also re: teens sitting around with their tablets and smartphones
like, if a kid can access the internet (with some privacy still) while also sitting in the same room as their parents, honestly that’s better and more social than what I did as a teenager, which was hole up in my room at my desktop computer that I couldn’t move anywhere else in the house
mostly what I see from the teens in my family is they will sit and scroll through their phone, but if something interesting starts happening, or a new person enters the room, or they see something cool they want to share, they look up and interact again, because they’re sitting right there with everyone else.
that is waaaay more social than 2002 me, hunched over my desktop for hours and only seeing my mom in passing when I went to microwave a burrito at 1am. way, way more social.
My whole family does this now. We’re all in the same room, but each on a phone, tablet, or laptop. Certain poop heads will shake their heads at how technology is dividing us.
But
Like
What do they think families have done for since ever? Talk constantly while playing educational board games every evening? No.
They’d each be reading, or sewing, or writing letters or some shit, and mostly sat quietly near each other but not bothering each other.
yes this
It reminds me of the whole “omg people on trains used to TALK to each other” argument. No, they didn’t. They read the newspaper or stared straight ahead avoiding eye contact.
People have been finding reasons not to talk to each other for centuries.
a man: men now have to think before they speak, they are afraid to be criticized or accused of something, can we believe that we have to live like this now?? uwu
all the women that had to grown up being super self-aware of what they wear, what they think, what they say, how they act, where they are, with whom, etc in every aspect of their life, all the time, in this sexist society (especially women of color, non-straight women and trans women): good. finally you all have to learn how to behave.
Hey, do you know that feeling of hitching up a long skirt so you don’t fall on your face when walking upstairs, and then you immediately become a wretched yet resolute Jane Austen character? It’s a universal thing, right?
It’s like resting a laundry basket against your hip and suddenly you’re a long-suffering peasant woman, wondering if you’ll survive the winter.
Steel Phoenix Studios 