 1: media commentator, used to be on Channel nine doing all
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  Speaker 1: the tech bits and has guided parents and people through
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  Speaker 1: technolog issues for a couple of decades on the TV.
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  Speaker 1: He's also started a company with a phone called the
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  Speaker 1: g ME Phone. That's the letter G and thene g
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  Speaker 1: me the GME phone why because he wants parents to
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  Speaker 1: be in control of what their kids are doing on devices,
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  Speaker 1: and he's got this phone. Oh, by the way, you
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  Speaker 1: can go to gme dot com and use the code
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  Speaker 1: happy and get the phone. Instead of one hundred and
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  Speaker 1: eighty nine bucks, he's giving a special discount one hundred
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  Speaker 1: and forty nine dollars. Anyway, I had a chat with
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  Speaker 1: him the other day and I thought you and I,
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  Speaker 1: ahead of the full podcast interview dropping on Saturday, have
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  Speaker 1: got to talk about two things that came up in
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  Speaker 1: our conversation. The first was this story about, once again
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  Speaker 1: just how serious bullying can get on Facebook.
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  Speaker 3: There's a woman on the phone to me in absolute
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  Speaker 3: tears because her daughter, who was about sixteen, hadn't left
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  Speaker 3: her bedroom for the past four or five days because
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  Speaker 3: someone created a Facebook page about her bullyt so I
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  Speaker 3: was bullying her in the worst possible way. So they
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  Speaker 3: morphed a face onto a naked body. They've done all
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  Speaker 3: of this terrible stuff. This girl hadn't left her room,
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  Speaker 3: and mum was worried because the kid, in mum's opinion,
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  Speaker 3: was suicidal or She's crying to me saying and I
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  Speaker 3: could hear I could hear this girl opening the door
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  Speaker 3: and screaming at her mom down the hallway and I'm
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  Speaker 3: standing there on the phone to her, going, well, what's
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  Speaker 3: the problem. I mean, why is the page still? Love?
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  Speaker 3: How long is the page? But she said, I've been
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  Speaker 3: up for three or four days. They keep flagging it.
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  Speaker 3: It doesn't get taken down. It was a Facebook page,
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  Speaker 3: mind't you. And I said, okay, fine, just just wait there.
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  Speaker 3: Let me see if I can make a phone call.
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  Speaker 3: And I rang I won't say who, but somebody very
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  Speaker 3: very senior at Facebook. It's now called Meta. And I said, okay, look,
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  Speaker 3: I'm standing over the desk from the cheaper staff. This
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  Speaker 3: is the story. It's running a story number three in
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  Speaker 3: twenty five minutes unless this page is taken down in
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  Speaker 3: three minutes. And they said, oh, we can't do it,
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  Speaker 3: and I said, okay, well, well i'll speak to you
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  Speaker 3: after after the story runs. Three minutes later, the page
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  Speaker 3: was taken down. So this page had been up for
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  Speaker 3: four days. This teenager was in the emotional state. She
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  Speaker 3: was in the mum was in a similar emotional state.
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  Speaker 3: And I'm listening to all of this, and then with
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  Speaker 3: a one phone call to one person, less than three minutes,
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  Speaker 3: the pages down. And I thought to myself. There is
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  Speaker 3: something very, very wrong with everything that is going on here.
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  Speaker 3: This is one example. Where are we going from here
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  Speaker 3: with this? And what is everyone else going to do
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  Speaker 3: that doesn't find a way to contact people like me
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  Speaker 3: who can actually help.
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  Speaker 2: I hate hearing stories like that. We've just so frustrating.
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  Speaker 1: I don't even have words. No, no, I know, I know.
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  Speaker 1: This is why I make such a really big deal.
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  Speaker 1: I've got a website, unplugged childhood dot org. There's nothing
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  Speaker 1: to sell there, there's no profit, It's just unplugged childhood
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  Speaker 1: dot org. Learn how to build a community so the
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  Speaker 1: kids don't need to be online, Learn how to delay access,
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  Speaker 1: go slow once they do get access, and how to
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  Speaker 1: reduce their time on social media.
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  Speaker 2: I just want to understand why do they have a
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  Speaker 2: report button if they're not willing to do anything.
