> Further, why would any parents allow their children to watch them?

Do you have children?

This is one of those things where when you're talking about it or thinking about it, it's common sense. Of course you're not going to let them watch TV! Or Youtube!

But then when you have a kid who is _just_ not stopping to cry, and you happen to be working from home this one day, and can't afford a babysitter or daycare, and you're tired and terribly sleep-deprived, you ... just resign to it, you give them your smartphone and off they merrily go and you're a little bit of a headache free, for now.

Or you realize that the theory isn't that important after encountering families who don't let their children watch TV and observing bad behavior. And encountering families who allow outrageous TV watching and noticing good behavior.

Anecdotes are not data.

There's not any data either: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/screen-time-for-kids-is....

Parenting is not a data driven activity. It's an art because children are people not statistics.

I have four kids and outright banned YouTube in our house after that elsagate article in the nyt. I just don't have the time or desire to monitor what YouTube decides to show them.

With Netflix I have a much better idea of what they're seeing. Plus they will watch an entire show with a beginning mine middle and end on Netflix.

When they asked why no more YouTube I told them I didn't want them seeing ads and that Netflix is enough.

I guess that's a long way of saying that it's possible to hand your kid a smart phone to get them out of your hair without involving YouTube.

I can't tell if this is an intentional strawman but you are in no way addressing the question.

There is literally millions of hours of high quality content to distract children that is not commercial. In fact, young children will happily watch the same thing over and over again.

So why allow them to watch low quality commercial content?

Personally, I literally don't know of a single kid that's allowed to watch YouTube. Trust me, they don't run out of things to watch without it.

I think the GP was asking about letting kids watch ad-sponsored youtube channels.

Lots of parents end up having that time to use screen time as a crutch.

I just avoid the most egregious sources, like youtube.

Netflix, Amazon, HBO, and my personal collection of Disney & Pixar films, all have enough kids content that if I need that extra help, I can go towards.

My mother solved the TV problem easily: don't have a TV in the house. Of course cellphones are now TVs, so that's a bit harder. But -- and I know I'll get down votes for writing this -- you as a parent are supposed to be in control. If I cried over something dumb like this, I'd absolutely be having a painfully intimate moment with a ruler, belt or hand. I say this as a 27 year old: these days parents are afraid to physically discipline their kids, and then wonder what's wrong with their kids.

Consensus among scientists seems to be that physical discipline is less effective.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/04/spanking.aspx

What does hitting your kid when they cry resolve? A kid doesn't get to watch TV. They cry. They still don't get to watch TV. They get used to it and stop crying. Why does hitting need to be involved?

Does your boss hit you when your less productive at work?

I think we have arrived at a significant culture clash.

I believe that whipping children is quite bad and, on its face, substantially worse than allowing children to watch videos of other children happily playing with toys.

Violence begets violence. Using violence teaches kids to be violent, aggressive and anti-social even under the guise of discipline. This is well known in child development. It also doesn't work. Even the worst behaviors can be managed effectively without resorting to violence.

At least where I live you would get cops called on you for spanking your kid. Lots of people are against it and view it as child abuse, so even if you view it as acceptable society will punish you for carrying out the corporal punishment.

Study after study has shown that spanking kids has detrimental effects on behavior later on. The solution you're advocating is the exact same trade-off you're deriding: gaining compliance now for negative consequences later.

I'm advocating nothing, as I don't really have a personal opinion on soanking. OP implied that people didn't spank their kids out of ignorance. I was just pointing out that there are forces preventing people from spanking their kids, even if they want to do so

> If I cried over something dumb like this, I'd absolutely be having a painfully intimate moment with a ruler, belt or hand

Children, especially very young children, cry over dumb things; it's normal and expected and beating them for it is both cruel and (as mountains of evidence have shown) counterproductive developmentally.

That's not to say parents should give in to tantrums, they should not. But there is a vast space between giving in to tantrums and beating children for them, and it's somewhere in that space that good parenting lies.

Yeah I had parents that thought way. Eventually I had enough of it and gave it right back to them. Think about that before you start a family.

This is absolutely right, but we live in a neutered society. Parents are absolutely worried about having the cops called on them if they strike their children, even in a an appropriate disciplinary manner. Also we've had years of experts telling us not to discipline our children. Result, unruly children who become unruly adults.

So if I don't "strike" my children, I'm not disciplining them? My kids would beg to differ. They are incredibly well-behaved, and I have never physically hurt them as punishment.

You can discipline without resorting to violence. People do it everyday in school, workplace, and all manners of life. I'm not sure why violent discipline is ok when it comes to children.

I'm not up to date on the research on corporal punishment, but isn't the obvious distinction that adults can respond to rational incentives, and children cannot?

