The ballot measure would forbid the sale of smartphones to children younger than 13
Colorado dad and Denver-area anesthesiologist Tim Farnum has always understood the intrigue of modern technology. Smartphones, tablets and unfettered Internet access connect us to faraway corners of the world and make life – and movie watching – all the more convenient.
But the father of five is not convinced these devices are beneficial for children, a conclusion he came to after his two youngest sons, ages 11 and 13, got smartphones last year.
“There were some real problems,” Farnum, 49, told The Washington Post. “If you tell them to watch the screen time, all of a sudden the fangs come out.”
As he tells it, his once energetic and outgoing boys became moody, quiet and reclusive. They never left their bedrooms, and when he tried to take away the phones, one of Farnum’s sons launched into a temper tantrum that the dad described as equivalent to the withdrawals of a crack addict.
So Farnum started researching the side effects of screen time on kids and found statistics that astonished him. Too much technology too soon can impair brain development, hinder social skills and trigger an unhealthy reliance on the neurotransmitter dopamine, a high similar to what drug and alcohol addicts feel.
Farnum read it all, then said he thought to himself: “Someone has got to do something.”
In February, he formed the nonprofit PAUS (Parents Against Underage Smartphones) with a few other medical professionals and began drafting a ballot initiative that, if passed, would make Colorado the first state in the nation to establish legal limits on smartphones sales to children.
Farnum’s proposal, ballot initiative no. 29, would make it illegal for cellphone providers to sell smartphones to children under the age of 13. The ban would require retailers to ask customers the age of the primary user of the smartphone and submit monthly adherence reports to the Colorado Department of Revenue.
The department would be responsible for creating a website portal for the reports and would investigate violations and collect penalties. The first violation would incur a written warning. A second would produce a $500 fine, and the amount would double with each subsequent incident.
The initiative has garnered “overwhelming” support from parents and grandparents who worry that too much technology can stunt imaginations and appreciation for the outdoors, he claims. But Farnum also faces opposition from others, including some lawmakers, who believe that it’s a parental responsibility, not one for government.
“Frankly, I think it should remain a family matter,” Colorado state Sen. John Kefalas, D-Fort Collins, told the Coloradan. “I know there have been different proposals out there regarding the Internet and putting filters on websites that might put kids at risk. I think ultimately, this comes down to parents . . . making sure their kids are not putting themselves at risk.”
Farnum told The Post he understands the pushback from those who see this as a parental responsibility and a law as an encroachment on parental power, but said his group sees premature smartphone access as a danger equivalent to smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol or watching pornography.
“We have age restrictions on all those things because they’re harmful to kids,” Farnum said. “This is no different, in my opinion.”
The proposal also distinguishes smartphones from other cellular devices like standard flip phones that cannot access the Internet, because many parents just want to be able to contact their children for safety reasons.
Though the goal is to curb what Farnum described as the corporate interest of cellphone companies and app makers from latching onto the younger generations, he admitted that there is also an educational component of his crusade. Many parents don’t know the dangers of excessive technology usage, he said, or the permanent damage it can do to their children.
Because iPads and tablets are even entering the classroom at an earlier age, Farnum said it is a “real struggle” for parents to feel like they have control over their children’s exposure to technology.
“Hopefully this helps and pushes the conversation forward,” Farnum told The Post.
The nonprofit has cleared some of the initial hurdles that come with proposing new legislation, but still has a long road ahead. PAUS will need to collect roughly 100,000 signatures over the next year and a half to get the issue on the ballot in the fall of 2018.
By the end of June, Farnum plans to have the official petition printed and ready for signatures. Colorado does not accept digital petition signatures, so Farnum and his group will have to collect support the old-fashioned way.
“It’s kind of ironic, perhaps,” he said. “We’re going to have to go knock on doors and sit outside grocery stores. It’s slowly gaining steam.”
Next week, Farnum, who characterizes his views as “fairly libertarian,” is meeting with the most liberal democratic senator in the state. But he is trying to keep the initiative away from partisan politics.
“I think it’s good that we’re all going to get to vote on it,” he said. “The parents all have to come together and do this.”
At home, Farnum’s two young sons no longer have smartphones – at least for now. They spent much of their second semester of the school year nearly technology free, and he says he saw a notable difference.
They laughed again and wanted to be outdoors.
