A mother of two boys―Ayaan, 12, and Aaryan, 8―I am still learning how to navigate their ever-changing moods. In my childhood, our evenings after school were spent roaming from one friend’s house to another, playing badminton on each other’s garden and climbing trees, all without adult supervision. The sun had to set for us to return home, but our parents were never worried. My childhood seems blissfully simple when I compare it with my boys’.
The biggest luxury we had was the freedom to be bored. Which would result in us inventing imaginative games like cubby-house (using old bedsheets) and battleship. We played them because we enjoyed playing them, not because they would make great Instagram stories. We did not have to prove to anyone that we were having fun. We also had the freedom to disconnect once we were done with school. The absence of Instagram and WhatsApp meant we had to wait till Monday to find out what our friends had done over the weekend, who met whom, where they ate and what movie they saw. This gave us a weekend of fun, enjoying time with family and living in the moment.
Kids today have to navigate a digital world of intense pressure. My boys are too young for Instagram and Snapchat, and yet I can see the trickle-down effect on them. Their language is highly influenced by YouTube reels. I overheard Aaryan tell his brother how he was “rizzing up”, because he was wearing a fancy T-shirt. “Sigma” and “Skibidi” are every day usages. And it’s not just the language. Social validation during our time meant wearing cool trainers or carrying a swanky new bag. Now, it is about having the right Insta profile. How cool or uncool you are is dictated by the comments, likes and shares on your profile. It’s almost like there is an invisible scoreboard keeping tab.
The biggest problem that parents face today is that, not having grown up with this, we are unable to comprehend what our children are going through. As far as I was concerned, cyber-bullying meant credit card frauds and unregulated cyber content. I thought that if I kept track of the websites my children had access to, they were safe in the online world.
It took a series like Adolescence―about a 13-year-old boy murdering his female classmate for chronically bullying him on social media―to make me understand that a child sitting at home under the watchful eyes of his parents could still end up being bullied and becoming a bully. I did not know that an emoji colour, a slang or a meme could be interpreted in so many ways by them. I am slowly realising the pressure these kids must be under, something I will never be able to relate to. In my childhood, a disagreement with friends might mean a physical fight or ignoring each other for a few days. Today, it means exclusion from group chats, being unfollowed on social media or an embarrassing meme about you being shared with the world.
I hope that at the end of the day, we as parents can retain the essence of childhood for our children, where they can cry when they feel upset, cut off from the hyper-digital world, have the strength to withstand failures and come to us for comfort when things go wrong. I want to tell my boys that there is no Insta profile that can make them cooler than the virtue of kindness. So be kind boys, both offline and online.