Cranky Post: You Don't Need a Cell Phone For Your Kid

[chayam]

I received an email today from someone wanting a cell phone for her son; her son's was stolen and she was hoping someone might have an extra (Verizon, specifically) cell phone they could give her. "When he's with his friends or has missed the bus it puts me at ease to know that he contact me and let me know what's going on," she wrote

Comments

[kishuku]

They're called 'helicopter parents' because they do nothing but hover. It's a pretty common phenomenom in Asia, which has been on the rise in the States oddly enough.

[praecognomen]

Except in Asia, they're grandparents; the parents are all working 14-hour days.

[mantispid]

My wife is a 'helicopter' mom. Then again, she is from Japan.

Poor kids break down if their mom isn't within earshot. Fortunately this has gotten better as they are older. My oldest is 4 now, and he is usually fine on his own.

Now, as for the cell phones... You do realize you sound like the previous generation with the 'back in my day' lines? ;) Times and tech changes... I'm sure in a few decades people won't be able to even comprehend what it would be like to not hear from folks they know across the country for weeks at a time.

[rayana]

Well... I had a phone when I was a kid in HS. It was useful

A family plan is only $10 extra per line. Not really that much money :)

[chayam]

High school makes a lot more sense. Once a kid is driving, especially, I'd feel better if they had a cell phone. That's why I ended up with one-- my car broke down and I had to walk to a phone.

My son is in third grade and his best friend has a cell phone. I can't imagine what he uses it for.

[praecognomen]

So, I just last week purchased my first cell-for-the-United-States in...almost three years. Mind, I've been back, for a full eleven months at a time, in the middle of that time. Surprisingly, you CAN still survive without a cellphone.

I remember in the 80s, if I missed the bus (to latchkey! My parents worked really late), I would actually sigh really loudly, hitch up my backpack, and start walking my seven-year-old self to the YMCA latchkey program--some three miles. I would get there an hour later, get in trouble for missing the bus, maybe even get a write up, and that would be it. None of this "ohmigodwherewereyou!?" crap, at least not after the first time

Harumph!

[sennomo]

I agree. Absolutely nobody needs a cell phone.

Re: Harumph!

[cos]

Nor do we need livejournal, email, the Internet, cars, a nationally regulated currency, or running water in our homes. Depends on how you define "need". The human race made it through the middle ages. I just don't want to go there myself. Expectations change as time moves, and there are things nobody had a couple of hundred years ago that I'd consider a need today (a landline to call 911? safe heating & cooling? universal suffrage?). Obviously as these things change, people from previous generations don't quite see them the same way as newer generations, and some generations are split down the middle. But I always look askance at proclamations made across that divide.

Re: Harumph!

[sennomo]

At best, your argument is relying on a slippery slope; at worst, it is a straw man argument.

I would not enjoy the middle ages, either, but there is a lot of technology between there and here. (If you slide to the middle ages, why not slide down to the Stone Age?)

No one can seriously group cell phones and the Internet into the same category as running water, for at least one simple reason: No matter how many lives are reportedly saved by telecommunications, that number will never become comparable to the number of lives saved by our modern water systems. On a scale of necessity, I would place cell phones somewhere closer to Prada bags than running water.

The question of cell phones isn't even about the olden days. There are millions of children in the US and more around the world today who are doing fine without cell phones.

Fundamentally, for something to be necessary, it takes more than just someone claiming that it is, regardless of generation.

Re: Harumph!

[cos]

I disagree with you. Notice that I am *not* attempting to define cell phones as "need" or "not need" - I'm not taking sides on that. My point is that when something is new we cannot be trusted to see what role it "should" play, and that whatever the merits of things we take for granted now, when they were new they also were not seen as needs. All these arguments about how you "don't need" a cell phone just seem like assertions lacking data. We're in no position to take a position on the topic, IMO.