February 11, 2025 • 12 mins
Use HAPPY at g-mee.com for a $40 discount on G-Mee Connect Pro (down from $189 to $149).
Why don’t tech executives let their own children use social media? Can teenagers appreciate strict phone boundaries? If you're fighting screen time battles with your kids, this episode offers hope that your children will eventually thank you for protecting them from unrestricted tech access.
Quote of the Episode: "Nobody ever says, 'That was the best weekend ever, just love that! We should do that more often—stare at our phones and ignore each other.'" - Justin Coulson
Key Points:
- Meta and other tech platforms are "terrified" of proposed legislation restricting youth access.
- Tech executives often ban their own children from using the products they create.
- The shift from play-based to screen-based childhood is rewiring children's brains.
- Building trust and supporting autonomy helps children understand and accept boundaries.
- Regular conversations about technology use are essential for family relationships.
- Social media platforms prioritise engagement over user wellbeing.
- Children eventually recognise and appreciate parents' protective boundaries.
Resources Mentioned:
- Unplug Childhood
- Jonathan Haidt's research on "the great rewiring"
- Need-supportive parenting approach
Action Steps for Parents:
- Include children in technology decision-making processes.
- Have regular conversations about tech use rather than one-time discussions.
- Build trust while maintaining appropriate boundaries.
- Support autonomy within safe limits.
- Create tech-free family time.
- Share the reasoning behind tech restrictions.
- Focus on building real-world connections.
- Stay informed about social media risks and platform practices.
Use HAPPY at g-mee.com for a $40 discount on G-Mee Connect Pro (down from $189 to $149).
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
At some point your children are going to say thanks,
thank you for having boundaries around tech and screens, thank
you for delaying my access to social media. Thank you
for helping me to have a play based childhood rather
than a screen based childhood. Today we tell you how
to get there. Welcome to the Happy Families Podcast, Real
(00:27):
parenting solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast.
We are Justin and Kylie Coulson and Kylie. A couple
of days ago, I had a great chat with a
guy called Charlie Brown.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Did his parents do that on purpose? Do you think?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I asked him. We didn't record that part, but he
said it was always Charles and that's what his parents
still call him. But the Peanuts cutoon was around when
he was born and everyone calls him Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown,
media commentator, used to be on Channel nine doing all
the tech bits and has guided parents and people through
technolog issues for a couple of decades on the TV.
(01:03):
He's also started a company with a phone called the
g ME Phone. That's the letter G and thene g
me the GME phone why because he wants parents to
be in control of what their kids are doing on devices,
and he's got this phone. Oh, by the way, you
can go to gme dot com and use the code
happy and get the phone. Instead of one hundred and
(01:24):
eighty nine bucks, he's giving a special discount one hundred
and forty nine dollars. Anyway, I had a chat with
him the other day and I thought you and I,
ahead of the full podcast interview dropping on Saturday, have
got to talk about two things that came up in
our conversation. The first was this story about, once again
(01:44):
just how serious bullying can get on Facebook.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
There's a woman on the phone to me in absolute
tears because her daughter, who was about sixteen, hadn't left
her bedroom for the past four or five days because
someone created a Facebook page about her bullyt so I
was bullying her in the worst possible way. So they
morphed a face onto a naked body. They've done all
of this terrible stuff. This girl hadn't left her room,
(02:08):
and mum was worried because the kid, in mum's opinion,
was suicidal or She's crying to me saying and I
could hear I could hear this girl opening the door
and screaming at her mom down the hallway and I'm
standing there on the phone to her, going, well, what's
the problem. I mean, why is the page still? Love?
How long is the page? But she said, I've been
(02:29):
up for three or four days. They keep flagging it.
It doesn't get taken down. It was a Facebook page,
mind't you. And I said, okay, fine, just just wait there.
Let me see if I can make a phone call.
And I rang I won't say who, but somebody very
very senior at Facebook. It's now called Meta. And I said, okay, look,
I'm standing over the desk from the cheaper staff. This
(02:52):
is the story. It's running a story number three in
twenty five minutes unless this page is taken down in
three minutes. And they said, oh, we can't do it,
and I said, okay, well, well i'll speak to you
after after the story runs. Three minutes later, the page
was taken down. So this page had been up for
four days. This teenager was in the emotional state. She
(03:14):
was in the mum was in a similar emotional state.
And I'm listening to all of this, and then with
a one phone call to one person, less than three minutes,
the pages down. And I thought to myself. There is
something very, very wrong with everything that is going on here.
