Families who want to delay the arrival of mobile phones until the age of 16 have one of their references in the clinical psychologist Francisco Villar (Barcelona, 1976). He has just published How the screens devour our children (Herder) and is in favor of the ban based on the experience at the consultation.
How do they devour screens?
The raw material of technologies, which try to sell us things, is human time. And it is time that our scoundrel needs to develop. If you give them a screen for a ride without complaints, you rob them of the opportunity to train frustration tolerance.
His arguments inspire families who oppose mobile phones before the age of 16.
We all know how bad screens are. I can’t go along with guys trying to end their days, watch screens get in the way, and leave it at that.
It is necessary to educate them in terms of use.
It’s unreal to think that. The people who speak in favor of educating have not made educational programs or tested them, and they forget who they are dealing with: different applications that compete for people’s attention.
There are people who think that banning up to 16 years is not real.
If compulsory schooling is until the age of 16?!
Why do you bet on the 16?
The maximum peak of suicidal behavior is at 14 and 15 years.
Many appeal to parental responsibility.
This [ picks up phone ] is super powerful. They access porn, anyone who wants to hurt them. Do you give something to a child that is being cyberbullied and not immediately take it away? We have children locked up at home, who don’t want to go to school, who spend all day with a screen. It’s great to empower parents, but they feel overwhelmed by social pressure. And that makes us fight. The pediatricians say that the parents are the irresponsible ones. The parents, who “are the schools” and, the schools, who “are the parents”. Because the fights they manage in the school environment have been generated at twelve o’clock at night through social networks.
What prevents them from taking their mobile phone?
sleep little And we know how important sleep is for humans and during periods of evolution. And cyberbullying. You give him a cell phone to communicate with and the kid makes a humiliating meme and passes it to another classmate in outer space. A screen at home is a theft of family relationships. Teenagers are not wanted there. And, the more satisfied, the more the desire is eliminated. What is the problem with our children wanting something they will have when they grow up?
Is it at 16 years old that they have the ability to manage the mobile phone?
No, from 16 they have more capacity than at 15. I am in favor of parental controls until 18.
Networks are what worries families the most.
Digitization is not a simple thing. It traverses life in all aspects. The only thing the networks have done is cyberbullying. For a child to have a cell phone at the age of 12 generates cyberbullying and online sexual harassment. And the brain is deprogrammed. The human being must be able to read in depth. Reading tweets and headlines is not reading. You need to delve deeper into a text to be able to integrate it, so that it begins to generate a criterion for you. And if the protection measure for these devices is to set the date of birth… Parents and teachers demand that they give us legislative guidance to make it easy for us. This is everyone’s!
There are families who see it as an individual decision.
If they feel capable, let them do it. But there are people we need to give us a hand and legislate. In our socio-cultural context, mobile phones are a risk and bad for our children.
To legislate there must be a public health problem.
it is there And who doesn’t see it…
Does it put all screens on the same harmfulness scale?
No, because the mobile phone is clandestine. To the technologists I say: one, thank you, because you help me work. And, two, leave our young people alone! We will take care of it, to teach them. When the screens are removed, life springs forth.
The argument in favor is that they are not left out of this world.
Look, how they steal the story from us! It turns out that being connected to others is now being connected to a screen. To be connected is to look at each other, it is to see an emotional reaction from the other. If they can choose, they choose the mobile phone. And with all the criteria, because it is made to overcome the satisfaction that life gives you, at least immediately. In the end and in the long term, obviously not, because it is destroying you.
What kind of cases does he see?
All the guys I deal with cyberbullying I shouldn’t deal with. Girls who, when they see a humiliating video of them on all the networks, already say “this is not worth it”. Posted on the networks becomes impossible for the person to manage.
Will the ban come?
Yes. There are countries that already prohibit it. In Holland they have decided to ban it and give themselves a year to think about it. If it is not for suicide prevention…, let it be for the protection of privacy and fundamental rights. The mobile worsens their reading compression, performance and makes them relate less. It robs them of their sexuality and creates harassment.
