Try as I might, I think there’s no saving my son from modern technology. It’s ubiquitous, seductive and deeply ingrained in every aspect of middle-class life. Worse yet, I’m also addicted. When do I not have my iPhone out, desperately scrolling through a suite of apps, hoping they’ll offer me some manner of comfort from the security of my living room couch? Hours go by as I’m practically begging someone to notice me on Instagram, while he’s skipping from brainrot videos to basketball tutorials on our internet-connected TV. Ten years ago, I might have witnessed a scene like that and thought it was a sign of the end times. We’ve lost our way so much as a culture that a parent and a child can be simultaneously subsumed by screens, barely noticing the other person. But at some point, everyone realizes that the battle is lost. This is just how it is.
In spite of that grim diagnosis, Keir Starmer – who turned snatching defeat from the jaws of victory his personal brand – has made this losing battle a signature issue. This week, the British prime minister announced a comprehensive ban on social media for children under the age of 16. That includes Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, X, Snapchat and YouTube (though not the kids’ version). The ban is modeled on one currently deployed in Australia, which has holes wide enough to drive a fleet of vintage Sherman tanks through. Teenagers in Australia are finding ways around their ban already, and of course they are. When I was 15, if I wanted a six-pack of Budweiser or some of those tiny airplane liquor bottles, I could figure it out.
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The UK will try the policy anyway, swearing that their social media ban is tougher. “Australia-plus”, as it was described by Starmer, like it’s an esoteric streaming service that only shows rugby and Crocodile Dundee movies. We must applaud the attempt, even if it’s plainly quixotic. Restrictions on underage drinking and cigarettes might not prevent every kid from picking up a bad habit, but what would it say about our society if we didn’t bother trying? Still, I’m fully aware that keeping my kid off social media until the day he turns 16 is about as likely as him reading the entirety of James Joyce’s Ulysses. First of all, he hasn’t even started yet. Second, he’s reading at a third-grade level. Because he’s in third grade.
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I suppose I could model better behavior for him. I could put my phone away. I could drag him outside for an aimless walk. I could force him into some elaborate arts-and-crafts project that I will then have to clean up after he’s done. Maybe we could pretend to be fairies in the forest and sprinkle invisible pixie dust on each other? We could, but I don’t want to do any of those things. I want to share this clip from La Dolce Vita on my Stories. What if a beautiful woman likes it and messages me? Oh, wouldn’t that be a fine thing?
Of course, as I’m modeling neurotic, digitally corrupted behavior, my son peers over to see what’s so damned important. “I’m on Instagram,” I blurt out, turning sharply to shield my shame from his view. He doesn’t need to know I’m a sad, middle-aged single man. Or at least he doesn’t need to know right now. When I text friends about the “depths of my solitude”, he has to peek. Fortunately, the only texts he really cares about are the ones I send to his mother, which are far more normal. Things like “yes, we’re watching YouTube again” or “he wants a Lamborghini because he saw one in a YouTube video.”
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“Lambos are cool, Dad,” he’ll say, slyly picking up my subtle frustration. You know what isn’t cool? Significant credit card debt. The thing that social media and online video has done the most with my son is make him not understand the basic tenets of capitalism as I know them. When I was his age, I understood that money comes from work. That work affords you a salary, which can be really high or really low. What you can afford is dictated by the boundaries of your bank account. YouTube has obliterated the concept of financial hierarchy. It says: you can have whatever you want in life as long as you have enough rizz, that you farm the requisite amount of aura. Success, according to YouTube, is not tied to work. It’s about clout. And maybe that’s true these days, and that’s why I don’t own a sports car. Can’t get many aura points if you’re too busy updating your Hinge profile.
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In some twisted, dystopian way, our form of online parallel play is like bonding for the modern age. We watch YouTube on TV, which means no easily visible comments section, no trolls. Just a lean-back TV watching experience, though one more chaotic than what I grew up with. My parents sat down to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation with me every week, and even though we were practically mute for an hour every Saturday, they were at least showing an appreciation for my interests. Watching YouTube with my son might be the 21st-century version of that. Instead of restrictions or draconian surveillance, I sit there with him while he watches a guy get hit in the groin with a Slim Jim-branded baseball bat to win $15,000.
At least we’re doing it together. At least we’re both sufficiently curious about the other’s technological addiction that we can be skeptical. Why is my son watching baseball bat punishment videos? And why am I doomscrolling and hoping to meet “single women in your area”? Perhaps the only thing that will break the cycle of social media addiction isn’t an elaborate law, but the basic shame of transparency. Whenever my son peers over my shoulder to ask me what I’m doing, I’m snapped out of my own neuroses and placed back into reality. I suffer a bit of embarrassment, then stow my phone back in my pocket. The lure of the infinite void of the internet will come back soon enough, but for at least a moment, my son and I can share a bit of joy. This is the life, I say, as we watch a woman eat a handful of Pop Rocks and brush her teeth.
