Kids Use Mobile Phones Too Much? Send 'Em To A Mental Hospital
from the seems-a-bit-extreme dept
We've noted in the past the, well, addiction some people have to calling any sort of regular usage of something an "addiction." It's quite common with all sorts of technologies. Often there doesn't seem to be any actual evidence of an addiction -- or, if there is, it usually becomes clear that the problem is somewhere else, and the people simply turn to technology to avoid that other issue in their lives. Either way, it still seems a bit extreme to hear that, in Spain, parents have sent two children, aged 12 and 13, to a mental hospital to try to help "cure them" of their mobile phone "addiction." As parents, what was wrong with just taking away their mobile phone?
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: addiction, mental hospital, mobile phones, uk
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
You can't cure addict by "taking away"
Human mind is quite complicated thing, and as being such, it can develop addiction to various things/objects/activities. There are sex addicts, gambling, running, killing, cleaning etc etc etc.
Mike, if you unfamiliar with the subject, why write nonsense?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: You can't cure addict by "taking away"
And it isn't "nonsense" to use taking-away as a first step towards determining the true depth of the problem.
The bigger issue here appears to be that the parents waited until the problem got so bad that grades were drastically affected. Now it is possible that the parents are using the addiction centre as a point of last resort, but if so that information is a major gap in the reporting.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: You can't cure addict by "taking away"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
I consider myself to be liberal, and I say punish the damn parents if they can't control their own offspring. If taking away a 12 year old's phone (a luxury item for a kid if ever there was one) causes so many problems, something has gone very wrong in the last 12 years of raising the child.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
So, Paul, in answer to your question, one of the stereotypes of liberals is that they like to take responsibility for one's behavior off of the individual, and blame it instead on some vague condition, predisposition, or disadvantage. I think this has less to do with liberal/conservative arguments than it has to do with whether someone is afflicted by what I call the "victim complex." That is, people who look for reasons to be victims. They exist througout the whole spectrum of politics. However, I do think it is accurate to say that they are more often attracted to the liberal side because of the more socialist, "government-should-take-care-of-me" attitude that persists in many outspoken liberals.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
You mean, like "god" or "acts of nature"?
I don't think those are liberals....
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re:
I never said I agreed with the stereotype. I simply said it exists.
Personally, I think I made it clear that I think such stereotypes are ridiculous, and no different, really, than racism. They are just directed at a different trait. Just like your own assumption that conservatives blame their problems on "god" or "acts of nature". ("Acts of nature" - huh??)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
I don't view "conservatives" as being bound to that stereotype. Heck I even like a few "conservatives".
Though many who portray that stereotype like to consider themselves as "conservative", it just so happens that those people tend not to be very conservative in their thinking (growing governments, eroding of rights, keep the children safe, but-it's-okay-when-i-do-it, etc...)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Unfortunately, a good portion of the population let the pundits do their thinking (and voting) for them.
The environment can be spun either way: conservatives could rally around the potential economic gains or the potential economic losses. But pundits have labeled it a "liberal hippie issue" and avoid any serious discussion beyond the "celebrity" the environment issue has gained.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
This is extreme...
even if you cant cure an addict by "taking away," The major point in the article is that there are few people addicted to the phone. They are just trying to avoid other social/mental problems. And honestly why would you send your kid to a mental institution just cause he's running up the phone bill with texting? That's just not logical in itself
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: This is extreme...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: This is extreme...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Inconclusive
That could mean two things; either the parents have no control over their kids at all, or whatever is going on is causing behaviour unusual enough to warrant some sort of addiction counselling.
The problem with articles like this is that a lot of context is lost in favour of sensationalism, and this gets a reaction from people with pro-tech perspectives that are sick of modern technology getting blamed for all of society’s problems.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Kids; cell phones
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Kids; cell phones
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Depends
It is hard to say if the parents could have really done anything. I mean, when a child has a psychological addiction (gambling, sex, etc.) it is hard to reason with them without professional help.
I guess what I am saying is nobody here knows how bad it was, so to automatically call these people bad parents is asinine and very foolish.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
> "liberals" when something happens or an opinion is held that
> they don't agree with?
Whoa! That's the conservatives you're talking about, not Americans in general. It's their limited intellect and diminished capacity for logic and reason that makes them attack ideas they don't understand or agree with. Unfortunately, there's a lot of them here and they can vote.
Point is, don't blame all Americans for the behaviour of some of our citizens.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
My parents are staunch liberals. My grandparents are even stronger conservatives. I love them all, and neither is a better or worse person. This is America. It is okay for someone to disagree with you. You don't have to hate them for it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
As for this article, the kids appear to be "addicted" to constant connection with others. That may, in fact, be a phenomenon on the horizon. When I first had a cell phone people got mad at me for not always having it turned on. We are expected to use our ability to be connected to stay connected 24/7. Left unchecked this idea becomes the behavior manifested in the two children.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Liberals and Conservatives
You make a good point that not all Americans should be blamed for the actions of a few.
However, this argument can be aplieded to the liberals as well. There are liberals who would say that "this is a genetic predisposition towards cell phone addiction", however this is not what all liberals belive.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Ummm...
Landlines aren't cheap. They're about $30/month, with asinine long distance fees for calling someone 20 miles away. Compare to cell phones which are usually $40/month with anything in your country considered to be a local call, and assume you want to call even one person that doesn't live right next to you, and the cell phone is cheaper. Personally, I ditched my landline for a cell phone, not the other way around.
Also, most cell phone companies offer accounts with a spending limit on them, so you can block your kid from running up a bill - whereas you can't do that if he decided to talk to a friend on the other side of the country for a few hours while getting billed by the minute on your landline. If you don't think he HAS friends on the other side of the country, then you clearly aren't very familiar with the internet. :)
There's nothing wrong with a kid having a cell phone - sure, he most definitely doesn't need one, but he doesn't need most of his toys either. The key, as with all things, is decent parenting and exercising moderation.
We don't have the full details of the story, but we DO know that grades were falling for months before the parents acted, and that's just plain bad parenting. Yes, there's flukes where a kid will flunk a single test and otherwise do fine in school... but when it's consistent failing for weeks straight, obviously there's a problem somewhere, and the parents should be trying to fix it - not waiting until it's so bad that they want to commit the kid.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Talking in Class
Kids today can now easily text each other and appear as if they are paying attention in class. So it might be harder and take a bit longer to figure out the kid isn't paying attention then it would before cell phones. I would tend to think it's more a attention deficit order or hyper activity that is causing their behavior and the phone is just the means. It's just modern age note passing.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Addiction...
We don't ever have to worry about it here. It's not a matter of blame, parents, liberals, or conservatives. I speak of the One True Enemy, the Evil Empire, the (mis)managed behavioral healthcare insurers.
One whiff of trying to admit anyone for an addiction will generate a hearty laugh and a suggestion to go to an AA group meeting.
In good old America, you can't get into the Happy Place unless you're prepared to kill yourself. Merely saying so isn't good enough either - you have to tell them HOW you want to do it and that you want to do it NOW.
Since cell phone addiction probably ranks somewhere under suicide in the Insurance Manual, you don't stand a chance.
This happy news brought to you by Congress and their mental health parity legislation. The only way mental/physical will get parity is if the E/R has to get a precert to cast your broken leg and it gets denied.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]