Two years back, I had the privilege of attending a workshop by brother Raja Zia ul Haq, the founder of Youth Club. This was focused upon the hottest topic in town “Our tweens and millennial’s attachment to their cell phones”.
It’s true that we can no longer confine our children and prevent them from using the latest technology. Too much is revolving around it. But why are we replacing the old for the new, completely eliminating the roots and legacies? It seems we are fast shifting from one extreme to another.
The capitalist society has flourished upon the parents’ psyche of ‘new and improved’. Some mothers and fathers are willingly swapping older past times such as reflective family conversations, playing board games, active sports, reading, writing, drawing, and outdoor ventures for a virtual world where the child gets to do all of this sitting in one place behind a screen, all alone.
However, besides numerous benefits, the smartphones are a double edged sword. And they should not be for under aged kids. As parents, we worry about giving metal scissors to our child and replace it with a plastic one. However, we gladly hand over our mobile phones to them that have a greater devastation spiritually and mentally.
Who are the investors?
George Bush, the Ex-President of America, stated: “It’s a battle of hearts and minds.” Barak Obama, another Ex-American President, pumped millions of dollars into the media industry, simply because these are ideological battles mightier countries engage into to win over the rest of the world. They do not need to send their troops everywhere. The world is succumbing to one global culture agreeably by simply using the latest technology that is in the hands of the super powers.
But what’s wrong with it?
- The danger of falling prey to cyber bullying/ trolls. They make fake IDs to harass people for past times and insult them otherwise. What many parents do not know is that kids are vulnerable to all kinds of ideologies out there from perverted to atheistic.
- Sinning big time. Deliberate or forced upon us, pornography is rampant and not sparing anyone. Gossiping, gloating, revealing private lives and wasting time, whether it is online or in offline realms, are sins which will be recorded by Kiraman Katibeen (angels who record our deeds as per Allah’s (swt) command).
- Selfie craze. Selfie is now proved to be a psychological disorder. People worldwide take nearly 150 poses at 45 degree angle daily. That’s not the behaviour of someone who is leading a responsible life and engaged in worthwhile pastimes.
- Some video games de-humanize players. When these games offer you to play a gangster and go into a God mode, you can kill people virtually, splatter blood everywhere, hear laughter in the background and your score is going up, with scantily dressed up women are popping here and there. What are they preparing you for? Should this game even be legal?
- Profanities. Profane language is marketed to kids under the age of sixteen. How else do you hear them using these words that were never taught to them at home or at school? It changes their perception of real life.
- Misrepresentation of truth. Adulterating truth with falsehood. James Bond can kill and walk away as a hero in his top of the line posh sports car, with women falling for him all over. Is he a hero or a villain? Is he worthy of becoming our child’s role model?
- Building comfort for immorality and obscenity. The innate quality of Islam is Haya (modesty). Abu Masud (rtam) narrated: The Prophet (sa) said: “One of the sayings of the early prophets which the people have got is: If you don’t feel ashamed (from Haya: pious shyness from committing religious indiscretions), do whatever you like.” (Bukhari)
The Bobo doll experiment
In 1976, Albert Bandura conducted the Bobo doll experiment. He took 7 to 10 kids and divided them into 3 groups of a, b and c.
He shot three different versions of a video, where his actors treated Bobo in three different styles:
- In group ‘a’, a person hugged Bobo and talked to him in a friendly manner.
- In group ‘b’, the same person mistreated Bobo and a woman watching him from behind disciplined the person for his ill behaviour.
- In group ‘c’, the person beat, kicked and abused Bobo. The same woman came in and laughed out loud encouraging the person to hit more. In other words, rewarding bad behaviour.
The kids divided into three groups were shown one of these three different versions. After viewing their specific video, they were given a chance to meet Bobo in person.
The kids emulated exactly as was shown in the video. The video that showed gentleness had kids hugging Bobo. The video that showed mistreatment had kids doing the same and looking here and there in case someone would catch them. And finally the last group of kids kicked and hit Bobo, as they knew no better.
This is the impact of media on us.
What to do? How to become an ideal family?
The Quran tells us that there were dysfunctional and deviated family members at all times everywhere. Lut (as) had a troublesome wife. Nuh (as) had a disbelieving son. Yaqub’s (as) sons tried to kill Yusuf (as), causing a great grief and separation between father and son. Aasiya (as) braved the torture and tyranny of her husband Firaun. Our beloved Prophet’s (sa) arch enemies were his own two uncles Abu Lahab and Abu Jahl, who were plotting his murder.
So our family is not a salad bar. We cannot pick the olives and the tomatoes. We cannot cut family ties for removing the unwanted elements.
The answer is to understand that this life is a test. We need to be our best.
- Try to instill Taqwa. Let your child know and believe that when he closes the door, switches off the lights, and draws the curtains, he is still not alone. Allah (swt) is with him 24/7. He/she can never escape Him. That will help him/her to be mindful before sinning and feel encouraged and protected when he/she is in despair.
- Respond and do not react. Everyone knows that Anas bin Malik (rtam) served the Prophet (as) as a teenager for nearly ten years. And it is his statement that during this tenure, the Prophet (sa) never even uttered the word ‘uff’ to him. And when he forgot a chore, the Prophet (sa) called out to him with a smile ‘Ya Unais?’ implying only you will do this for me. That builds confidence in the child.
- Learn to prioritize. We hit children over mistakes and let go over sins. A parent must choose what is negotiable and what is non-negotiable and then decide its consequences and communicate to the child in advance. Let him make wise choices.
- Follow the Sunnah. That was to become a child with the child. Do not be just present but available. Today most of the parents have smartphones in their hands round the clock. How can we lecture them on appropriate usage of a gadget we are so hooked to? Lead by example and do not become a hypocrite.
- Let them whine. The new breed of parents simply cannot tolerate their child being unhappy or bored. Technological companies have taken great advantage of this weakness of parenting. Hence, while an adult is busy conversing with another adult or taking care of a certain chore, he/she lets the kid entertain himself on the parent’s smartphone. What a great loss for this child who could have learnt, observed and experienced things by being by on his own.
- Teach them dining etiquettes. This simply means no screen time while eating. No matter how restless your children are, no matter how hungry he goes throwing tantrums, and no matter how occupied you are. It’s tough but this is the discipline you need to exhibit for instilling in children the right ideas about the choices in life they would make in future, even if everyone else would be going the wrong way.
- Do not worry that they will become obsolete. This is the greatest insecurity of our times: if our children do not know how to operate a smartphone at the age of one, they will have no future. Even if we try very hard to keep the disease of ‘technologitis’ away from our kids, we will not succeed. It is an epidemic now. If seventy years old grannies have become tech savvy today, how can we even imagine that babies of the twenty-first century will not learn? They all will do so in time, when they can handle it with responsibility and trust.
- Give them bigger goals. According to your children’s interests and aptitudes, let them develop healthy past times, where they lose sense of time due to their passions. Give the children a flavour of a variety of interests such as sports, cooking, baking, art, language, science, IT, media and so on. This will allow them to spend less time with gadgets for wasteful stuff.
- Facilitate self-directed learning. Discuss with kids how they can find such useful stuff as tutorials (under your supervision for younger kids), in order to learn new things and be inspired to carry out the projects. Become a part of something as a family (or even as one parent), so you can do it together with your children. Steer their choices to what is sensible. This can also be followed by a reward, such as eating out at the children’s favourite restaurant or buying them something they wanted to build/create.
I will conclude by encouraging you to pray to Allah (swt) to grant Furqan to your children and facilitate the path for them, so that they are able to draw out an apple from the heap of trash out there!
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