One, Farnum recalled, even offered a striking admission: “‘Hey dad, I really like reading now.’”
http://www.denverpost.com/2017/06/18/colorado-voters-may-consider-ban-on-childhood-smartphones/
STATE MOVES TO CRIMINALIZE SCREEN TIME FOR KIDS, PARENTS TO FACE $20K FINE FOR VIOLATION
SOURCE: THE FREE THOUGHT PROJECT
Should Colorado legislators get their way, smartphones and other electronic devices capable of connecting to the Internet would be verboten for kids under the age of 13 — and parents could face up to $20,000 in fines for violating the proposed law.
Intended “to make children free,” Initiative 29 is the brainchild of Parents Against Underage Smartphones (PAUS), a group of concerned parents whose mission statement includes ending “the insane practice of giving children smartphones”; but — while the spirit of the proposed law might be considered a laudable attempt to reconnect kids with nature — in actuality, its Nanny State overtones trump the unabashed appeal to emotion.
If successful in Colorado’s Legislature, the proposed strictures governing children’s use of Internet-connected devices will inculcate parents as de facto agents of the U.S. Police State in holding them accountable for kids’ screen time through an inexcusable, untenable quandary — shared in part with cell phone and electronics retailers.
Indeed, Initiative 29 requires store owners “verbally inquire about the age of the intended primary owner of the smartphone” — a mandated interrogation conditional to the voluntary exchange of goods for payment will undeniably turn parents who feel the question none of the State’s business into potential liars and, thus, criminals.
PAUS president and founder Dr. Timothy Farnum grew disheartened at the deleterious effects on his own children, which, he surmised, stemmed from their constant use of cell phones and forays into the sometimes wild Internet.
“They would get the phone and lock themselves in their room and change who they were,” lamented Farnum, board-certified anesthesiologist, to The Coloradan. “They go from being outgoing, energetic, interested in the world and happy, to reclusive . . . They want to spend all their time in their room. They lose interest in outside activities.”
“(With smartphones), the internet is always begging for your attention,” he added. “The apps are all designed to addict you. … For children, it’s not a good thing.”
However, what Farnum and the initiative’s supporters seemingly fail to grasp is the inordinate overreach by a State so invasive and burdened by excessive law, Big Brother already commands a seat at every family’s dinner table. To additionally mandate retailer interrogation and parental restriction, to boot, not only robs parents of the right to raise children how they see fit, it veritably secures the State as a coercive, fine-imposing babysitter.
“Frankly, I think it should remain a family matter,” asserted Senator John Kefalas, noting the commendable motive behind the legislation does not negate its boundary-trampling reach into our private lives. “I know there have been different proposals out there regarding the internet and putting filters on websites that might put kids at risk. I think ultimately, this comes down to parents … making sure their kids are not putting themselves at risk.”
Kefalas speaks to an increased dependence on government to step in where parents may fall short — Farnum’s proposal clears guardians of inherent responsibility for children’s activities and development, instead placing the onus on store owners to perform the tasks of, in essence, State spies — all at the barrel of a weighty financial gun.
Of PAUS, Salon notes,
“On their website, the group points to pediatricians who recommend limiting handheld screen time for kids and an article about Bill Gates’ thoughts on adolescent development and smart phones. They also have a YouTube embed of a Louis C.K. bit about cell phones.
“Among pictures of falling rain, sunflowers, crowds and the random image of Mel Gibson in ‘Braveheart,’ PAUS lays out its argument on their website: the internet is a dangerous place for children.
“PAUS explains, without sourcing much of their information, that the ‘damage begins in the cradle,’ citing parental negligence an overflow of electronic stimulation as the cause for future ‘physical damage’ and ‘stunted social, emotional, and cognitive development.’ Additionally, the group pins pornography and a ‘lack of meaningful connections in a digital society’ as reasons for higher rates of suicide in young girls from ages 10-14.”
To reiterate, the group’s goals might bubble from a place of concern for children’s wellbeing and an apathy becoming entrenched in society that could facilely evince its peril — but, to place a burden of financial culpability as steep as $20,000 after a single verbal warning for 13-and-unders’ use of electronic devices unduly penalizes their access to an entire planet’s wealth of online information.
In fact, the positive benefits reaped in youth having Internet access at the ready comprise a damning counter-narrative to Initiative 29’s foisting of any damaging effects onto the backs of guardians and business owners, who might otherwise engage in a voluntary exchange on their terms.
