Teenagers find their phones very important,” she says. “It makes them feel secure and safe, so taking away something that is important to them just causes more stress and more worry which makes situations worse at school and harder for teachers, supervisors [and] support workers to deal with.”
Sweetie, what you’re describing here are withdrawal symptoms from addiction
harder for teachers, supervisors [and] support workers to deal with.
Because they have to teach the kids what the word “No” means?
Yes, it is pretty hard for teachers and associated professionals to teach uncooperative high school kids about the word ‘no’ when their parents have been teaching them they can do whatever they want for 12 years.
Ruqayah, who graduated from a western Sydney high school in 2024, thinks the bans were an “overreaction”. After going through high school with access to phones, she finished her final year with the phone ban in place and says fellow students were still finding ways to use them in secret.
If they’re being forced to use them in secret, then they are being forced to use them in a less disruptive manner. It makes it easier for the students complying in good faith with the ban to concentrate and goes some way to normalising a lack of visible phone use in schools. Teenagers are never going to 100% comply with a ban on their liberties, but if some of them do then it is an improvement.
When I was in high school, we changed from very lax uniform rules one year to strict ones the next. Of course there were some students who didn’t comply with the rules and continued to wear what they wanted and risk punishment, but because a majority of students did comply it made it easier for all of us. We didn’t feel like we were missing out or at risk of being bullied for complying with the rules. Over time, the culture of the school changed to one where students just complied with the uniform rule by default. I’m not trying to compare uniforms to smartphones here; it’s just common sense that you don’t abandon a ban overnight because it wasn’t instantly 100% effective.
Do this, instead of banning YouTube subscriptions and forcing me to rely on the algorithmic feed (I’m over 18, just don’t want to give google my ID).
Do this, instead of making Steam delete my library of thousands of dollars of games (allegedly).
Do this, instead of banning accounts on a bunch of social media apps but NOT TELLING US WHICH APPS WILL BE BANNED.
In short, it’s only tangentially related but I wanted to vent about the e-karen.
Do this? They already did this.
And it’s working far better than the social media ban ever could.
It doesn’t solve the issue entirely, but rather than get it over the line all the things the e-Karen is doing will take us in the opposite direction.
You don’t have to provide your ID, that is misinformation. There will be alternative measures in place for all services covered by the “social media ban”. You can also export your YouTube subscriptions to a different app and continue receiving a personalised feed whilst signed out. Apps like Grayjay and NewPipe allow you to do this.
You don’t need to provide your ID documents, but you do need to provide your identity. I was being hyperbolic but technically what I said was still correct. I’ve already installed Freetube just in case my account gets deleted.