This is one example. Where are we going from here
with this? And what is everyone else going to do
(03:36):
that doesn't find a way to contact people like me
who can actually help.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
I hate hearing stories like that. We've just so frustrating.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
I don't even have words. No, no, I know, I know.
This is why I make such a really big deal.
I've got a website, unplugged childhood dot org. There's nothing
to sell there, there's no profit, It's just unplugged childhood
dot org. Learn how to build a community so the
kids don't need to be online, Learn how to delay access,
go slow once they do get access, and how to
reduce their time on social media.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
I just want to understand why do they have a
report button if they're not willing to do anything.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
This is the great challenge, right because we know the
algorithm is all about outrage. The algorithm is when you
stoke outrage, you get more people commenting, you get more
people sharing, you get more people involved. Jonathan Hate calls
it the great rewiring. Kids have gone from the play
based childhood of our youth too a screen based childhood
(04:35):
and everything that's accompanying that, the outrage, the commentary, the
all encompassing nature of it. It makes a child feel
like they are completely overwhelmed, fully swamped, and there is
no way out no matter where they turn. The federal
government's decision to bring in a social media ban for
under sixteens might be the single best thing that the
(04:57):
Albaneze government has done since they've been in office. Obviously,
there's going to be an election between now and the
end of the year, but fingers crossed that will stay there.
I just think it's so so vital.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I find it intriguing that kids of tech execs they
don't even allow their kids on devices, let alone on
social media. Like, yeah, they're meshed, completely embedded in this community.
They know the magnitude of what our children are being
bombarded with.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
I've heard the podcast interviews, I've read the articles where
they've been quoted directly as saying, yeah, no tech for
our kids in school, no tech in their bedrooms. We
don't give our children access to smartphones until they're at
least sixteen. I mean, these are the people who are
making the poison for your children to consume. They won't
fit in their own kids and it.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Just breaks my heart, like, where's the humanity in that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I won't say who told me this, but I was
speaking to somebody who is very connected in the technology world,
and they indicated to me that Meta and the other
big platforms are absolutely furi as terrified that this legislation
will end up being enacted by the end of the year.
And I think that's because they will have less access
(06:08):
to rewire kids' brains at that most impressionable stage.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, if we go back to Charlie's story, this mum
and her teenage daughters trapped in a room because she
won't come out. The only reason they won't take that
story down is because it's clickbait. Yeah, it's literally getting
traffic yep, millions and millions of.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Views, captures attention, brings people in devastating I was thinking
about it, though, Kylie. No one ever has said to me, Oh,
you know that weekend, that Saturday afternoon where we all
just sat on the couch, didn't talk, but we watched YouTube,
or we all played our games, or we all looked
at our Instagram reels. That was the best Saturday afternoon ever.
Nobody ever says that was the best weekend. Ever, just
(06:49):
love that we should do that more often stare at
our phones and ignore each other.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
At the beginning of the podcast, you preface with the
idea that in time, our children will actually thank us,
actually tell us that they appreciate the boundaries and the
rules that we placed around them in an effort to
protect them.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yet real parenting solutions every day. We're going to get
the solutions in a sec How do we make that happen.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
Our eldest daughter, I can't tell you how many times
I've heard her talking to her younger sisters when they're
having a big winge about us and telling them that
she knows how frustrating it is. She's lived it. But
she also recognizes now that she's in the position she is,
that we're only doing what's necessary to protect them. And
on top of that, she now has an almost two
(07:37):
year old who she will not let watch the TV.
The only time she gets to use the phone is
if she's first timing Lolly or her other grandma, And
I just it just blows my mind because that kid,
Holy smokes, she came as hell when it came to
social media and phone usage.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Quick context check as well. When you say that the
baby at granddaughter gets to use the phone to FaceTime Lolly.
For those who have missed the memo, You're Lolly and
I'm Pops because we like the idea of lollipop because
we're sweet. Hey after the break. More on how Charlie
Brown says you can get sixteen year olds to say hey, thanks,
really glad we had tech boundaries in my interview with
(08:23):
Charlie Brown. The full episode, by the way, we'll drop
on Saturday in our special weekend edition of the Happy
Families podcast. Charlie Brown, of course, the CEO of g ME.