As Greg Pulscher points out for FEE, “Children’s inactivity is a major rallying cry for the advocates of the initiative. However, smartphones are not the cause of this idleness, smartphones are the symptom. Decades of regulations and cultural norms are treating children as delicate flowers which leads to these unintended consequences.”
Notably, educational psychologist Dr. Peter Gray observes in Free to Learn,
“Surveys of game players in the general population, indicate that kids who are free to play outdoors as well as with video games usually, over time, choose a balance between the two […]
“Video-game play appears to compete much more with television watching than with outdoor play for children’s free time.”
Further, Initiative 29 and PAUS fail to account for an interminable list of reasons parents might provide children with cell phones and other smart devices beyond the simple pleasures of arguably addicting games and apps — whether for safety while alone, purely for portable connectivity to their guardians, or security in ability to summon necessary emergency services — kids’ possession of Internet-ready devices can encompass virtually any sound justification.
None of which deserve any additional excuses by the State to intervene in our private lives.
As with nearly any legislation, examining a slurry of negative ramifications expeditiously destroys any possible positives — particularly in the context of an invasive government, which seems intent only on watching our every move.
Indeed, the Nanny State’s onerous presence in children’s lives as they learn, grow, explore, and adapt to the modern digital world, is far more inclined than any amount of screen time to stunt natural curiosity, foster ambivalence, and strew resentment — particularly if parents are forced to dole out tens of thousands for the ‘crime.’
After all, unless a communist regime usurps power, it is the job of parents, not the State, and certainly not retailers, to see children prepared for the perils of adulthood — whether or not that preparation includes responsible use of the Internet.
A Colorado group wants to ban the sale of cell phones to preteens
Parents Against Underage Smartphones wants to regulate cell phone ownership — and to create a “separate internet”
TUESDAY, JUN 20, 2017 02:39 PM PDT ALESSANDRA MALDONADO
A Colorado group is proposing a ban on the sale to and ownership of smartphones for preteens. Parents Against Underage Smartphones says its goal – “to make children free” — is reflected in its mission to end “the insane practice of giving children smartphones.”
Initiative 29 would require retailers to “verbally inquire about the age of the intended primary owner of the smartphone” and file monthly paperwork to the Department of Revenue to make sure kids under the age of 13 don’t get access to any cell phone that can connect to the internet. Retailers found selling smartphones to preteens will receive a verbal warning for their first infraction but will face up to $20,000 in fines for future violations.
“They would get the phone and lock themselves in their room and change who they were,” says PAUS president and founder Dr. Timothy Farnum. Thea board-certified anesthesiologist told The Coloradoan “They go from being outgoing, energetic, interested in the world and happy, to reclusive . . . They want to spend all their time in their room. They lose interest in outside activities.”
On their website, the group points to pediatricians who recommend limiting handheld screen time for kids and an article about Bill Gates’ thoughts on adolescent development and smart phones. They also have a YouTube embed of a Louis C.K. bit about cell phones.
Among pictures of falling rain, sunflowers, crowds and the random image of Mel Gibson in “Braveheart,” PAUS lays out its argument on their website: the internet is a dangerous place for children.
PAUS explains, without sourcing much of their information, that the “damage begins in the cradle,” citing parental negligence an overflow of electronic stimulation as the cause for future “physical damage” and “stunted social, emotional, and cognitive development.” Additionally, the group pins pornography and a “lack of meaningful connections in a digital society” as reasons for higher rates of suicide in young girls from ages 10-14.
The larger argument PAUS is attempting to share is their belief that there should be “a separate internet which is safe for children,” asserting that children are producing child pornography “for the first time in history.”
“If my father was still alive he would not believe that my generation of parents would sit by and let this happen to our children,” says Farnum on the group’s website. “Come with me brothers and sisters. RISE UP!!”
Supporters of the bill will need to collect 300,000 signatures to secure a spot on the 2018 ballot now that the language of the initiative has been approved by Colorado officials.
Alessandra Maldonado is an editorial intern at Salon. You can find her on Twitter at @alessamberr
http://www.salon.com/2017/06/20/parents-against-underage-smartphones-colorado-initiative-29/
pausamerica.com
pausamerica.com/share-your-story.html
Legal Document : Ballot Measure Initiative #29
VIDEO COVERAGE
http://denver.cbslocal.com/2017/05/31/paus-smartphones-preteens-ban/
http://kdvr.com/2017/06/18/colorado-group-wants-to-ban-sale-of-cell-phones-for-kids-under-13/
