#1 NYT bestseller! Jonathan Haidt, THE ANXIOUS GENERATION: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness
[0:02]Hi, I'm Sivi Owens, and I am the host of this podcast, Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[0:08]I am also a newly minted USA Today best-selling author of the novel, Blake.
[0:14]I've created a whole community of book lovers around this podcast, a publishing company, reading retreats,
[0:20]a bookstore, and more. Learn more at ZiviMedia.com or follow me on social at Zivi Owens or join the community at ZiviReaders.
[0:31]Jonathan H. is the author of the anxious generation, how the great rewiring of childhood
[0:37]is causing an epidemic of mental illness. Jonathan is the Thomas Cooley professor of ethical leadership at New York University's Stern School of Business.
[0:45]He obtained his PhD in social psychology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1992 and taught at the University of Virginia for 16 years.
[0:53]His research focuses on moral and political psychology, as described in his book The Righteous Mind.
[0:59]His latest book, The anxious generation, is a direct continuation of the themes explored in the coddling of The American Mind, written with Greg Lukeianoff.
[1:07]He writes, The After Babel Substack. And by the way, Jonathan's book was included in the parenting category of my summer beads.
[1:15]Check it out on ZiviMedia.com.
[1:17]Welcome, Jonathan. Thank you so much for coming on Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss the anxious generation.
[1:22]Have the great rewiring of childhood. It's causing an epidemic of mental illness.
[1:27]Thank you. Thank you. Thanks so much, Zivi. What a pleasure to be here. It was so wonderful meeting you at the event. It was hosted on your behalf at Tiffany's, which my gosh is so pretty.
[1:37]But anyway, that was I couldn't believe that's things. I know I just got pictures of like those so beautiful where, you know, it was so great just to sit there on the floor and listen to you talk about all the important
[1:50]issues that are in the book. And then of course to go through the book later for all the specifics. Tell listeners, basically the premise of the book, although it's pretty obvious from the subtitle, but just like give your little spiel about the book.
[2:03]Sure. So the origin of the book is the fact that teen mental health began to collapse around 2012, 2013, very suddenly we didn't know why.
[2:12]I was on college campuses. We noted that the students coming in in 2014, 2015 were just really different, much more fragile, much more anxious.
[2:19]All of our mental health centers were flooded in 2015. Wasn't like that in 2012.
[2:24]And so why? Why did that happen? And there's two parts of the story. The first part is that we have vastly and grossly over protected our children blocking them from the kind of independence and preplay that all of us, if you were born before 1987 or so,
[2:39]you know, we all had adventures outside. We were on our own. We learned how to be self supervising by being self supervising from around the age of seven or eight kids were out playing.
[2:50]And we stopped for that in the 90s. So anyway, the over protection is a story that I told in my last book, the coddling of the American mind. And in that book written in 2017,
[3:00]we have just a couple of paragraphs on how well, you know, it might also be because of smartphones in social media. I mean, the timing is right.
[3:07]But we don't really know the evidence is not clear. But, you know, the kids who went through puberty on smartphones in social media, especially Instagram, they seem to not be doing so.
[3:16]But that's just correlation. We can't prove its causation. So that was what I thought in 2017.
[3:21]2019, we had a lot more data. The problem was a lot bigger than we thought. And it was international. That's what blew my mind. Once I saw, wasn't just us.
[3:29]This was happening in Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand. It was even happening in most of the Nordic countries and they let their kids out to play the Nordic countries still to this day actually let their eight girls walk around outside.
[3:41]So I was talking with the Finnish journalist the other day. She said, yeah, we let our kids walk outside and they walk around looking at their phones all day long.
[3:47]So anyway, so the story in the book is that what really did them in, but really has damaged our kids and especially the girls is going through puberty on social media.
[3:57]This is no way especially for a girl to go through that transition of bodies changing. She's coming up with a new identity. She's learning new social skills.