GM is the company behind the GME connect Pro. You
can get it for one hundred and forty nine instead
of one hundred and eighty nine dollars using the code
happy at gme dot com. Charlie shared this story about
his sixteen year old daughter.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
We're talking about parenthic controls and not letting our eleven
year old and thirteen year old do certain things and
the sixteen year old. This was in the car were
family five were in the car. Sixteen year old turns
the eleven and twelve and the thirteen year old who
are complaining about the print controls and not being allowed
access to this. As she said, Look, it's really annoying
what dad's job is.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
But you get to my age and you look back
on when I was at your age, and you actually think, Yeah,
there's a lot of merit and what mom and dad
was saying, and I'm better off for it.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
And this voice of experience. Love it, Kylie. I love
stories like that. And I'm sure that every parent's saying,
but how how am I supposed to get that?
Speaker 2 (09:26):
The most important thing that we have done with our
children is include them in the decision making process. Our
children want the autonomy to make choices, and as we
work with them, we actually have to trust that they
have the capacity to recognize and see why we're doing
(09:49):
what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
I love the way you've used those words. One of
my favorite studies ever is a study by no One
Cares but Landry and colleagues who were looking at this
idea of what they call organismic trust. In other words,
do you trust that innately inside your child they have
the desire and the ability to grow in healthy ways
(10:12):
towards flourishing. If you have that innate trust, what that
does is it changes the way that you parent them.
Instead of being controlling and feeling like you need to
come in with correction and direction constantly to keep them
on track, you're able to, I guess, loosen the controls
a little bit and work with them rather than do
(10:34):
things to them. So what you step into instead is
what's known as need supportive parenting. You build the relationship,
you give them credit for having a brain, and you
work on solutions together. It doesn't mean that you let
them do whatever they want. It's not like you're saying, well,
you've you've got a prefrontal cortex too, why don't you
just do what you think? It's not total freedom and independence,
(10:55):
but rather it's saying, okay, this is tricky. I mean,
we're going through it with a couple of our kids
at the moment. This is a trick stage. You want
something that we're not comfortable with you having. How can
we work out a way that you can have it
and we can feel good about it? Or alternatively, what's
a space in between that gets you feeling like you're
moving towards it but you're not quite there yet, but
(11:15):
we can loosen the reins a little bit. So it's this,
it's the give and take of relationship.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And the reality is this isn't a one done conversation.
This conversationally, this conversation is happening pretty much every other month.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Oh sometimes it feels like it's every other day. Honestly,
I mean it's draining. Raising kids can be draining.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
We can't shy away from them. These conversations are so important.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yeah, yeah, they are. The full interview drops on Saturday.
We'd love for you to listen to what Charlie Brown
has to say in detail about the way tech is
affecting kids and how we can find ways to guide
our children navigate them through the tech maze successfully and safely.
That's all happening on the Happy Families podcast on Saturday.
(12:00):
A whole lot more fascinating conversation points and parenting solutions
for you then. The Happy Families Podcast is produced by
Justin Roland from Bridge Media. If you'd like more information
and more resources, including videos about how you can help
keep your kids safe online, visit us at happyfamilies dot
com dot a u
At some point your children are going to say thanks,
thank you for having boundaries around tech and screens, thank
you for delaying my access to social media. Thank you
for helping me to have a play based childhood rather
than a screen based childhood. Today we tell you how
to get there. Welcome to the Happy Families Podcast, Real
(00:27):
parenting solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast.
We are Justin and Kylie Coulson and Kylie. A couple
of days ago, I had a great chat with a
guy called Charlie Brown.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Did his parents do that on purpose? Do you think?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I asked him. We didn't record that part, but he
said it was always Charles and that's what his parents
still call him. But the Peanuts cutoon was around when
he was born and everyone calls him Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown,
media commentator, used to be on Channel nine doing all
the tech bits and has guided parents and people through
technolog issues for a couple of decades on the TV.
(01:03):
He's also started a company with a phone called the
g ME Phone. That's the letter G and thene g
me the GME phone why because he wants parents to
be in control of what their kids are doing on devices,
and he's got this phone. Oh, by the way, you
can go to gme dot com and use the code
happy and get the phone. Instead of one hundred and
(01:24):
eighty nine bucks, he's giving a special discount one hundred
and forty nine dollars. Anyway, I had a chat with
him the other day and I thought you and I,
ahead of the full podcast interview dropping on Saturday, have
got to talk about two things that came up in
our conversation. The first was this story about, once again
(01:44):
just how serious bullying can get on Facebook.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
There's a woman on the phone to me in absolute
tears because her daughter, who was about sixteen, hadn't left
her bedroom for the past four or five days because
someone created a Facebook page about her bullyt so I
was bullying her in the worst possible way. So they
morphed a face onto a naked body. They've done all
of this terrible stuff. This girl hadn't left her room,
(02:08):
and mum was worried because the kid, in mum's opinion,
was suicidal or She's crying to me saying and I
could hear I could hear this girl opening the door
and screaming at her mom down the hallway and I'm
standing there on the phone to her, going, well, what's
the problem. I mean, why is the page still? Love?
