Zoomers, and late millennials, were raised in a birdcage of optimization. Their childhoods resembled job training, not adolescence. Parental surveillance, beginning far before but accelerated by smartphones, is the main driver. 🧵
tedks
13.2K posts
- Replying to @_tedksSo parents are constantly told: - if you let your child out of your sight, they will be abducted, raped, and murdered, while the world watches - If you let your child relax even a little, they will ruin their record, be rejected from college, and die poor, penniless, and alone
- Replying to @_tedksOver the 20th century, mass media reporting of child abductions spread the "stranger danger" concept. From the Lindenburg baby, to milk cartons, to satanic ritual abuse, this leads to a curtailment of freedom and an increase in parental surveillance.
- Replying to @_tedksFirms became more rational, stopped training young workers, employing them for life, and supporting them into retirement. By "outsourcing" this training to the education sector, they could vastly increase their profits. College becomes mandatory, and the stakes rise for kids.
- Replying to @_tedksIf you are growing up under this regime, death is the only escape. You are driven to and from school and mandatory extracurriculars. You've been groomed for anxiety and subservience since your college-prep pre-k. But wait, what's that trough?
- Replying to @_tedksAs the Internet becomes more popular, kids become able to access digital "third spaces" without the risk of police being called on them for existing in public, and with plausible deniability to parents that Work is being done. AOL and Myspace are liberatory technologies.
- Replying to @_tedksWho would not do this, when every stray IM carries not just the small risk of mutilation and death, but also the certainty of time wasted that could be spent studying? Parents have wanted these trends for half a century. With Zoomers, they have them. The cage is shut.
- Replying to @_tedksAlas, all technology is dual-use. While early parental surveillance technology is crude and easy to subvert, as time goes on and devices become hardened, the cage tightens. A smartphone is the ideal surveillance platform for a concerned parent. Just look at the features!
- So, you hate the reality that Kids These Days are stuffed into smartphone-shaped boxes, noses to the grindstone as they are polished to be future corporate workers, no slack, no sex, no drugs, no parties, no friends, no fun. How do you stop it? 🧵
- Replying to @with1elIt's absolutely insane to me that anyone would think "I need to surveil my 25yo and am totally justified in doing so" but here we are. My partner works with parents and says exactly the same thing btw.
- Replying to @_tedksWant to change this? Check out my thread here, and remember to like, subscribe, comment, and send me Bitcoin.So, you hate the reality that Kids These Days are stuffed into smartphone-shaped boxes, noses to the grindstone as they are polished to be future corporate workers, no slack, no sex, no drugs, no parties, no friends, no fun. How do you stop it? 🧵
- Replying to @_tedksEncourage children to disobey. Teach them to value and cherish their own agency, and to do what they actively desire, rather than pounding that desire into the dust and going to another extracurricular.A Disobedience Guide for Children - it might seem impossible to get your parents to stop hurting you, but you have more power than you think. Here's how you can wield that power against them. (link below)
- Replying to @feeBonVHS and @WestRider3025Nicotine is a productivity drug. Helps you focus, improves your memory, brings those test scores up, wrings an extra few tenths of a percent of GDP out of your tired broken bones
- Replying to @_tedksBuild anti-surveillance technology, fund anti-surveillance technology, and spread the word about anti-surveillance technology. Contribute to and share guides for resisting technologically-facilitated abuse.
