Blackberries Preventing Parents From Parenting
This is, um, ridiculous. Am I to believe that Blackberries (actually, any smartphone with email functionality) are actually causing parents to ignore their domestic duties and sneak away to answer work emails? Is this really happening?
Apparently, yes.
I have a BlackBerry 8700c on Verizon, and I have to tell you: while I find it an amazing gadget [insert CrackBerry joke here], when it comes time to eat dinner or read stories to my son, there’s just no competition. Blackberry loses.
Still, like teenagers sneaking cigarettes behind school, parents are secretly rebelling against the rules. The children of one New Jersey executive mandate that their mom ignore her mobile email from dinnertime until their bedtime. To get around their dictates, the mother hides the gadget in the bathroom, where she makes frequent trips before, during and after dinner. The kids “think I have a small bladder,” she says. She declined to be named because she’s afraid her 12- and 13-year-old children might discover her secret.
Wacky parents. But do you know what wacky parents beget? Wacky children.
Parents point out they’re not alone in their habits. Jerry Colonna, father of ninth-grader Emma, says that for her birthday earlier this month, she asked for and received a T-Mobile Sidekick. “She’s obsessively on email now,” he says. “Kind of ironic.” Emma responds: “I use it a moderate amount.”
I had no idea this sort of wireless compulsion existed.
I bet I’d be surprised at the number of things like this that are out there.
The whole wireless phenomenon is putting pressure on people to work at all times. It makes it hard for some people to separate work time from home time. I’m with you though – what kind of dope prioritizes a freaking BlackBerry over kids? And who is going to look back on a terrible car accident and say, “It was worth it, though. I had to respond to that email while driving. Imperative!” These people need to grow some balls and learn to say it can wait until morning. Most of this pressure we put on ourselves is self imposed anyway.
Ever read about Internet addiction? Type it into Google and you’ll be amazed. It’s real.
Love the blog, by the way!
Sad but true, as will cell phones = talk to your caller and ignore the real people around you. Who needs real people when you can communicate with ‘faceless’ avatars.
Cheers
mcwen — hey! My avatar IS my face!
I’m not part of the problem!
I have a téliPhone SIP account with numbers in multiple area codes (I travel a lot), a snazzy office desk phone at my office and at home with a wifi cordless phone that will all automatically follow me to my Mike (Nextel for the rest of you) cell when I’m not at my desk. Super connected.
90% of the time my cell is off and my desk phone is on DND…
Buzjohn — hi Beth!
I know about Internet addiction, and I can see how it happens — I do most of my reading and writing on the web, and let’s face it, the web is only getting richer.
Extending that compulsion to wireless, portable, hideable gadgets? That’s a problem.