[4:05]So I can summarize the book in a single sense. We have over-protected our children in the real world and we have under-protect them online.
[4:13]So you're one of the suggestions and you have a lot of conclusions in the book and how we can stop it because when I sit here and I listen to you say,
[4:22]yes, I start panicking like, oh my gosh, everyone, my children, it's too late, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, one is intercepting this issue early, right, postponing, delaying kids.
[4:33]But I feel like that is easier said than done and obviously you are aware of this, you know, with all of your research but the kids are expected.
[4:44]And how do you, even if you know that it's a danger, what can parents do and what if it's when is it too late, is it ever too late?
[4:54]Well, it's never too late to make things a lot better. So, you know, I do fear that my kids are 14 and 17.
[5:02]And if they had a fully normal childhood with a lot of outdoor adventure, I think maybe tougher and stronger than they are now. So I do suspect we're going to see lasting effects.
[5:11]But, you know, most kids are not mentally ill, they're not. Most kids are not depressed or anxious.
[5:15]Among girls, it is about a third that girls, you know, 30 to 40% are having anxiety and depression difficulties.
[5:22]So let's take it into steps. Let's first let's talk about parents and young kids, where it's not too late. So, you know, every kid is just mesmerized by the screens, a lot of my family videos.
[5:32]Because I got an iPhone in 2008, my son was born 2006. So he grew up with me having my phone so many of our videos. He does something cute and then you see him reaching out.
[5:42]So they're desperate.
[5:43]I want to see.
[5:44]I want to see.
[5:45]I want to see.
[5:46]Yeah, exactly.
[5:47]And so, you know, as when we were kids with television, parents have to set them as they have to have constraints. Otherwise, this stuff will take up the entire entire life.
[5:55]So television, you know, you couldn't take it outside with you, but the iPhone or an iPad, you can take around with you around the house.
[6:01]So if your kids are young, you need to really delay immersion into the phone base, into the screen based life.
[6:08]So keep in mind, stories are good. If you watch a movie with your kid, that's great. There's no problem there.
[6:15]If you're if you're five, six, seven year old watches a cartoon, you know, a 15, 20 minute cartoon show.
[6:20]That's okay. That story is what you really need to, but what racing to mess them up, it's the short form videos.
[6:26]It's it's the fragmented attention. It's the sitting there with the device and doing five things that once were in a row.
[6:31]That is really bad training for your child's brain to develop focus and the ability to stay on task and what we call executive function in psychology.
[6:39]So you wanted to lay the latest much as possible.
[6:42]And the I'll just give you the four note. We'll start with the four norms or four norms that if we all do, it gets much easier.
[6:49]I mean, you know, you're right that it's easier said than done, but it's only easier said than done if reacting alone.
[6:54]If you're acting with other families, now it gets much easier and much more fun.
[6:58]So here are the four norms. No smartphone before high school.
[7:02]Just give them a flip phone when you send them out and fifth, sixth grade whenever it is.
[7:06]Give them a flip phone or a phone watch.
[7:08]Don't give them the whole internet in the pocket.
[7:10]The second norm, no social media before 16.
[7:12]This one is really important. This is one where it would really help to have legislation raising the age to 16 and demanding enforcement.
[7:18]But even if we do this as a norm, even if we see, you know, like my daughter, I won't let her have Instagram.
[7:22]If we had four other families that we're doing this, it would be much easier for them.
[7:26]Third norm's phone controls.
[7:28]To clarification on that point. Sorry.
[7:30]When you say don't have social media, do you mean,
[7:34]consume it or post on it? I mean, you can, you could say don't have an account.
[7:38]But can you look at other people's accounts?
[7:40]Right.
[7:41]So the key step is opening an account.
[7:44]This should be by law.
[7:46]It should not be legal for anyone to open it.
[7:49]When you open an account, what your child is doing is she's saying,
[7:52]she's making, she's signing a contract with a company that says that she's given way her data and writes to the data.
