My 4 year old has a tablet, and I'm getting her a smart phone as soon as she can figure out how to text. She uses it to watch shows, draw, play games, facetime with her grandparents, look at family photos, etc.

Most of the "harms" of screen time disappear when adjusted for things like socio-economic status: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/screen-time-for-kids-is-... http://daily.jstor.org/screentime-feminist-issue. Basically, like most parenting advice, exhortations to limit kids' access to screens is based on pseudo-science and old wives' tales. It should not be taken seriously.

There will always be that kid at school or at a friend's house that DOES have access to these devices. We are already a paranoid, helicopter parent society as it is. Next step, strap kids into their beds and chairs and spoon feed them only what you want them to consume. Never let them leave home. Problem solved.

Cool. The idea is that theoretically, you're opening your kid's mind to more and more things under some degree of supervision. By the time they're looking up horrific or immoral stuff on their own or with friends, hopefully you've given them the tools to handle it. The idea isn't to stick a filter on their computer until they turn 18 and assume that there's no further parenting needed.

of course, how we parents didn't think of that before!

Many don't. Unfortunately.

Exactly. Unfortunately, this seems less usual than you would think.