Here’s an idea: I think video documentation of extremely risky behaviour (parkour, rooftopping etc.) and self-harm (mutilation, mukbang, ana) should be banned on all the major video platforms.
Reducing kids’ exposure to the internet and social media is something that’s very tempting for governments who want to control and surveil everything that happens online.
Being close to tech and now also to schools, I can tell you that those two things should not mix in any way. The only interchange should be levying taxes on tech companies to better fund schools.
At some point you have to ask yourself how many predators work at Meta. They seem hell bent on targeting children. You don’t have to be a predator to work at Meta but it helps.
Meta’s push towards sexualised chatbots for children is very concerning and nobody should let their kids use any of Zuckerberg’s platforms unsupervised.
It’s a shame these people are so thoroughly psychopathic (from this epic Guardian profile) because this piece about pronatalism is nothing if not well argued.
Love having the kids be off school every 6 weeks or so which means we get a week of everybody adjusting to them being at home and then another week of adjusting them being back at school. All thanks to the trash tier school logistics of Germany.
A third truth is that we have a generation in crisis and in desperate need of the best of what science and evidence-based solutions can offer. Unfortunately, our time is being spent telling stories that are unsupported by research and that do little to support young people who need, and deserve, more.
Schools wasting money is not as big of a deal as it is made out to be here. Not every investment can be a good one and you have to deal with that and just keep investing. My business partner used to say that innovation in the education field is like driving a van full of money to a school building and setting it on fire. Soit.
The most vocal people in progressive/critical technology don’t have kids (for various reasons) and as such also have zero empathy for the real problems people deal with.
The next bit of insanity has to do with the German Datenschutz nutters. This is a small but virulent group of people who have blown up privacy issues to the point where most of Germany is still afraid to use the internet.
Some friends of ours have started a coworking space in Berlin hat includes childcare. The space looks great and I think that flexible solutions like this could alleviate a lot of the burden on parents right now.
Despite the popular idea that we need to “express”our anger so that it doesn’t eat away at us, research shows that expressing anger while we are angry actually makes us more angry. This in turn makes the other person hurt, afraid, or angry, and causes a rift in the relationship. Rehashing the situation in our mind always proves to us that we’re right and the other person is wrong, which again makes us more angry as we stew. What works is to calm down, and then find a constructive way to address whatever is making us angry so that the situation is resolved, and our anger stops being triggered.
“But we don’t need a secret police to turn us into atomized, isolated souls. All it takes is for us to stand by while unbridled capitalism rips apart the temporal preserves that used to let us cultivate the seeds of civil society and nurture the sadly fragile shoots of affection, affinity, and solidarity.”
“Sometimes when he walks, I swear I can hear it, the depression. It’s a liquid sound. I can hear the cortisol sloshing around in his veins. I can hear the adrenaline drip-drip-dripping down the twisted cord of his spine.”
Fisher says there is brain evidence that when women are under stress (say, a new baby has colic), they are inclined to “tend and befriend”(become more empathetic and social), while men under stress are apt to withdraw.
The dropping arises from the combination of the laissez-faire attitude of Dutch parents along with the incredible safety of the Netherlands. I have been dropped as a child and I never considered that this was a uniquely local experience.
Whenever our kids are dismayed by somebody else, they come to us and say that there was either a human (ein Mensch!) or a kid (ein Kind!). No genders, no nothing.
Just like almost every public service in Berlin the pediatrician situation is absolute squalor. It’s impossible to find one who picks up the phone or takes on new patients 1.
I am hard out at three 2/3 days a week to pick up my children and stayed at home last Friday to take care of a sick kid, so I am doing my best to parent very much out in the open in my workplace. It helps that my grandboss is also very explicit about this but I still find it difficult.
Deze Nederlandstalige app van Juf Jannie belooft puzzels voor kinderen vanaf 2 jaar aan te bieden maar de interactie en gebruiksvriendelijkheid zijn erbarmelijk slecht.
Zählen für die Kleinsten 123 heb ik gekocht omdat er een Nederlandse versie van is (inclusief de audio). Helaas is de kwaliteit te slecht om dat vaker aan te horen en de interactiviteit laat veel te wensen over.
Dikkie Dik spelletjes is een officiele app van de uitgever Gottmer. Het is een rijke verzameling spelletjes maar over het algemeen matig bruikbaar en ongeschikt voor kinderen van 2 jaar oud.
When setting limits, the emotional state of the parent almost always dictates the child’s reaction. If we lack clarity and confidence, lose our temper or are unsure, tense, frazzled, or frustrated — this will unsettle our kids and very likely lead to more undesirable behavior.