How long is the page? But she said, I've been
(02:29):
up for three or four days. They keep flagging it.
It doesn't get taken down. It was a Facebook page,
mind't you. And I said, okay, fine, just just wait there.
Let me see if I can make a phone call.
And I rang I won't say who, but somebody very
very senior at Facebook. It's now called Meta. And I said, okay, look,
I'm standing over the desk from the cheaper staff. This
(02:52):
is the story. It's running a story number three in
twenty five minutes unless this page is taken down in
three minutes. And they said, oh, we can't do it,
and I said, okay, well, well i'll speak to you
after after the story runs. Three minutes later, the page
was taken down. So this page had been up for
four days. This teenager was in the emotional state. She
(03:14):
was in the mum was in a similar emotional state.
And I'm listening to all of this, and then with
a one phone call to one person, less than three minutes,
the pages down. And I thought to myself. There is
something very, very wrong with everything that is going on here.
This is one example. Where are we going from here
with this? And what is everyone else going to do
(03:36):
that doesn't find a way to contact people like me
who can actually help.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
I hate hearing stories like that. We've just so frustrating.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
I don't even have words. No, no, I know, I know.
This is why I make such a really big deal.
I've got a website, unplugged childhood dot org. There's nothing
to sell there, there's no profit, It's just unplugged childhood
dot org. Learn how to build a community so the
kids don't need to be online, Learn how to delay access,
go slow once they do get access, and how to
reduce their time on social media.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
I just want to understand why do they have a
report button if they're not willing to do anything.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
This is the great challenge, right because we know the
algorithm is all about outrage. The algorithm is when you
stoke outrage, you get more people commenting, you get more
people sharing, you get more people involved. Jonathan Hate calls
it the great rewiring. Kids have gone from the play
based childhood of our youth too a screen based childhood
(04:35):
and everything that's accompanying that, the outrage, the commentary, the
all encompassing nature of it. It makes a child feel
like they are completely overwhelmed, fully swamped, and there is
no way out no matter where they turn. The federal
government's decision to bring in a social media ban for
under sixteens might be the single best thing that the
(04:57):
Albaneze government has done since they've been in office. Obviously,
there's going to be an election between now and the
end of the year, but fingers crossed that will stay there.
I just think it's so so vital.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
I find it intriguing that kids of tech execs they
don't even allow their kids on devices, let alone on
social media. Like, yeah, they're meshed, completely embedded in this community.
They know the magnitude of what our children are being
bombarded with.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
I've heard the podcast interviews, I've read the articles where
they've been quoted directly as saying, yeah, no tech for
our kids in school, no tech in their bedrooms. We
don't give our children access to smartphones until they're at
least sixteen. I mean, these are the people who are
making the poison for your children to consume. They won't
fit in their own kids and it.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Just breaks my heart, like, where's the humanity in that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I won't say who told me this, but I was
speaking to somebody who is very connected in the technology world,
and they indicated to me that Meta and the other
big platforms are absolutely furi as terrified that this legislation
will end up being enacted by the end of the year.
And I think that's because they will have less access
(06:08):
to rewire kids' brains at that most impressionable stage.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, if we go back to Charlie's story, this mum
and her teenage daughters trapped in a room because she
won't come out. The only reason they won't take that
story down is because it's clickbait. Yeah, it's literally getting
traffic yep, millions and millions of.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Views, captures attention, brings people in devastating I was thinking
about it, though, Kylie. No one ever has said to me, Oh,
you know that weekend, that Saturday afternoon where we all
just sat on the couch, didn't talk, but we watched YouTube,
or we all played our games, or we all looked
at our Instagram reels. That was the best Saturday afternoon ever.