Scientists seem to take a strong stand against corporal punishment, but I do have to say, as an Asian dude I know _lots_ of Asian people (well really everyone from Asia) who are brilliant (engineers, surgeons, businessmen) and seem mentally fine and well and they were disciplined physically both at home and school.

My pet theory is that since in school environments physical punishment was distributed "equally", that's not as bad.

I really wonder how far back corporal punishment dates in the west, and whether brilliant people like Einstein ever received physical punishment.

How is that obvious? I have two kids that respond quite well to rational incentives. On the other hand some adults I know respond to irrational incentives all the time.

That is a difference (well past the teens, even, to an extent), and even without the piles of research on the harmful effects of corporal punishment on children, it should be immediately obvious from that difference why corporal punishment of children (whose entire theory is demonstrating an unacceptably high cost of the course of action) makes less, not more, sense than corporal punishment of adults.

Children are absolutely rational when you present the incentives appropriately.

I once saw a mother in a grocery store with her two little ones in the cart. The older child smacked the smaller one. The mother quickly smacked the older child and said emphatically "We! Don't! Hit!"

It doesn't take a scientific study to realize that teaching children not to be violent by punishing them with violence is confusing. Especially to a small child.

She was just too tired to be logical.

And what makes you think that the generation of “spanked” kids grew up as a well behaving individuals? As far as I see there is less violence nowadays compared to times before

Violent crime is down from the 1990's, but still double what it was in the 1950's: http://www.newgeography.com/content/003799-crime-down-urban-....

Your cite starts in the 60s not the 50s and it is for total crime rather than violent crime. Violent crime is about the same now as it was in the 60s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States

Is there any real difference between this and targeting children with advertisements on good old fashioned TV?

It probably isn't, but isn't that awful, too? One thing I have noticed over the last ten years is how much quieter it is in my home than my parents' house when I was growing up. Not people, but advertising. I actively notice (and reject) advertisements when I'm exposed to them today because I've largely built my habits around things that are not trying to sell things to me.

Bathing children in constant upsells and advertising seems like a really bad idea to me.

Here in Norway, advertising towards children is actually banned (at least for TV). Some channels get around this by broadcasting from other countries (ironically the ones that show the most cartoons), but at least there was a conscious effort made at one point.

> It probably isn't, but isn't that awful, too?

Sure, but it's something we've been doing for decades. And I can't really blame parents for keeping kids occupied the easy way for a few hours at a time.

Being something we've been doing for decades is no reason to continue, though.

I'm not blaming parents. This is a collective problem. We killed Joe Camel; we can kill other ads designed to mess with kids' brains, too.

It depends on what you mean by "old fashioned TV." Until the 1990's advertising for products for children primarily was structured around the "Gatekeeper Model." The advertisement was focused on selling the product to both the child and their parents. In A Christmas Story Ralphie is asking adults for the Red Ryder. He even pens an essay to provide a reasoned case. He grudgingly lives with "You'll put your eye out, kid" as having legitimacy.

In the 1990's advertisers started marketing directly to children in a different way. Recommend, Born to Buy: The Commercialized Child and the New Consumer Culture

https://www.amazon.com/Born-Buy-Commercialized-Consumer-Cult...

There are some pretty strict rules about advertising to kids and this is one way to fly under that radar. It is also why these people make as much money as they are.

There are limits to how much you can advertise to children on TV nowadays. It's one of the reasons Saturday morning cartoons died.

I didn't know Saturday morning cartoons had died. But surely the huge volume of content on Netflix et al played a role?

Which is outlawed in some countries (e.g. Sweden)

In my region, commercials were shown for evening shows/sitcoms. I forgot the name but pens and jrking were mentioned as part of the teaser. This happened more than once. So, I don't think they realise...

I do not allow anymore, as this is seen as a spoiled kid with too many toys/attention in our house. We rather focus on having toys that last, like Lego. The way this is portrayed is subliminal as the kids are unaware of it being sponsored. The real show or review element is hardly there.

Although, some stuff I easily allow, like coilbook, super simple songs or race grooves or some stop motion videos...

Kids cartoon TV shows are essentially longform mechandising gambits, with kid-oriented advertisements on top, so it wouldn't be entirely out of bounds.

Not much different from cartoons/channels targeted at children on television IMO.

I haven't been able to read the article due to the paywall.

This is about incentive. You buy toys and books for kids and they are monetized, aren't they?

My friend and I work on a "life hacks" YT channel together because we can take our minds off of work on the weekend as we be creative with new hacks and editing videos. We don't think we will generate revenue, but we do hope one day we will because props do cost money.

We have a friend who's a full time mother. Like us, She started a YT channel to share with people how to make new toys as an interest. It took one video to go viral and now she has over 50K subscribers and she makes decent income.