[7:58]She can say things about her family.
[8:00]And the company can do whatever they want with the data.
[8:03]And your parents don't know, they won't have to know.
[8:06]And they don't, you don't need their permission.
[8:08]That's the way the law is written that.
[8:09]As long as you're old enough to lie and say that you're 13, you can go any run the internet.
[8:12]Oh, but if you say to 18, they can course go to porn sites.
[8:15]So the main thing is just don't let them open an account.
[8:18]When they open an account, the algorithms get to know them.
[8:21]The algorithm will feed your daughter or your son exactly what activates their deepest unconscious urges.
[8:28]And if they don't have an account, we can't post hosting is the worst, especially for girls.
[8:32]Girls must not grow up posting pictures of themselves and waiting for people to comment in their bodies and their faces.
[8:37]Now, as for whether they can watch YouTube videos, of course, YouTube is technically social media.
[8:42]But the way we use it, it's not so much used by kids as like a place to posting.
[8:46]There's more just like, you know, it's it's how to do everything in the world.
[8:50]It's it's interesting.
[8:51]So YouTube is mostly in entertains.
[8:53]Say a talk is much, much worse. All the short and video forums are much, much worse.
[8:56]So I would suggest, don't keep it up YouTube.
[8:59]But I would suggest keeping an entirely off of TikTok.
[9:02]In fact, my daughter, she was, she, she transitioned from elementary, from middle to high school.
[9:07]And she was watching TikTok.
[9:10]And even though I'd said you can't have an account, but she was watching it still.
[9:15]And she was failing her classes. And we made a deal. And I, I admit, I ended up, she knows, she's a very good negotiator.
[9:21]She ended up negotiating for $50 a month. She'll stay off entirely.
[9:25]And we did that. And her grades went right up right away.
[9:28]And just so.
[9:29]So yeah, I'm not saying that they can never watch it because they want to.
[9:33]I'm just saying really make sure that it's some, you know, no posting at a tiny portion of their consumption.
[9:38]Okay. Good to know.
[9:41]What about the rise of eating disorders as well?
[9:44]And I don't actually have good data on whether eating disorders are going up a lot or a little.
[9:49]Everything is up. Of course, eating disorders was a big deal.
[9:52]You know, in the 90s when we, you know, when I was, you know, in graduate school.
[9:56]And so I haven't heard so much about eating disorders shown.
[10:00]whose rise we anxiety and depression have,
[10:02]but we now see very clear evidence that a lot of girls
[10:05]get drawn into it because they're shown
[10:07]and are actually a content.
[10:09]So the thing to keep in mind here is that
[10:12]when you make the transition,
[10:13]it puberty all around the world,
[10:14]cultures help their kids make the transition
[10:17]from child to adult, they guide them,
[10:19]they say, here's what you need to know,
[10:20]they give them role models.
[10:22]And it's never the parent, it's always like,
[10:24]if it's a girl, so it's gonna be a woman
[10:26]who is not the family,
[10:27]it's gonna be an outsider as a mentor.
[10:30]And we don't do that anymore,
[10:31]we stopped out a long time ago,
[10:32]we don't really give them any guidance.
[10:33]And then around 2012, on the all got on Instagram,
[10:36]we basically said,
[10:37]how about we have random weirdos on the internet
[10:40]be your God, like you can watch 1,000 of them a day
[10:42]and the ones that are most prestigious
[10:44]are obviously the one that you should copy.
[10:46]So one just copy the popular one, the influencers,
[10:49]and the results have been catastrophic, I would say.
[10:52]Yeah, I don't know the data,
[10:54]but I feel anecdotally,
[10:55]this is, you know, younger and younger girls
[10:57]are having issues from, you know, the moms who go,
[11:01]I think that's probably true.
[11:02]For some reason, I haven't found good data
[11:04]on that, maybe the company doesn't track it as well
[11:05]as it does for depression, anxiety,
[11:07]but I bet you're right.
