
Ask HN: How are you treating your child's internet addiction? - artur_makly
My son is 5yrs old.<p>His mom and I made a terrible mistake when he was around 2 to allow him to watch YT &amp; YTkids videos (which have a vicious algo of horrible content [1]). My wife and I are in tech, but we try our best to not use devices around him and promote &#x27;quality family time&#x27;.<p>But nothing helps.. His addiction grows, even though we forbid all phone use and their games ( which i was hesitant to do..as they were at least challenging him).<p>These days, all he asks for is to watch his netflix shows. Over and over.. like a crack addict..he simply can&#x27;t control his desires for the eye-cocaine.<p>We&#x27;ve tried setting strict time limits and rules for when he can watch them.. but it&#x27;s not helping.
The only thing left to do is purely ban it. But the cat is out of the bag and he took a huge dump.<p>Recently I discovered tech solutions like DNSlearning [2] which I feel is just starting to constructively attempt at finding a balance - I wish there was more being done.<p>Honestly I&#x27;m starting to get REALLY worried for him and society in general.<p>Everywhere I look, social quality, focus, reflection, empathy, and critical thinking - is exponentially dropping.<p>How do we as digital leaders&#x2F;parents&#x2F;inventors take on this challenge?!?<p>I&#x27;ve asked this on other parent forums[3]--no luck.<p>Are children are expecting responsible loving guidance.<p>Daddies, Mommas, what has worked for you??<p>[1] https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=14910125<p>[2] https:&#x2F;&#x2F;dnslearning.org<p>[3] https:&#x2F;&#x2F;parenting.stackexchange.com&#x2F;questions&#x2F;30073&#x2F;5yr-old-addicted-to-mobile-devices-need-advice
======
tarr11
Not to be (too) flippant, but this is your first child I assume?

I have no particularly good advice for you other than it'll work itself out,
and it's probably just a phase. When kids go to school, a lot of things
change.

Also, it is often a point of pride for parents to talk about restricting
screen time, how much their child reads, plays piano, is a star athlete, etc.

Parents often exaggerate to score points. :). This says more about parents and
less about children.

Personally, I don't think devices are either good or bad. Perhaps your child
actually loves some show and it gives them comfort. One thing to do is sit
there and watch with them, and try to engage in their world. Ask them about
what they like in the shows, etc.

Childhood is so fleeting and you will miss it before it's gone!

------
jnbiche
> Over and over.. like a crack addict..he simply can't control his desires for
> the eye-cocaine.

Dude, he's 5. He's not some addict. Relatively few 5-year-olds can control
their desires in a consistent way. I mean "kid with his hand in the cookie
jar" is a saying for a reason.

Be a parent, limit his use (or remove it altogether), and do other stuff with
him. Take him to the zoo, maybe karate lessons or something, to the park, etc.
I'm sure he'll be fine, as long as you don't continue to do stuff like
denigrating him in public as some kind of "internet addict" in the throes of
his addiction to "vicious" content (a kid's show, I presume) when he's only 5.

Maybe talk to him about how doctors say kids should limit their TV/YouTube
usage to keep healthy. When my kids weren't getting enough veggies and fruits
at that age, it deeply impressed them when I took them to the doctor and he
talked about how important that was, and they then competed to see which
sibling could reach 5 fruits and veggies a day first. The APA (American
Pediatric Association) has released guidelines on this stuff (media
consumption), if I'm not mistaken.

------
savethefuture
Hes 5....take it away from him, and teach him other things, remove tv all
together (even for yourself).

~~~
artur_makly
It's looking like the only option at this point to salvage his budding
neurons. But for how long should this 'hardcore' ban last? +5yrs? 10?

~~~
savethefuture
As the other guy said, be the parent. Take your kid to the zoo, go to a
museum, show him how to play catch, both of you should learn to build a bird
house, do ANYTHING else besides letting your kid veg out in front of a tv, wtf
are you doing... Be there for your child.

------
gt565k
> We've tried setting strict time limits and rules for when he can watch
> them.. but it's not helping. The only thing left to do is purely ban it. But
> the cat is out of the bag and he took a huge dump.

How are you setting limits? Verbally?

Just enforce the time constraints through the router. Tell the kid you can
only watch youtbe/netflix for 40 minutes or whatever at a specific time. Set
the mac address filtering and rules on the router, and ta-da!

~~~
pravula
YT Kids has a built in timer that you can password protect. I am not sure
about netflix

------
wslh
Is your son doing physical activities? Does he like drawing, music, art? Are
you playing with him enough?

~~~
artur_makly
yes - my son has a healthy amount of activities outside of his half-day at
Montesorri. Could i spend more time with him? i sure wish i could have half-
days too but reality is i get home and have just ~1hr to make dinner, bath and
play with him.

next week i will experiment with a 50% reduction of screen time (currently
@30min/day) and substitute it with a plethora of strategy games and legos.

hopefully this will do the trick.

ive twlked to a ton of friends with kids and they all deeply wrestle with
this.

i honestly feel this will be our generation's greatest challenge. thanks guys
for your support.

~~~
unimpressive
When I was a kid the psychiatrist prescribed me Ritalin and on an average
22-hour day I probably spent it watching cartoons for hours on end, playing
Neopets ferociously, xbox, along with some time outside with the other kids
riding my scooter and shouting conversation over the backyard fence with the
older kids on the other side.

This was probably tolerated in part because I was a pretty darn misbehaved
child sometimes and watching TV wasn't as hard to deal with as explaining to
me that no you can't tape a kitchen knife to your toy assault rifle as a
bayonet.[0]

I like to think I turned out fine, so freaking out over 30 minutes a day seems
a bit hysterical. That in mind here's my advice to get him away from the TV:

\- Try taking him to the park. A lot of when I got out and really exerted
myself as a kid was when I went to the park. It lets you interact with other
kids, climb on stuff, go running around, and play pretend games that are good
for the imagination.

\- Get toys that encourage him to get up and play pretend. I was always a huge
fan of toy guns, action figures, stuff with _interesting_ mechanics (if you're
on HN I'm sure you have the requisite taste to find such things). My rooms
floor was always strewn with action figures and the like. A lot of the time
I'd pit them against each other, sometimes in epic battle royales that may as
well have been the Ultimate Showdown Of Ultimate Destiny. [1] Important tip:
Kids are generally not snobby, if it were me instead of buying expensive new
toys I'd go down to value village and just pull twenty dollars of grab bags
with interesting looking stuff off the wall, with the occasional new toy for
flavor. When you're that age playtime is half imagination for _everything_
anyway, and you won't get mad when he breaks them. Even when I'd play video
games I'd make up my own story for what was happening with narration of the
villain growing more despondent as I got closer to the stage end. Do be
mindful of the choking risk though!

\- Get him some real friends, especially neighbors kids. A lot of what would
get me to go outside, was seeing someone else outside in the cul-de-sac and
wanting to be with them. Even in those famous studies with rats and the
cocaine water they found that when you introduced social opportunities and
other recreation the cocaine water became much less compelling.

Overall though, your son is probably fine. As one comment in this thread
suggested perhaps you could set a good example and pack up the TV yourself.
After all are you _really satisfied_ with the time you spend watching?

[0]: It needed a bayonet! Cmon I was like 9.

[1]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WgT9gy4zQA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WgT9gy4zQA)

~~~
artur_makly
Thanks Unimpressive.. great tips!

------
pravula
Wait, 30 min a day is addiction?

