Recovering from the Screen Epidemic.

Last night, I had a vision:

Chip, Media Jean and Johnny giving up their screens, not just for two weeks but three. All I had to do was nudge our Yosemite trip back a few days to dovetail with National Screen-Free Week.

That’s when Alice has the kids and their families sign a Screen-Free pledge. That first screen-free week will become detox for the following two weeks in Yosemite!

To back me up, I asked Alice to help with some research. Using screens to build an argument against screens may seem hypocritical. But I’m not arguing for zero screen usage. I’m arguing that there’s a screen epidemic in America that's turning into an AI disease, and we must do something about it.

According to the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood:

• Preschool children average between 2.2 and 4.6 hours of screen time every day.
• Kids between the ages of 8 and 18 spend an average of 7 hours using screens every day.
• Extended screen time has been linked to increased fast food consumption, hyperactivity, childhood obesity, sleep problems, and poor school performance.

According to a recent Nielsen report, the amount of time the average American spends in front of screens each month is staggering:

• Television: 144 hours, 54 minutes.
• Internet on a Computer: 28 hours, 29 minutes.
• Online Video: 5 hours, 51 minutes.
• Video on Mobile: 5 hours, 20 minutes.
• Game Console: 6 hours, 26 minutes.
• DVD/Blu-ray: 5 hours, 13 minutes.

That’s a full six days a month watching screens. Six 24-hour days.

And that's not counting the recent studies showing that AI usage is physically deteriorating cognitive areas en the brain, or that those creating the tech won't let their own kids use it.

Imagine what would happen if you gave 1 hour a day to screens and spent the other 4-5 hours creating or learning or training or exploring.

If you love music, 4-5 hours of daily practice can take you to the concert halls. If you love writing, 4-5 hours a day will not only refine your craft but finish that languishing novel.

Have more than one passion? Use those 4-5 hours to develop them all! Sink into your talents! Soak up your bliss! Invest in yourself and your future! Be a creator, not just a consumer!

I’m getting ahead of myself, as usual. The point for now is to give Chip, Media Jean and Johnny an opportunity to experience life screen-free for three full weeks.

​And since two of those weeks will unfold in Yosemite, I’m hoping for a life-changing experience.

Comments

Media Jean: Three weeks screen-free?!

Chip: I've never gone that long without screens.

Media Jean: Who in their right mind has?! The last time Miss Stillwater made us participate in Screen-Free Week, I went bonkers!

Chip: Ha ha! I remember! You dressed up like Little House on the Prairie and refused to use any technology.

Media Jean: Yeah, but Miss Stillwater called my bluff. She made Screen-Free Week into Little House on the Prairie Week.

Chip: That was a long week. My dad made me wash clothes by hand.

Media Jean: My parents wouldn't let me use the vacuum cleaner. I had to sweep the rug! You ever try to sweep a rug?!

Chip: Still, those stats are pretty amazing. And since my dad found them in a magazine at the doctor's office, those stats are a few years old. I'm sure it's way more now.

Media Jean: But they don't represent us! We don't spend hundreds of hours a month watching TV and streaming movies! Why should we be punished for someone else's viewing habits?!

Chip: We probably spend almost that much time online and on our phones.

Media Jean: That's different! That's interactive!

Chip: Well, that's sort of true.

Media Jean: We're Googling and social networking and creating, not just watching!

Chip: Last night, my dad told me about FOMO.

Media Jean: FOMO? That sounds R-rated.

Chip: FOMO stands for Fear Of Missing Out. It's a new anxiety disorder that's sweeping the world. People are so afraid they'll miss something on their social networks that they check their phones over 100 times a day. Some even sleep with their phones on the pillow so when they wake up in the middle of the night they can check for messages.

Media Jean: Ha ha! A cell phone instead of a teddy bear!

Chip: You have to admit, my dad makes a pretty good argument about spending more time doing what you love.

Media Jean: I suppose. Instead of 5 hours a day online, I could spend an hour drawing. I love art.

Chip: I could spend an hour a day writing stories. I used to make up stories all the time.

Media Jean: I loved those stories. You should write more.

Chip: What about your origami? Remember when you wanted to be an origami master?

Media Jean: I was getting pretty good too.

Chip: I could spend an hour a day on languages. I love computer languages, but I always wanted to learn more people languages, especially Japanese.

Media Jean: This is starting to sound fun! Let's take a pledge. For one year, I'll spend an hour a day drawing and an hour a day on origami. You'll spend an hour a day writing and an hour a day learning Japanese.

Chip: Counting weekends?

Media Jean: Let's not get carried away.

Chip: So just weekdays. That's about 260 days a year. 260 hours works out to over thirty 8-hour work days a year.

Media Jean: Wow! That's like a month full time on art and origami.

Chip: When you crunch the numbers, it's kind of amazing.

Media Jean: So it's a pledge?

Chip: It's a pledge!

Media Jean: On our honor?

Chip: On our honor!

Media Jean: One other thing: we tell no one — especially your dad or Miss Stillwater. Agreed?

Chip: Agreed!

Media Jean: The last thing we need is a smug adult smiling at us all year.

​​Comic strip from the series "Screen-Free Week!
(Kid, Inc. Volume 1: Look Out, Tomorrow, Here We Come!)

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