I swear if I see one more of those posts about modern mothers being too engrossed in their phones to notice their children, I’m going to hit the roof.
Or maybe just the fan.
You know the ones I mean. They’re usually accompanied by a wholesome AF picture of a child playing with wooden blocks in an unnaturally tidy home, while the mum is sitting to the side looking at her phone, clearly depriving the child of 1000% of her total possible energy and attention.
And the quotes! Don’t get me started on the quotes. It’s always something passive aggressive like ~be present~ or ~your children will grow up while you’re on your phone~ or ~don’t even blink because you will miss everything~.
Basically, every one of these posts is about how mothers nowadays just ignore their children and instead choose to spend their every waking moment within the vain world of social media. They’re depicted as taking endless selfies, as treating their phones as their children, and essentially as being selfish, shallow, and absent parents.
All these posts assume that a mum can’t possibly monitor her own screen time and that they must police it for her. If you’re on your phone once, then apparently that means you’re on your phone all day and all night, and your kid is left to fend for themselves. It’s very black and white, and assumes that women don’t have the basic intelligence or understanding to be able to moderate their own usage. Just the norm of society thinking and making decisions for women; nothing new here.
And have you noticed that these posts are always about mums? Like always? It’s never dads. Ever. In a world where dads are always depicted as one of two stereotypes: either permanently absent or superdads-who-can-do-no-wrong-and-who-are-so-wonderful-for-“babysitting”-their-own-kids, this is unsurprising. Dads are, obviously, far more capable parents who are able to know when to put their phones down, unlike us women folk with the smaller brains.
These posts also fail to understand the complexities of modern life. A lot of my work (and for a lot of parents) is on my phone. And I work and look after my kids at the same time. It’s hard. And I always feel like I’m not giving enough attention to someone or something. But there really is no perfect option. Because if you send your kids to daycare while you work, then you’re criticised for having them in the first place. And if you don’t do paid work, then your criticised for not contributing financially and for supposedly doing nothing all day. So no matter what you do, it’s always wrong, Nowadays, we also pay bills on our phones, we order groceries, we make appointments, and we organise play dates. And this is apparently so much worse than hopping on the landline and calling someone to do all these things instead?
And on that note, the expectation for mothers to be “on” and interacting with their children perfectly, 100% of the time, is just downright cruel and harmful. It is humanly impossible to be constantly a perfect, attentive, never-meeting-your-own-needs parent. And this expectation is so harmful, because it leads to mothers burning out, feeling inadequate, and their mental health suffering. So if you need to spend some time mindlessly scrolling on your phone just to mentally survive the day, then all power to you. I certainly do it. Spending 12 hours a day parenting alone, running the household, being awake all night, and working, is mentally draining. And so sometimes when I feel the anxiety rising and my emotions bubbling with the sheer relentlessness of it all, doing something as mindless as not being “on” for a bit is exactly what helps.
Parents needing a break is nothing new. But I would argue that our methods of getting one have simply changed to meet today’s knowledge of what is safe. Back in the day, parents would park their babies in the pram at the bottom of the garden, and at bedtime they would give them some brandy. They would also let their kids leave the house all day, not knowing where they are, only to come home at night. As fun as that sounds; it’s generally pretty frowned upon in today’s world. So I think that going on your phone for a bit to get some down time is just possibly an acceptable, contemporary alternative.
And on one final note: for most of us these days, our village is within our phones. We don’t have people to support us, right there and ready to go. And so we instead turn to our friends who are just a message away. We laugh with them, we vent together, we hold each other as we cry. Virtually. Because that’s what life today is like.
So to everyone who puts on their high and mighty pants when they see a mum on her phone: please step out of them. Trust that she’s able to manage her own screen time. Know that’s it’s highly likely that she has an emotional range larger than a teaspoon (thanks Hermione!). Know that she’s probably exhausted. Know that she could be paying bills or making a doctor’s appointment or getting some work done in a tiny sliver of time she’s found. Know that she could also just be giving herself a tiny, mental break so that she can keep on loving unconditionally. Know that she’s doing her best.
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