(no subject)

[labellementeuse]

I got a text from my brother Rewi this morning.

It says "Hey Tui this is Rewi i got a cellphone but you're not to tell mum or dad okay? I let Hedley and Freya use it. Hedley uses it to text his girlfriends but all freya wants to do is take it 2 school so she can look cool! When are you coming back up to Wellington?"

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. I may soon have to go into mourning for the premature death of my brother: Killed by parents because he's too dumb to live.

I love him, and I've been missing him (which was why it was really cool to get a text, actually) and that's also why I DON'T WANT HIM TO DIE. Man.

Comments

[disturbed-kiwi.livejournal.com]

My Dad bought me a cellphone when I was 15. So that I could go out and still be in contact. Y'know, the whole 'for your safty' idea.

Hmm, I've had a cellphone for seven and a half years...

[megaffe.livejournal.com]

my, parents did the same when I was 14 - they worried about me - I didn't actually want one! - still, 'for your saftey' is always a good reason for parents - maybe Rewi could use a 'so I can tell you where I am" reason for getting one - or a 'so you can ring me when you need to' ?

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Well, but the thing is, I think that argument's fairly spurious: we don't need cellphones to keep safe, we don't need cellphones to keep in touch, we basically just don't need cellphones. They make it more easy to do all these things, yes- but with regards to safety, a cellphone is only maybe going to help get you out of a bad situation. Useful, yes, especially if you're older, but possibly it also encourages you to be a little less careful when you make plans. A cellphone isn't the failsafe we think it is.

Also, people survived without cellphones for aaaages. ;) Basically, Freya's twelve: if she's in situations she needs a cellphone to get out of, someone's not doing their job properly; any other reason is fairly obviously about convenience. If you tell your parents where you're going, you don't need to ring them and tell them you're going to be going here after this after this- and I actually think that in some ways, for younger children, this is a good argument against cellphones. Of course older kids should be able to change their plans, I do it all the time and when I went out late I would text or call, but when you're twelve and fourteen not only do you not need to do that kind of thing, you shouldn't. I mean staying at friends' houses, yeah, but you can just as easily use a landline for that- more easily, because it's free.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think cellphones are bad things and I'm glad I have one- I just think that, especially for younger children, the safety thing is kind of a false sense of security and the rest is spurious. :) That's not to say that kids shouldn't have cellphones, just that there aren't really any good reasons apart from convenience and communicating with friends, rather than family.

Hmmmmmmm

[nzlemming.livejournal.com]

Firstly, cue Spelling/grammar Nazi:
"safty" I can almost live with (one letter missing) and "saftey" is about the same although, if ironic comment was intended, Meg, you lose at irony. ;-)

But "more easy"???? Girlie, that is something up with which I will not put! Now go and write "It's easier to write 'easier', you know" 100 times in letters 4 feet high across the walls of Jerusalem! Or I'll cut you balls off.

Secondly, we also survived without antibiotics, vaccines, television, CDs et al ad nauseum for thousands of years (which is longer, I think, than ages, no matter how many "a's" you add). It doesn't mean they're not a good idea. So, I submit, that argument is a little specious.

I first got a cellphone because I broke down on the motorway and had to wait for someone I knew to drive past, see me and stop before I could send for help. He used his cellphone to call the AA for me. Perhaps once upon a time, a stranger would have stopped, offered me a lift to a service station and maybe even lent me some petrol. Not likely now.

And sure, once upon the same time, parents knew where their kids were and knew they were safe, or had a reasonable expectation that they might be. It's a different world now. Kids are not safe. Hell, adults are not safe. Had I kids, I might seriously consider RFID chips in their clothes and GPS transmitters in the knapsack. Possession of a cellphone can also help find a child who's lost or missing.

You're not wrong about someone not doing their job properly being the problem, but you're not going to fix that by declining to let the actual and potential victim have access to a tool that could help keep them safe. (Please note the use of "could" and "help" - there is no surety about anything other than never letting them out of your personal supervision and perhaps not even then). It may be a situation beyond Freya's control, through no fault of your parents or hers, that causes a problem. The cellphone may not keep her safe, but it's a tool she can't use if she hasn't got it.