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  Speaker 1: This is the great challenge, right because we know the
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  Speaker 1: algorithm is all about outrage. The algorithm is when you
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  Speaker 1: stoke outrage, you get more people commenting, you get more
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  Speaker 1: people sharing, you get more people involved. Jonathan Hate calls
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  Speaker 1: it the great rewiring. Kids have gone from the play
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  Speaker 1: based childhood of our youth too a screen based childhood
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  Speaker 1: and everything that's accompanying that, the outrage, the commentary, the
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  Speaker 1: all encompassing nature of it. It makes a child feel
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  Speaker 1: like they are completely overwhelmed, fully swamped, and there is
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  Speaker 1: no way out no matter where they turn. The federal
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  Speaker 1: government's decision to bring in a social media ban for
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  Speaker 1: under sixteens might be the single best thing that the
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  Speaker 1: Albaneze government has done since they've been in office. Obviously,
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  Speaker 1: there's going to be an election between now and the
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  Speaker 1: end of the year, but fingers crossed that will stay there.
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  Speaker 1: I just think it's so so vital.
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  Speaker 2: I find it intriguing that kids of tech execs they
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  Speaker 2: don't even allow their kids on devices, let alone on
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  Speaker 2: social media. Like, yeah, they're meshed, completely embedded in this community.
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  Speaker 2: They know the magnitude of what our children are being
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  Speaker 2: bombarded with.
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  Speaker 1: I've heard the podcast interviews, I've read the articles where
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  Speaker 1: they've been quoted directly as saying, yeah, no tech for
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  Speaker 1: our kids in school, no tech in their bedrooms. We
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  Speaker 1: don't give our children access to smartphones until they're at
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  Speaker 1: least sixteen. I mean, these are the people who are
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  Speaker 1: making the poison for your children to consume. They won't
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  Speaker 1: fit in their own kids and it.
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  Speaker 2: Just breaks my heart, like, where's the humanity in that.
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  Speaker 1: I won't say who told me this, but I was
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  Speaker 1: speaking to somebody who is very connected in the technology world,
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  Speaker 1: and they indicated to me that Meta and the other
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  Speaker 1: big platforms are absolutely furi as terrified that this legislation
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  Speaker 1: will end up being enacted by the end of the year.
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  Speaker 1: And I think that's because they will have less access
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  Speaker 1: to rewire kids' brains at that most impressionable stage.
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  Speaker 2: Well, if we go back to Charlie's story, this mum
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  Speaker 2: and her teenage daughters trapped in a room because she
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  Speaker 2: won't come out. The only reason they won't take that
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  Speaker 2: story down is because it's clickbait. Yeah, it's literally getting
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  Speaker 2: traffic yep, millions and millions of.
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  Speaker 1: Views, captures attention, brings people in devastating I was thinking
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  Speaker 1: about it, though, Kylie. No one ever has said to me, Oh,
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  Speaker 1: you know that weekend, that Saturday afternoon where we all
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  Speaker 1: just sat on the couch, didn't talk, but we watched YouTube,
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  Speaker 1: or we all played our games, or we all looked
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  Speaker 1: at our Instagram reels. That was the best Saturday afternoon ever.
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  Speaker 1: Nobody ever says that was the best weekend. Ever, just
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  Speaker 1: love that we should do that more often stare at
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  Speaker 1: our phones and ignore each other.
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  Speaker 2: At the beginning of the podcast, you preface with the
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  Speaker 2: idea that in time, our children will actually thank us,
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  Speaker 2: actually tell us that they appreciate the boundaries and the
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  Speaker 2: rules that we placed around them in an effort to
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  Speaker 2: protect them.
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  Speaker 1: Yet real parenting solutions every day. We're going to get
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  Speaker 1: the solutions in a sec How do we make that happen.
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  Speaker 2: Our eldest daughter, I can't tell you how many times
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  Speaker 2: I've heard her talking to her younger sisters when they're
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  Speaker 2: having a big winge about us and telling them that
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  Speaker 2: she knows how frustrating it is. She's lived it. But
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  Speaker 2: she also recognizes now that she's in the position she is,
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  Speaker 2: that we're only doing what's necessary to protect them. And
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  Speaker 2: on top of that, she now has an almost two
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  Speaker 2: year old who she will not let watch the TV.
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  Speaker 2: The only time she gets to use the phone is
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  Speaker 2: if she's first timing Lolly or her other grandma, And
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  Speaker 2: I just it just blows my mind because that kid,
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  Speaker 2: Holy smokes, she came as hell when it came to
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  Speaker 2: social media and phone usage.
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  Speaker 1: Quick context check as well. When you say that the
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  Speaker 1: baby at granddaughter gets to use the phone to FaceTime Lolly.
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  Speaker 1: For those who have missed the memo, You're Lolly and
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  Speaker 1: I'm Pops because we like the idea of lollipop because
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  Speaker 1: we're sweet. Hey after the break. More on how Charlie
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  Speaker 1: Brown says you can get sixteen year olds to say hey, thanks,
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  Speaker 1: really glad we had tech boundaries in my interview with
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  Speaker 1: Charlie Brown. The full episode, by the way, we'll drop
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  Speaker 1: on Saturday in our special weekend edition of the Happy
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  Speaker 1: Families podcast. Charlie Brown, of course, the CEO of g ME.
