Scottish Catholic Observer

THE recent Good Child Report from the Children’s Society—an annual study of the wellbeing of children in the UK—shows increasing numbers of children are suffering from mental health problems, and the authors suggest ever increasing social media usage is a contributing factor.

Here is a radical idea: the internet is not for children. Yet, schools let pupils use the internet—including social media—in and around the school, and many parents allow their children to be online entirely unsupervised.

Is it really impossible to have friends without a phone? Is it really a necessary part of growing up to be plugged into social media?

I am even asked to sign up to internet access for my five-year-old!

Parents need to understand placing a barrier between your child and the internet does not make them a failure in an IT literate world.

Radical change is needed to understand the harm that is being done under our noses at home and in school by the constant use of social media and the internet.

For me, the right response is that of a ‘courteous dissident’ from social media and the presumed essential use of mobile internet devices for each and every family member, however young. Courtesy means refraining from usage without any judgemental commentary.

For me, it’s about safeguarding the vulnerable child. The developing child or young person is vulnerable in a way that adults are not when it comes to use of the internet and social media.

If, like me, you refuse to let social media into your children’s lives and closely supervise internet usage by banning You Tube and Facebook then by some you will be regarded as a bit of a curiosity—mainly by your children, because friends and their teachers evidence how normal such activity is now regarded.

Yet just a decade ago, mentioning Facebook or YouTube would have drawn blank stares from all.

Indeed if you stand in the way of internet and social media usage then some professionals will judge you to be ‘placing your child at risk’—at risk because the child will not know how to be ‘safe online’ in the present or future!

Phones also undermine the parental role when they are a means of information with no parental arbitration.

Studies of social media and mental health consistently reach the view that adverse and harmful effects await our children when they are encouraged to use social media as daily entertainment and even for social learning—parents, schools, and charities communicating with children all assume a young audience is ready made for their messages.

Family life and parent-child relationships are being undermined by the gift of the much-desired phone because of the outside world that it lets in without any filter.

What should our response be as parents and members of the lay faithful? Do we ask the school or the Church authorities to give a moral lead?

I believe that Catholic parents should not leave protection and safeguarding in the online world to schools, but instead we should lead the way—where the faithful lead the Church follows, in time.

It’s first of all the parent’s job to ensure the safety, protection and welfare of the child. If you decide to allow social media and perhaps place a time bar on usage and ‘parental controls’ then there are many pitfalls.

It is not much of a stretch to reflect on how a childhood spent online may affect our capacity to form lasting relationships.

Low self-esteem and body dysmorphia are associated with social media usage in psychological studies.

Far from enlarging one’s social world and contacts, it is paradoxically the case that the online world of the social media user becomes narrow and self-centred to the detriment of real social contacts and experience.

Unsupported and unsupervised, the young user of social media will encounter a false sense of reality, and particularly for girls, the result is likely to be lowered self-esteem, and for some, depression.

The protective and safety messages of the NSPCC, Childline and other bodies all assume that young people will not abandon social media and that parents will continue to hand out mobile internet enabled devices and feel unable to prevent its use through ignorance.

The government offers policies that simply promote more and more internet and social media-based usage around school and in schooling. The only government guidance for schools approaches, but stands shy of, urging schools to ban phones from the school.

Talk by government of promoting responsible use and good citizenship online is fudging the issue.

The NSPCC and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) ask that we place our trust in the Brook organisation when concerned about ‘sexting’ or other sexualised messaging, including for contraception and pregnancy advice.

Children are in effect confirmed in their path towards sexual activity. It’s just about ‘being safe’ in the language of Brook. Parents are offered support through the Young Scot cards which kick in at age 11 with discounts on various products and other services included in the scheme.

The website provided by the Young Scot card charity does not promote a Catholic perspective on sex and relationships and marriage, but your 11-year-old will be encouraged to join by your local education authority and your Catholic school and to log in to the website where a few clicks open up abortion advice pages from the Brook organisation.

A Catholic perspective would emphasise purity, chastity and partnership at once between parent and school to ensure the child’s safety. Taking the phone away would be a start.

In a social work post working alongside health workers, I saw how text messages could be sent signalling contraceptive and abortion advice to schoolgirls and boys and I, as chair of the meeting, called for parental involvement first.

I dissented from the ‘child’s right’ perspective where it undermines the parental role. In my last social work post I invited an educator to make a proposal about online safety when the police reported that online factors were increasingly part of anti-social behaviour and bullying in neighbourhoods and schools.

Aa parent I knew simply didn’t allow his children to go online unsupervised and that social media, chat online or otherwise connecting with friends or exploring websites for information was not allowed. The expert response was incredulous regarding the irresponsible parent to whom I alluded.

Parents saying no to the Young Scot card scheme are in a minority, and if like me you say no then your child will not be connected to the 650,000 Young Scot users who can access the charities’ advice pages, much of them encouraging a permissive attitude to sex and easy access to contraception and abortion with no Catholic content like chastity, virtue, and marriage as a union of one man and one woman.

I choose therefore to be a social media dissident rather than embrace the vast array of internet-enabled phones that now accompany childhood at home and in school.

Does this make me a naive parent? I am a social media dissident, but in a courteous way when it comes to governmental and Church-led programmes that aim to keep my children safe.

I am old-fashioned enough to believe that it is the parent, not the ‘Named Person’ or teacher who has the primary job of ensuring safety online or elsewhere.

Adults who have previously developed social skills independent of technology have the advantage of their life experience to make sense of electronic media and can choose to ignore messaging or instigate a direct personal response.

I wonder when you hand her or him a telephone with the internet and access to various websites do you intend her to enter the online world alone, unsupported?

I suggest that we the laity should begin a cultural revolution and raise our children to be social media dissidents; courteous dissidents with educational and social interests in and around the family, neighbourhood and their schools without a telephone permanently attached.

With a largish young family it is normal as a parent to experience children asking for things—especially phones that do amazing things. Is it not part of modern family life?

The Church calls for a more active laity and as with the campaign against the Named Person scheme we need to protect our relationship with our children and remove the barriers that get in the way. We might be smart to start with our screens.