It's very easy to say this if you're not a parent.

Social media does some harm. Being socially excluded does far _more_ harm. Which starts to happen in middle school.

So as a parent, you have three choices:

1. Deal with the emotional consequences of your kid being systematically excluded and having few/no friends.

2. Construct an alternative school/community with like-minded parents and kids.

3. Just give them the damn device, with screen time restrictions and the understanding that you'll be monitoring their activity. Follow through and be involved in their social life, with open and honest conversations about what happens online.

It turns out most good parents these days opt for #3.

This idea that not letting kids access social media is harmful is something I don't understand.

We don't allow our kids to use social media. Some of their friends do, and some of them do not.

Doesn't seem to be a problem in any way.

Your kid won't have no friends if they have no phone. They will be in school with other kids for 8 hours a day, no phone required for interaction. Pretty much all messaging apps work from computers as well if they need to talk to friends from home and you don't have a landline.

In fact, many schools are starting to ban phones on campus (for a variety of reasons, not just the negative aspects of social media), which makes this even easier.

Outside the classroom there are still plenty of in-person activities from informal gatherings, to sports teams, to clubs and civic events, and in those situations, the few people who are sitting on their phones are the ones more separated from the rest.

I think a lot of us who were early involved in building some of the web that led beyond Web 2.0 into algorithmically-driven media consumption see the massive dangers, and have probably sometimes even overreacted in terms of kids' access to it, but it's certainly better than the alternative.

I don't get how we got to the point where phones were allowed at school in the first place. Cell phones (though not smart phones) were around when I was a teenager and were universally banned in class and even in the hallways, except for emergencies. Even a non-smart phone is a huge distraction because of texting. Why were they unbanned?

Yeah and same with portable video game consoles, which of course smart phones are too.

Because helicopter parents that install surveillance apps on their child’s phone probably threw fits.

No probably about it. The schools are (were? I'm seeing a lot of school districts near me banning phones) trying to reduce friction with (troublesome) parents who demanded 24/7 direct communication and surveillance.

Your first sentence is true. The rest of it isn't remotely close to being true (starting in around 7th grade).

Your kid's school day changes to be much less after 7th grade? Which messaging app doesn't work from a computer?

I'm not speculating here, I am telling you how it works.

Phones ARE banned from school and the kids DO socialize in person there.

But then they all get home and stay in touch. Some have phones, some have tablets, some just their school-issued laptops. But they're constantly talking, 1:1, in various overlapping group chats. They organize getting together in the neighborhood or meeting up elsewhere over the weekend. It's where a lot of the drama happens (which isn't great.)

If you prevent your kid from accessing this communication layer, it will 100% affect their social life.

I'll find out in due time when my kids get older, but I think #1 is overblown due to #2. It probably varies by region, but there is so much demand for "back to the roots" where I live, that I don't think this will be as bad socially as you say. There will be other like-minded families, and the bonds between my kids and those families' will be more enriching and meaningful than the average, device-oriented ones.

Some degree of device pragmatism is inevitable of course. But I don't think my kids will need a smartwatch until high school, or a phone till very late HS. In other words, I think there is a balance of these options possible.

Jonathan Haidt gives a lot of hope here, as depressing as "Anxious Generation" usually is.

You can also talk to your kids candidly about social media. It's an amplifier of the issues they will have to face in middle school and growing up _anyway_, it's a conversation every parent should be having.

1.5. Same as #1 except turns out the kid has plenty of friends despite not having a smartphone

> Also making sure kids have friends in their community is a plus.

A lot of them coordinate hangouts via social media, unfortunately. It’s a tough balance.

Yup. This is what I see missing from all the non-parents or parents of kids under 10 on HN. Once middle school hits their whole friend/support system is probably on SnapChat and if you're not on there, you're instantly excluded from everything.

Imagine growing up without a phone in the 90s. That’s what these Luddite patents are advocating. It’s hard.

We actually have banned social media until 16, but fortunately iMessage was the defacto coordination and we accepted that.

No TikTok until adults, for a host of reasons.

Same here. Hard no on YouTube and TikTok. Sadly everything happens on SnapChat in their friend groups and SnapChat has a terrible TikTok style feed that I wish to god I could disable somehow. It adds nothing to the experience for actually socializing with one's friends group and is simply designed for mindless scrolling and consumption. I hate it.

But it's via the messaging component of a social media site, which is fine by itself. Nice how FB Messenger is its own app.