Robin Barfield wonders if Christian parents are sometimes a little too negative on the impact of smart phones and social media. For an alternative perspective click here.
How do you feel about smartphones and social media? Does it fill you with panic or have you not really thought about it? Many parents that I have spoken to land on one side or other of the controlling/permissive line – either they just want to ban them, or they give an unprotected smart phone to their 5-year-old. These are thorny issues which many of us are deeply divided over.
What do we need to think?
First, we need to ask what are we dealing with here? When it comes to technology, the Bible is both positive, negative and redeeming. It’s positive when we read of God telling Noah to build a boat which will bring salvation. It’s negative just a few chapters later when people build a tower at Babel, and rebel against God. But it is also redeemable – consider crucifixion, a hideous torture which God uses for salvation. Which is the smart phone?
Second, we need to ask what social media is doing. Primarily, it is doing two things: connecting and nurturing creativity. We connect with others by liking and interacting and commenting publicly and privately. We create by putting out words, images, videos which we hope represent the real us, or at least the ‘us’ that we want to show to the world. This means that the same gifts of offline life are available online (joy, friendship, self-expression), but so are the same problems (bullying, brokenness, sin). The problem is not social media – it’s us!
Third, we need to consider the variety of children God has created and what personality he has given to them. We may have introverts for whom this technology provides a world in which they can connect to others like them. We may have incredibly creative kids who produce remarkable works of poetry, song, dance or photography that expresses something wonderful of God’s world. We may also have kids who are very vulnerable to bullying which that connectivity might bring. We might have kids who are very vulnerable to the twisted creativity of sexual images.
What do we need to be?
for those who say it all causes a mental health decline, mental health is a huge and varied category. We cannot say that one large category directly causes a second large category
Perhaps you can see that we need to be more nuanced – are we wanting to ban smart phones or social media? And, if social media, which social media? Each platform has different ways of interacting and therefore different possibilities and dangers. Similarly, for those who say it all causes a mental health decline, mental health is a huge and varied category. We cannot say that one large category directly causes a second large category. There may be certain aspects of, say, Instagram, that have a negative impact on, say, self-image in certain young people. That is possible, although hard to prove. How we navigate these issues as parents will depend on the personalities and particular struggles of our children. For some, Instagram may be a curse like Babel and for others it may be a blessing like the Ark. For some families a smart phone may enable video calls with grandparents in a distant country, for others it may make them a target of predators.
What do we need to do?
Whatever children we have they will have to learn to navigate a world in which smart phones and social media are a normal way of interacting. Helping them to be wise online is like helping them to learn to be safe on the roads. It is part of growing up. Helping them to have integrity in life both on and offline is key – they are living a hybrid existence and part of growing in Christlikeness is for their unwatched life to please Jesus.
It is right to say ‘no’ to young children on a regular basis as they learn what is good for them. This changes as children grow into adolescence. There comes a stage where they need to learn from their mistakes, and we need to be there to pick up the pieces. Often as parents we want to keep control for too long and teens and tweens push back against those restrictions. They then become less likely to tell you when things go wrong.
younger generations who have grown up with this as normal have a more intuitive sense of how to behave and what the dangers might be
I am not saying this is easy. I have made many mistakes. Interestingly my children have made fewer, I think. From my experience, younger generations who have grown up with this as normal have a more intuitive sense of how to behave and what the dangers might be. As a parent we are given the responsibility to help our children to be wise online, to keep an open line of communication so that when things do not go well, they run to you for help.
The opportunities for this technology to be redemptive are huge. Just imagine for a moment that your child loves Jesus and, with your help, guidance and wisdom, learns to express their God given creativity online. How beautiful might that be? Imagine that they learn to be good neighbours online, showing love to the marginalised and care to the vulnerable. What opportunities might lie before them? Navigating the world as a parent has never been easy and this moment is no exception, but banning and becoming stricter is unlikely to have the effect we might desire.
Pete Killingley has given an alternative view here.