[11:08]There are, not to just belabor this whole social media
[11:11]point, but there are benefits to be feeling
[11:15]a part of a community, right?
[11:16]There are fine, like you can make a niche in all of them.
[11:19]Yeah, I really do be, so I'm very happy to say that.
[11:22]So let's look for adults, yes, look,
[11:25]these technologies do a lot of things.
[11:26]We have a business, if you need to network,
[11:29]but seventh graders don't need to network with strangers.
[11:31]They certainly don't need to be talking
[11:32]to men in other countries.
[11:34]So let's talk about middle school.
[11:36]Tell me for a sixth or seventh or eighth grader
[11:39]who's on Instagram.
[11:40]Tell me what the benefits are, because I don't see them.
[11:43]Okay, I would say that there's,
[11:47]for the people who are authentic
[11:51]and who share their actual experiences
[11:54]and their insecurities and this,
[11:56]the notion that they are not alone
[11:58]and how they feel and that there are people outside
[12:01]of their class or their school,
[12:03]or maybe they don't fit in at school,
[12:04]but they found a group of people who also love,
[12:07]I don't know, random sport, random thing, random interest
[12:10]and all over the world that they can feel like,
[12:12]oh, my world is not quite this small in this town,
[12:16]but I am not alone.
[12:18]Okay, yeah, our high school kids,
[12:20]I can see that for six, seven, eight graders.
[12:23]I really don't, to expose, to expose,
[12:26]let's suppose you have a seventh grade daughter
[12:29]who's very shy, a little bit anxious,
[12:31]and so she finds a community of people
[12:33]who are also shy and anxious.
[12:34]This is a terrible thing to do to her.
[12:36]Do not let that happen,
[12:38]because they will mutually reinforce
[12:39]each other's identity as shy anxious people,
[12:41]which one could you all know over comment.
[12:43]So a lot of psychological ideas
[12:45]that make sense for adults are often just really bad
[12:48]for kids is to put out Abigail Shrier
[12:50]as a book called Bad Therapy.
[12:51]I haven't read the book yet,
[12:52]but I've listened to her pop as I think she's right about this.
[12:55]So yeah, a lot of everything that's put forward to me
[12:58]as a benefit.
[12:59]I just, if you look at it closely,
[13:01]yeah, it always look at the opportunity cost.
[13:03]It is, okay, so now your daughter is standing three hours a day,
[13:06]watching videos of other people who share her disorder.
[13:09]That's really bad, first of all.
[13:11]And the second of all,
[13:12]what did you, where does that time come from?
[13:15]Since 2012, kids have very few hobbies,
[13:17]there's no time for a hobby, they don't do things,
[13:20]they don't read books, there's no time.
[13:22]Every available moment, if they're in an elevator,
[13:24]the phone comes out there on social media,
[13:26]if they're in a car, right, the phone comes out,
[13:27]social media or videos.
[13:29]So once you let them have a smart phone and social media,
[13:33]it's going to take over almost every available minute.
[13:36]For half the kids in the country, they say
[13:39]that they are online almost constantly.
[13:41]So even if they seem to be talking to you,
[13:43]they're not fully present.
[13:45]They're thinking more about what's going on
[13:46]and the phone, what's going on on social media,
[13:48]what are people saying about the thing that I posted?
[13:50]So that's why I say they're sort of taken away
[13:52]to an alternate universe,
[13:54]which is completely unsuitable for human development.
[13:56]Whatever mind or benefits there might be,
[13:58]what you're giving up is so important that, no,
[14:01]I don't see it, I just don't see it,
[14:02]the benefits of social media for children.
[14:04]Okay, okay, I've still come from you.
[14:07]I'm a dad weekend, I'm just,
[14:09]please go ahead, play, play more.
[14:11]Playing devil that weekend, that's all, you know.
[14:14]You've been out sort of touring and talking to groups
[14:16]and people about this book and blah, blah, blah.
