They are part of the resistance. A rare bird of families that have not given in to the unwritten rule that boys and girls must start secondary school with a cell phone under their arm. Or in the backpack. Xabier has started first year of ESO without a device and his parents are clear that she will not have one until she reaches third year, despite being one of the only four students in class who does not yet have one. G. and A. are twins, they are in the third year of ESO and just a week ago their family decided to give them their cell phone. They were the only ones in the classroom without him. And they will also have to wait until the penultimate year of secondary school – just like what happened with their two older sisters – Silvia and Salva, who have just started second year, but who are eager to take the step to life with a mobile phone with the vast majority of their classmates. and friends. The families of these young people have endured without succumbing to the cell phone too soon (85% of young people between 12 and 14, according to the INE) and trust that this kind of parental revolution against the imposition of the cell phone will invite reflection on the need to have a device of their own at an early age.
“Children without cell phones are freer children,” says Cristina Domingo, a 43-year-old teacher and mother of Xabier Barrachina. At the end of December he will turn 12 years old and he is one of the four students in his first year ESO class who still does not have a cell phone. And his parents' intention is for him not to have it until third grade. There is a lot of social pressure from colleagues, friends and even family to give Xabier the cell phone: "My father has told me that we are making a mess of him," says Domingo. And the boy would also want to, with the argument of "being more localized" but his parents insist that it is not his turn yet and he accepts it, recognizing that they are right. "We live eight minutes from the school and if something happens to him he can go into a bar to call us, as he already did once... There is no cabins, but good people who will help you if you need it,” says his mother.
This family assures that they operate out of necessity and consider that at this time Xabier “does not need” his cell phone. What most reaffirms them in his decision is his concern about bullying, which before the appearance of cell phones remained in the school environment, but now with smartphones it does not stop and follows you home, they explain.
The management of the emotions that social networks entail, among which Cristina Domingo counts WhatsApp, is what worries them the most because she considers that a child does not yet have the right head to deal with it and at an early age it is easy to "fall into a bad situation." use". Domingo regrets that in the last stages of primary school there are more and more children with telephones and calls it “nonsense” that at 10 years old they have “such a powerful tool that they do not know how to manage.” Despite this, she believes that children must be trained and educated in the technological world and given tools because they were born with a screen under their arm and they should know how to use it. For this reason, she is not in favor of banning cell phones before the age of 16, although she recognizes that “it has gotten out of hand.”
“From time to time he asks us to have a cell phone, but he knows that it is something non-negotiable,” explains Cristina, who reaffirms her idea of holding out until the end of the second. Xabier is a very “enjoyable” child, according to his mother, and he would like to be like the rest. But the reality is that he doesn't miss the phone. He neither wants nor needs social media, he explains. And he is not alien to this world nor does he feel isolated. For now, he uses his father's smartphone when he has to communicate punctually with a colleague. And he believes that those who, like him, do not have a cell phone, are more concentrated in class.
G and A have spent the first 14 years of their lives without a cell phone. “We live next to the school” and the boys have not complained about it excessively, says his mother, Laura Villarreal, a press agent. But for a week they have had it on the recommendation of A.'s psychologist, who considered that having the device would be positive for his social relationships because there was a risk that he would get "stuck." They recommended it to him and he has listened, but he points out that he has not succumbed to social pressure. A. has already joined her class's WhatsApp group, while G, who goes to a different school, has not yet seen the need.
The twins, like the rest of those interviewed, are not young people who are strangers to screens. They use a computer, tablet or video games, but always with supervision. A. and G. have never associated cell phone use with gaming and are not very into social networks, at least for now, says their mother. In the first year of ESO, 90% of classmates already had a mobile phone and some already had a device in primary school, but at home things “flowed naturally” and they have spent half of secondary school without a smartphone. They ended up being the only ones without a cell phone, but they did not feel “neither strange nor pressured” in part because if at a given moment they needed it, they used Laura's phone to ask questions about homework, for example. In addition, they have been instilled in them that mealtime is sacred and phones are not part of it. “We have always separated screen space from real life and we are very much about table space,” explains the mother. And any use of screen is done in this house, in the dining room “nothing about being locked in the room.”
