'This is what it's like to grow up in the age of likes, lols and longing'

Nah. It's bad. Internet addiction is bad. We don't even appreciate how bad it is yet. Give it 30 years.

 

Replace iPhone with SJ.com and you've written an article about several of the posters here.

 

IMO, being on call 24/7 makes one less effective cumulatively in any role. Any role.

Human on demand is ruinous over time.

 

Eh, I just like to shoot the shit with people about stuff.

 

Another thing we wring our hands over is kids' activities being so structured.

But if we didn't ahve our kids in sports and music and such, the concern is that they would be fiddling with their phone, playing video games or loitering outside the 7-11 (Wait. That last was me.)

Putting them in structured activities at least keeps them unplugged for a while.

 

Yeah, Huck Finn isn't walking through that door.

 

We're all in it for the likes.

 

Nah, I want barbershop folk talkin' 'bout my posts. Or at least Mike Wilbon.

 

The one constant throughout time has been that every human being thinks every other human being is doing it wrong.

And "kids today" suck. Always.

So much hand-wringing over what, in the long run, amounts to very little overall difference between generations.

 

Regardless of how you feel about the issues, it's a great example of immersion journalism and great storytelling. That Contrera hints at the mom stuff early and doesn't give it away, that the piece shows you a lot without lecturing, that the ending is so moving yet we never find out what happens, is a credit to her and her editors. I think this might be as good as Susan Orleans piece about "The American Male at age 10."

 

You think Internet addiction among kids is bad now, wait until Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality takes over in the next few years; you'll have 12 year-olds locking themselves in their bedrooms for days on end, doing everything you ever feared.

 

OK. But sometimes human beings actually do fuck things up. Just because war protesters were wrong about WWII doesn't mean they were wrong about Vietnam. And just because people were wrong about the devil's music doesn't make them wrong about this.