[14:19]What is there anything that you've learned?
[14:22]Is there anything that's challenged
[14:23]what you thought at the outset or that made you,
[14:26]you know, surprised you and made you take note,
[14:30]anything like that?
[14:31]Well, so there's been, so first of all,
[14:34]nobody in Gen Z, not a single Gen Z person
[14:37]I've ever found or heard of is saying that I'm wrong.
[14:40]Gen Z sees the problem, they know the phones have messed them up,
[14:43]they do not like their child, let's say,
[14:44]do not like their phone based lives.
[14:46]My students at MIT, let's say,
[14:47]so okay, you're spending four hours a day on TikTok,
[14:49]why don't you stop?
[14:51]This I can't because everyone else is on,
[14:52]I need to know what's going on.
[14:54]So this is a trap and they recognize it.
[14:56]So that's been, I was surprised that I accept,
[14:58]so I expected some pushback and I've gotten almost zero pushback
[15:02]other than from about six researchers who say
[15:05]that I'm confusing correlation with causation,
[15:07]but I'm not, I've been writing about three years.
[15:09]How do we know it's causation, not causation?
[15:11]I have a lot of articles on that,
[15:12]if there's a section in my book.
[15:14]So that's been one of the surprises
[15:15]that it's been not controversial,
[15:17]it's been almost no question.
[15:18]Another is that it's become a global rebellion
[15:23]that is in Britain first, in February,
[15:27]in Britain parents are up in arms,
[15:28]they are spontaneously getting together
[15:30]to delay smartphones to try to keep smartphones
[15:32]out of their kid's lives.
[15:34]The government there is acting.
[15:35]So Britain's a few months ahead of us,
[15:36]but here we are, we're now in May 2024.
[15:40]I'd say the parents rebellion is starting this month.
[15:42]I'm seeing, you know, whatever,
[15:45]you know, parents are constantly email me saying,
[15:47]I read your book, I bought a copy for all my parents
[15:50]and my kids friends, I bought a copy for the principal,
[15:52]I bought a copy for the teachers.
[15:54]Parents are desperate for this.
[15:55]All around the developed world,
[15:57]we've seen our kids become zombies hunched over screens
[16:00]and we just knew something was wrong.
[16:02]So that's been a surprise is how quickly it's spread.
[16:04]I don't have to persuade people.
[16:06]I just put the book out there and people say,
[16:08]oh yes, so this is what we do,
[16:09]because there's a lot of specific suggestions and ideas
[16:12]to what to do.
[16:13]Do you think that the funds will become like tobacco?
[16:17]I think that, yes.
[16:19]Yes, tobacco, they're much more addicted than tobacco.
[16:22]When in 1997 was the peak year of teens
[16:25]of high school students smoking,
[16:28]one third of high school students smoked,
[16:30]which means two thirds didn't.
[16:32]Now, you could never get 95% of a high school
[16:36]to do heroin or, you know, or cocaine,
[16:39]just so we couldn't get that high.
[16:41]So with social media, it's that high
[16:43]and at a much younger age, because they have to,
[16:45]one, it's a trap, it's a social trap.
[16:47]So now that we're recognizing,
[16:49]I think we're gonna recognize, you know,
[16:50]like a bottom appeal is a wonderful thing,
[16:52]but you don't let an 11 year old drive.
[16:54]Social media has all kinds of possible advantages for adults.
[16:58]It does nothing for 11 year olds
[17:00]to have them watch videos of B headings
[17:02]where to be contacted by Nigerian sex storcien rings,
[17:05]where to be approached by strange men trying to get
[17:07]them to give a photograph of themselves
[17:09]in the bathing suit.
[17:10]Like, this just doesn't make sense
[17:11]and we're gonna start, we're gonna start seeing that.
[17:13]Oh, the biggest surprise to me is that the,
[17:15]the main obstacle that I'm facing is just resignation.