Silvia and Salva go to the same school as Xabier, in the Barcelona neighborhood of Sant Andreu. They are in their second year of ESO and a priori they still have a year left before they can have a cell phone. There are four siblings and with the two oldest – one goes to university and the other is in high school – they already did it this way, says their mother, Marta Selvi, a doctor by profession. “We have never believed that it is necessary to start high school,” she explains. Silvia – in her class there are two more classmates without a smartphone – would love to have a mobile phone. She also saved Salva – with only one classmate in the classroom in the same situation – although she believes that not having him, she has also left them out of some “troubles” with the telephone, something that her mother certifies.
Their option is to wait until third grade because it is from the age of 14 when they can legally use social networks, explains Marta. With this decision they believe they are keeping them “safe from communication through networks.” They use screens, but “cold communication” is limited, in which “vapid conversations” occur, the mother describes. They can use their parents' devices for specific “concrete” things, but they don't allow for much interaction.
Silvia and Salva's parents have already suffered to remain firm with their older daughters. She remembers that the second wrote as a wish for the end of high school “to have a 4th phone” and Marta recognizes that the young woman did not live well with her decision because she felt that it “left her out of adolescence.” Despite her idea of not being mobile until third grade, Marta and her husband Salva are now at the point where, with great sadness, they are considering that perhaps they will end up “giving up.” Not because of social pressure, but because they believe that, especially for Silvia, having a mobile phone can help her. The debate is on the table and it is the father, who is an educator at an institute and sees “the negative things” about the cell phone every day, who is most reluctant to hand over the cell phone before the agreed time.
“They don't need it at all: neither academically nor socially or familiarly,” says Desconect@ psychologist Marc Masip, who “urgently” demands state laws that govern the minimum age of access to technology and certain websites.” At the same time, Masip calls for pedagogy in educational centers and also to train adults so that they can educate the youngest.
A. and G.'s phone number “belongs to their parents,” emphasizes Laura Villarreal. It is a transfer that they make to their children. When at a mothers' dinner, the rest of the families learned that Laura's children did not have a cell phone, they could not believe it. They, she says, are “desperate” to get their boys hooked. They were also concerned about the pornography images that began to circulate in WhatsApp groups from the beginning. And violence. In Laura's case, they try to talk about issues related to sexuality as naturally as possible. In many aspects she has followed the advice of Álvaro Bilbao, an author with whom she maintains contact for professional reasons and who believes that he has helped her on a path that she recognizes that his children have made easy for her. He remembers that before taking the step, “the teachers told me that if they didn't claim it, I should throw it away.” Also at Xabier's institute they congratulate the family for resisting without a cell phone.
The families consulted are not in favor of prohibiting the use of mobile phones, but they think that having one too soon is still not appropriate. “Xabier is still a child,” says Cristina. Laura wants her children to be aware of the time they invest in networks. “We have the obligation to form ourselves as a family because the screen is an electronic pacifier,” she claims. And her children are clear that the phone is left outside the room at bedtime. The debate has been open for some time and in the class of one of her children, now the families are voting not to let them have the phone in class. “It seems like we want to pull back now,” she explains. Marta doesn't want vetoes either, but she does reflect on “what we put in the hands of children.”
The use of screens also came to Xabier later than the rest: when he was 10 years old. And now on Friday afternoons you can choose between tablet, Nintendo or going out. And he always chooses to leave. His parents do not believe in parental controls and regret that society has become very “paternalistic” and that it is necessary to “trust.” They know that it is a bit of a utopia to think that their child will not have a cell phone until they are 14 or 15, but they are clear that now it is time to "endure the pull" because "society needs more parents to rebel and see that there is no need …Children should be children,” claims his mother.