Nobody ever says that was the best weekend. Ever, just
(06:49):
love that we should do that more often stare at
our phones and ignore each other.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
At the beginning of the podcast, you preface with the
idea that in time, our children will actually thank us,
actually tell us that they appreciate the boundaries and the
rules that we placed around them in an effort to
protect them.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yet real parenting solutions every day. We're going to get
the solutions in a sec How do we make that happen.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
Our eldest daughter, I can't tell you how many times
I've heard her talking to her younger sisters when they're
having a big winge about us and telling them that
she knows how frustrating it is. She's lived it. But
she also recognizes now that she's in the position she is,
that we're only doing what's necessary to protect them. And
on top of that, she now has an almost two
(07:37):
year old who she will not let watch the TV.
The only time she gets to use the phone is
if she's first timing Lolly or her other grandma, And
I just it just blows my mind because that kid,
Holy smokes, she came as hell when it came to
social media and phone usage.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Quick context check as well. When you say that the
baby at granddaughter gets to use the phone to FaceTime Lolly.
For those who have missed the memo, You're Lolly and
I'm Pops because we like the idea of lollipop because
we're sweet. Hey after the break. More on how Charlie
Brown says you can get sixteen year olds to say hey, thanks,
really glad we had tech boundaries in my interview with
(08:23):
Charlie Brown. The full episode, by the way, we'll drop
on Saturday in our special weekend edition of the Happy
Families podcast. Charlie Brown, of course, the CEO of g ME.
GM is the company behind the GME connect Pro. You
can get it for one hundred and forty nine instead
of one hundred and eighty nine dollars using the code
happy at gme dot com. Charlie shared this story about
his sixteen year old daughter.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
We're talking about parenthic controls and not letting our eleven
year old and thirteen year old do certain things and
the sixteen year old. This was in the car were
family five were in the car. Sixteen year old turns
the eleven and twelve and the thirteen year old who
are complaining about the print controls and not being allowed
access to this. As she said, Look, it's really annoying
what dad's job is.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
But you get to my age and you look back
on when I was at your age, and you actually think, Yeah,
there's a lot of merit and what mom and dad
was saying, and I'm better off for it.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
And this voice of experience. Love it, Kylie. I love
stories like that. And I'm sure that every parent's saying,
but how how am I supposed to get that?
Speaker 2 (09:26):
The most important thing that we have done with our
children is include them in the decision making process. Our
children want the autonomy to make choices, and as we
work with them, we actually have to trust that they
have the capacity to recognize and see why we're doing
(09:49):
what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
I love the way you've used those words. One of
my favorite studies ever is a study by no One
Cares but Landry and colleagues who were looking at this
idea of what they call organismic trust. In other words,
do you trust that innately inside your child they have
the desire and the ability to grow in healthy ways
(10:12):
towards flourishing. If you have that innate trust, what that
does is it changes the way that you parent them.
Instead of being controlling and feeling like you need to
come in with correction and direction constantly to keep them
on track, you're able to, I guess, loosen the controls
a little bit and work with them rather than do
(10:34):
things to them. So what you step into instead is
what's known as need supportive parenting. You build the relationship,
you give them credit for having a brain, and you
work on solutions together. It doesn't mean that you let
them do whatever they want. It's not like you're saying, well,
you've you've got a prefrontal cortex too, why don't you
just do what you think? It's not total freedom and independence,
(10:55):
but rather it's saying, okay, this is tricky. I mean,
we're going through it with a couple of our kids
at the moment. This is a trick stage. You want
something that we're not comfortable with you having. How can
we work out a way that you can have it
and we can feel good about it? Or alternatively, what's
a space in between that gets you feeling like you're
moving towards it but you're not quite there yet, but
(11:15):
we can loosen the reins a little bit. So it's this,
it's the give and take of relationship.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And the reality is this isn't a one done conversation.
This conversationally, this conversation is happening pretty much every other month.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Oh sometimes it feels like it's every other day. Honestly,
I mean it's draining. Raising kids can be draining.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
We can't shy away from them. These conversations are so important.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yeah, yeah, they are. The full interview drops on Saturday.
We'd love for you to listen to what Charlie Brown
has to say in detail about the way tech is
affecting kids and how we can find ways to guide
our children navigate them through the tech maze successfully and safely.
That's all happening on the Happy Families podcast on Saturday.
(12:00):
A whole lot more fascinating conversation points and parenting solutions
for you then. The Happy Families Podcast is produced by
Justin Roland from Bridge Media. If you'd like more information
and more resources, including videos about how you can help
keep your kids safe online, visit us at happyfamilies dot
com dot a u
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