[17:18]Parents just feel it's too hard
[17:20]that with the phones are here to stay,
[17:23]the train's left the station.
[17:24]It's too late.
[17:25]We have to just accept,
[17:26]we have to meet them where they are, people say.
[17:29]And I say no way.
[17:30]If my kids are playing down on the train tracks,
[17:32]I'm not gonna need them where they are,
[17:34]we take them off the train tracks.
[17:37]I love that.
[17:38]Okay, I know you've started a non-profit
[17:41]or associated organization.
[17:43]Tell me about that and the work that you intended to do.
[17:45]Yes, so a few years ago, so in 2017,
[17:49]I started an organization with Lenore Scenezi,
[17:52]the woman who wrote Free Range Kids.
[17:53]She's brilliant, she's funny.
[17:55]And so we started an organization called Let Grow.
[17:58]And so if this nurse go to letro.org
[18:01]with all kinds of great ideas,
[18:03]for how you can restore play and independence
[18:05]in your kids at home and also in your kids' schools,
[18:08]so this should be stop one.
[18:10]If you have, especially your kids are under around 12 or 13,
[18:14]and that's been our sweet spot
[18:15]as sort of elementary and middle school,
[18:16]and do the Let Grow project, it's amazing.
[18:19]If you don't school, it's incredibly powerful,
[18:21]but you can do it at home too.
[18:22]It's just the teacher gives you a hand.
[18:24]If the kid a handout and come home, he comes home,
[18:27]he'll work out, the kid proposes something
[18:29]that she thinks she can do that,
[18:30]she's never done alone.
[18:32]Maybe it's walked the dog,
[18:33]maybe it's go three blocks to a store to buy a quarter milk.
[18:37]And so you agree what that is, the kid does it,
[18:39]and when they do it, they're thrilled.
[18:41]It's so exciting.
[18:42]The parents are often really nervous,
[18:44]especially if the kid is out of the house.
[18:45]They're really nervous.
[18:46]And that's important,
[18:47]because the parents have to get over their nervousness.
[18:50]We all were out of the age of eight and nine,
[18:53]go around the neighborhoods.
[18:53]We were all riding our bicycles around town of eight, nine.
[18:56]And this was during a crime week,
[18:58]a lot of us were doing a crime week.
[18:59]But now things are so safe.
[19:01]There's the, I mean, the physical safety of our children
[19:04]is so much greater than it's ever been in any human history.
[19:06]We're all terrified, we're terrified of our neighbors.
[19:09]We're terrified our kids will be kidnapped.
[19:10]And that's just not gonna happen.
[19:12]So we have to overcome our anxiety.
[19:13]And the lecro project helps you do that.
[19:16]A powerful part of it is if the school does it,
[19:19]now you have the whole town,
[19:20]all the eight year olds are out getting a quarter milk.
[19:23]And suddenly everyone sees that eight year olds
[19:26]are capable of crossing the street.
[19:28]And eight year olds are capable of going from point eight
[19:29]to point B.
[19:30]And it becomes normal.
[19:32]And none of us have seen that since the eighties,
[19:34]we haven't seen kids on a company
[19:36]come super botch on chaperoned.
[19:38]So anyway, lecro has really powerful ideas
[19:40]for how you or your school can restore independence.
[19:43]And it really reduces anxiety,
[19:45]especially if you have a kid who is a little anxious,
[19:48]independence therapy works within a week or two,
[19:51]it begins working where as Prozac takes four or five weeks.
[19:53]So lecro and then so that takes care of the play half
[19:57]of the story,
[19:58]because my book is about how it was still
[20:00]also the play-based child that we've got to restore that.
[20:03]And then there's the rise of the phone-based childhood
[20:05]instead.
[20:06]There's a lot of groups working on that.
[20:08]I'm not sure if I'm going to start a nonprofit for it,
[20:10]but I am a professor at New York University.
