Yesterday, USA Today published an article titled “Kids’ electronic media use jumps to 53 hours a week.” In it, they reported that kids spend more than 53 hours a week with electronic media (cellphones, iPods, video games and computers)–that’s 7.5 hours/day! What do they do with electronic media? They listen to music, watch TV and movies, play video games, and hang out online. And they’re often doing 2 or more of these at the same time.
Interesting facts:
- African-American and Hispanic kids spend nearly one-third more time each day with electronics than white kids.
- Cellphone ownership has increased sharply since 2004, from 39% to 66%.
- Ownership of iPods has jumped even more since 2004, from 18% to 76%.
- 20% of kids’ media comes via mobile devices–most of which have no filtering capabilities.
And the more time kids spend with electronic media, the less face time they have with their parents and siblings. Stay tuned for tomorrow’s article “Does Electronic Media Make Kids Happy?”
These people are surrounded by adults who have no earthly clue what’s important to them, what they spend most of their time doing, who their friends are, or why they like any of it. Moreover, these adults consider this to be a problem not with themselves but with their children, and think that the solution is to become the familial version of a police state.
C.S. Lewis once said that the class of people you’d expect to be most opposed to escapism are jailers …
Please do forgive my rudeness. I’ll try to overlook the alarmism perhaps. >.>
The statistic about ipods is ridiculous. More evidence for Michael Crichton’s theory that our race and status on earth is not charactized by awareness, but conformity. >_>
The children of this next generation are going to be a bunch of girly-men(as Schwarzenegger says) more into pokémon than sports or anything worthwhile.
Or maybe I’m just being pessimistic. Good thing they’ll still at least have to serve missions and learn what the real world’s like, right?
Mr. Johnson: If you think sports are always more important to everyone than fantasy stories about taming animals, and call people who disagree “girly-men” and think that they’ll have to learn that they’re wrong and you’re right, then who exactly is the one pushing conformity here? And being oblivious and un-aware of the fact that some people are different?
Not all of the people out in the “real world,” who have to be taught on missions, are like you. And if you have such contempt for people who are different from you, how effective could you be as a missionary to them?
There are people who are driven away from the Church because they do not find Christlike love and understanding within it, and people with attitudes like the one that you demonstrated make this possible.
Mr. Spurbeck, I was being sarcastic. Thank you.
I am a computer/video game addict.
Electronic media is my career. But my wife and I attempt to limit media at home by not paying for cable or satellite and other forms of electronic entertainment. We limit computer time, and movies, and try to spend more time reading books to the kids and with the kids, and playing outside. But I must say, not having CNN on 24/7, or spending countless hours online and on twitter and keeping up with all the latest mediums of technology is hurting me at work. I can’t keep up with my co-workers who come into work knowing everything that’s happened that day. They are very connected with the outside world, and I feel I don’t have time.
In the working world, it’s become too competitive. We’re forced to be locked into technology. If we’re not, we can’t compete.
Any advice to survive in the media world and still find that quiet time we all need.
@Kevin Randall
It’s simple, just stop trying to keep up with them. The news you see on TV is only a glimpse of the world through a tiny lens. Just embrace the fact that you don’t submit your life to following every little story a media company deems worthy to show you. Look at it this way, if it’s important enough for you to know, you’re “uber-connected” colleagues will be sure to fill you in. Realize that it doesn’t really matter. You’re doing a great work and you cannot come down.