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  Speaker 1: GM is the company behind the GME connect Pro. You
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  Speaker 1: can get it for one hundred and forty nine instead
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  Speaker 1: of one hundred and eighty nine dollars using the code
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  Speaker 1: happy at gme dot com. Charlie shared this story about
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  Speaker 1: his sixteen year old daughter.
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  Speaker 3: We're talking about parenthic controls and not letting our eleven
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  Speaker 3: year old and thirteen year old do certain things and
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  Speaker 3: the sixteen year old. This was in the car were
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  Speaker 3: family five were in the car. Sixteen year old turns
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  Speaker 3: the eleven and twelve and the thirteen year old who
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  Speaker 3: are complaining about the print controls and not being allowed
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  Speaker 3: access to this. As she said, Look, it's really annoying
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  Speaker 3: what dad's job is.
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  Speaker 4: But you get to my age and you look back
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  Speaker 4: on when I was at your age, and you actually think, Yeah,
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  Speaker 4: there's a lot of merit and what mom and dad
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  Speaker 4: was saying, and I'm better off for it.
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  Speaker 1: And this voice of experience. Love it, Kylie. I love
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  Speaker 1: stories like that. And I'm sure that every parent's saying,
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  Speaker 1: but how how am I supposed to get that?
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  Speaker 2: The most important thing that we have done with our
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  Speaker 2: children is include them in the decision making process. Our
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  Speaker 2: children want the autonomy to make choices, and as we
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  Speaker 2: work with them, we actually have to trust that they
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  Speaker 2: have the capacity to recognize and see why we're doing
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  Speaker 2: what we're doing.
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  Speaker 1: I love the way you've used those words. One of
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  Speaker 1: my favorite studies ever is a study by no One
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  Speaker 1: Cares but Landry and colleagues who were looking at this
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  Speaker 1: idea of what they call organismic trust. In other words,
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  Speaker 1: do you trust that innately inside your child they have
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  Speaker 1: the desire and the ability to grow in healthy ways
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  Speaker 1: towards flourishing. If you have that innate trust, what that
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  Speaker 1: does is it changes the way that you parent them.
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  Speaker 1: Instead of being controlling and feeling like you need to
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  Speaker 1: come in with correction and direction constantly to keep them
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  Speaker 1: on track, you're able to, I guess, loosen the controls
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  Speaker 1: a little bit and work with them rather than do
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  Speaker 1: things to them. So what you step into instead is
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  Speaker 1: what's known as need supportive parenting. You build the relationship,
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  Speaker 1: you give them credit for having a brain, and you
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  Speaker 1: work on solutions together. It doesn't mean that you let
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  Speaker 1: them do whatever they want. It's not like you're saying, well,
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  Speaker 1: you've you've got a prefrontal cortex too, why don't you
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  Speaker 1: just do what you think? It's not total freedom and independence,
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  Speaker 1: but rather it's saying, okay, this is tricky. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: we're going through it with a couple of our kids
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  Speaker 1: at the moment. This is a trick stage. You want
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  Speaker 1: something that we're not comfortable with you having. How can
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  Speaker 1: we work out a way that you can have it
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  Speaker 1: and we can feel good about it? Or alternatively, what's
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  Speaker 1: a space in between that gets you feeling like you're
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  Speaker 1: moving towards it but you're not quite there yet, but
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  Speaker 1: we can loosen the reins a little bit. So it's this,
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  Speaker 1: it's the give and take of relationship.
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  Speaker 2: And the reality is this isn't a one done conversation.
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  Speaker 2: This conversationally, this conversation is happening pretty much every other month.
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  Speaker 1: Oh sometimes it feels like it's every other day. Honestly,
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  Speaker 1: I mean it's draining. Raising kids can be draining.
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  Speaker 2: We can't shy away from them. These conversations are so important.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, they are. The full interview drops on Saturday.
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  Speaker 1: We'd love for you to listen to what Charlie Brown
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  Speaker 1: has to say in detail about the way tech is
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  Speaker 1: affecting kids and how we can find ways to guide
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  Speaker 1: our children navigate them through the tech maze successfully and safely.
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  Speaker 1: That's all happening on the Happy Families podcast on Saturday.
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  Speaker 1: A whole lot more fascinating conversation points and parenting solutions
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  Speaker 1: for you then. The Happy Families Podcast is produced by
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Justin Roland from Bridge Media. If you'd like more information
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: and more resources, including videos about how you can help
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: keep your kids safe online, visit us at happyfamilies dot
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: com dot a u