this post was submitted on 05 May 2025
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How isn't it possible? Just don't give them phones, it's not that complicated
You can walk into any Walmart in America and buy a cheap smartphone for $30.
This approach is even less effective than "just don't give them drugs".
Ok, but you also need a data plan to go along w/ it (or regular visits to top up; is that still a thing?), plus hide it from parents, or you're going to have a bad time.
Drugs are a different story. You can often get drugs from friends (free to start), can buy them a little at a time, and you don't need to stash any at home. For a phone to be useful, it needs to be readily accessible, which means you'll have it with you everywhere.
It's possible, but it's going to take a fair amount of work to hide a phone from a parent who's paying even a little bit of attention.
The real problem here is parents. Parents need to step up and do a better job. Source: am a parent.
You don't need a data plan if you can access wifi. There is public wifi and I don't think most parents even know how to check the devices using their home wifi.
It's not hard, and parents can easily change the WiFi password if they don't know how to check the leases if they suspect something is up.
I'm very much in the camp of no filters and building a relationship on trust, but occasionally verifying if that trust is misplaced.
I'm a GenX that works with IT. I can tell you that none of my coworkers that are the same generation would know how to do any of that.
I agree that parents should be more involved with their children, but when do we hold a company responsible for the harm it causes?
If they are knowingly doing something that can cause harm and not properly warning users of it, then they should be held accountable. However, users shouldn't be prevented from using a service just because a government agency doesn't like it. That's a delicate balance that preserves individual freedom to choose while still providing some reasonable amount of protection.
One critical piece here is requiring companies to safeguard any data they collect, not allow them to sell/make it available to other entities w/o express permission and fair compensation, and to remove any data they have collected upon request. That alone helps mitigate the worst of it.