[20:14]And so I have research accounts and I have a way
[20:16]for people to donate to support because I'm hiring staff.
[20:19]I am overwhelmed.
[20:19]I can't read my email.
[20:20]I can't do so many incoming requests.
[20:22]And I can't even say no to them.
[20:24]I mean, it's overwhelming.
[20:25]So I'm trying to hire a chief of staff.
[20:28]But if you go to anxiousgeneration.com,
[20:30]we have all kinds of resources.
[20:32]anxiousgeneration.com, click on take action.
[20:34]We have an action by for parents, action guide for schools,
[20:37]all kinds of ideas by which you can go back to the phone-based
[20:40]childhood and restore a real childhood in the real world.
[20:45]Amazing.
[20:46]Any last tips for parents who have listened to this episode
[20:53]and they've bought in and they're like,
[20:54]I'm getting the kids off the train tracks.
[20:56]You're absolutely right.
[20:58]No, it'll be hard, but I'm going to do it.
[21:00]What's like the one piece of advice?
[21:03]Is there a way to ease it?
[21:04]Let me give you two, because let's talk about this
[21:07]is for the parent who you've got a 14, 15-year-old kid.
[21:10]His life is all ready.
[21:12]It's all online.
[21:13]Don't take him off and say, like, no, you're not going to,
[21:16]because that's going to cut them off and they're
[21:17]going to feel a bit horrible.
[21:19]And then, rather, we're always work with the families
[21:24]of your kid's friends.
[21:25]So if you have four families that are doing this together,
[21:29]what you say is, we're going to put some structure in place.
[21:31]We're going to reduce the total amount of screen time,
[21:33]but we're all doing it.
[21:34]All four families are not going to be alone.
[21:36]And guess what?
[21:37]Our goal isn't to punish you.
[21:38]Our goal isn't to take away fun.
[21:39]Our goal is to give you fun.
[21:41]Our goal is for you to have the kind of childhood
[21:43]that people always have, that we have, that your grandparents
[21:46]said, we have a lot of adventures.
[21:48]We want you to have that too.
[21:49]So you guys are 14.
[21:51]Here, here's some money.
[21:53]Take the subway to Coney Island.
[21:55]Go to Uber to a movie, but just go somewhere
[21:58]where you're not being supervised by adults.
[22:00]Have fun.
[22:01]So if you think about it more as restoring a fun and adventurous
[22:05]childhood rather than taking away something,
[22:07]it'll go down a lot easier.
[22:09]It'll be more fun for you.
[22:10]OK.
[22:11]All right.
[22:12]I'm equipped.
[22:14]This is not also serving.
[22:15]I promise.
[22:17]I have four kids.
[22:17]We've spent this any day to age at that.
[22:20]We're all facing it.
[22:21]I mean, this is all over the world now.
[22:23]Family life is fighting over screens.
[22:25]Yeah.
[22:25]That's a great thing.
[22:27]Which is probably what they're doing while I'm doing this podcast.
[22:29]So anyway.
[22:30]I got to go get them off.
[22:32]Anyway, thank you so much for coming on mom's
[22:34]no time to read bugs.
[22:35]Thank you for all your work.
[22:37]Thank you for your advocacy on behalf of the future generation.
[22:40]I mean, it is super, super important.
[22:42]It has long-term consequences for the leaders of tomorrow
[22:46]and what we can expect them to do with our country
[22:48]and our world and the types of attention
[22:52]that need to, yeah, attention prowess
[22:55]that they can have.
[22:56]Because otherwise, what's going to happen to all of us?
[23:00]No, that's right.
[23:01]That's right.
[23:02]Well, thank you so much, Libby.
[23:03]Thanks for all of your work.
[23:04]Thanks for the time.
[23:05]OK.
[23:05]Bye-bye.
[23:08]Thanks for listening to mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[23:10]If you love it, please leave a review.
[23:12]And follow us on social at Zibi Owens and at Zibi Readers.