I have a friend J. with 2 teenagers - one, like you, in her first year at varsity, the other in his (sigh, we used to call it '6th form') year. Both kids are smart (scarily so), well adjusted, and have an excellent relationship with their parents. They've also both had cellphones for the entire time I've known them. They text each other (i.e. kids to parents and v.v.) all the time. I've been out in Welly with J. (who travels a lot for work) and she can exchange 5-10 texts with the kids and a couple with the husband in the course of an evening (the family home is in Auckland). The lad will text to ask Mum what she wants for tea tomorrow, because he's cooking when she gets home from Wellington. He's good too, thanks to the excellent parenting, part of which has been about the appropriate use of the cellphone.

Don't blame cellphones.

Having said that, I think Rewi's an idiot for getting one without permission, but then teenage years are a time for idiocy as we find out about the world. Let us know if he survives. ;-)

Re: Hmmmmmmm

[nzlemming.livejournal.com]

oh fuck! s/b "cut your balls off"

That's what i get for going nazi on your ass

Re: Hmmmmmmm

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

*snerk* See, it never pays to be superior.

Or anatomically stupid, come to think of it... totally irrelevant threats don't get much of a response, do they? :D

Also:

"Oh fuck! S/b "cut your balls off."

That's what I get for going Nazi on your ass."

Periods. Please.

Re: Hmmmmmmm

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

MORE EASY SOUNDS COOLER (also is easier even a word? *kills* And, haha, I just got these awesome emails from Meg in which she spells "feel" "feal" so, you know, I promise it's not irony, she just can't spell. She's pretty good at irony, really.)

And, look, I don't think cellphones are bad things. But maybe if you did have kids of your own, or were a kid, and saw the way my sister, for example, treats a cellphone, you'd be a little more, umm, cautious about them. I guess if you can afford them they're fine, and they're certainly not inherently bad... I just do not think a twelve year old should have one, or not the way Freya would use one if she had it.

6th form, by the by, is year twelve- you just add six to the number of forms- but generally you'll be understood, most people still say seventh form. :P

You're also not wrong about antibiotics et al (and screw you, I will be creative with my as any time I please. ;) ) but, I don't know, I feel that antibiotics and gene therapy and thingummy, you know, something cell testing (just to show you that I'm not anti-progress), they are things that are inherently useful, whereas a cellphone just might be, and I don't think they encourage people to be careful, basically. Also I don't think they keep people safe; everyone I know has a cellphone and that hasn't stopped them being raped or abused or lost or too drunk to see straight, and it hasn't helped them to get out of those situations either. So. You know.

And I'm sure J is a great parent, especially if she has a sixth form son who can cook. Mum should get tips, she'd LOVE it if Rewi could cook. :P

And I really don't think it is a different world, actually. Rates of crime, including violent crime, have dropped- certainly over the past ten years, although I suppose I don't know about since your time. :P Certainly we are more aware of crime, and I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing either... Yes, there are ways I could get into trouble, or Rewi, or Freya. But put it this way, if Freya gets into trouble a cellphone wouldn't help her anyway- you think the big bad pervert's going to stop and let her phone home? No way. :-/

[megaffe.livejournal.com]

maybe, but I can think of a lot of situations where they are useful - and decrease parental worry, if not increase saftey. - you saaid young kids shouldn't be changing plans. My answer - in 3rd & 4th form, I was at afterschool activites every day of the week. I often had to go to more than one, I often didn't find out about them till the day they were on. My cell phone allowed me to tell my mum what was on, so she wouldn't worry, and would know where I was all the time.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Yeah... but I didn't have one, I was in exactly the same positions as you, and I was totally fine.

Also, frankly, you are in so much of a different world than Hedley and Freya that... put it like this, if they were like you, it wouldn't bother me at all.

It wouldn't bother me that much anyway, really. But you know.