Parenting in the 21st Century..Challenging Because of the Internet

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The internet has made parenting very challenging. It's changing the way we do things at work, business, school, entertainment, family life, and especially on parenting. The pervasiveness of the internet is affecting families in both good and bad ways.  So the question is: As parents are we going to fear it or are we going to embrace it?



Photo credit - Samien Hope Jose (my Grandson)

 I solicited comments on my Facebook page about this topic and got a few responses. Which I'm posting on my blog site.

“Both good and bad. There's more pressure on parent's role in supervising, guiding and disciplining children on the appropriate info or games and time spent”......Auntie Sarah Nono Eguna

 ”My two cents on this, I think parents should set the tone on the way they want their family to shape their life especially the children. The word disciplining is a broad term.  It could be based on respective formulated values, values set by your parents that you grew up with, and/or values you learn from school or community. I think these family values should be set in the minds of the kids even before the start of their active social life, no matter how fast technology or other outside influences come their way, children would have a good sense of what is good or bad for them”...Ana Amisto Espejo

“Hi Mel, mahilig ka pala dyan, heto masasabi ko...I guess both - it should be feared and embraced. Embrace it.  Because nobody has the capability to change it.   It is nobody’s control, and besides, since change is constant, the only option is to keep abreast of the changes in time. Fear it. Because the internet revolution, if not managed carefully, will not only change you, it will also change your family’s values.  Let's admit it, children now spend almost 90% of their time on the internet (my own estimate not supported). This being the case, you’ll never know the values, attitudes, and beliefs of their cyber friends. So as parent(s), we need to double our effort to share our own influence on our children. (By all means)”….Eduardo Fernandez

I got one response through text from my friend who saw the post on Facebook.  He said that "the internet does it the other way.  People are always in touch without getting in touch"....Alex Gansatao

This reminded me of John Naisbitt’s book entitled Megatrends published in 1982, where he came out with the concept of  "high tech-high-touch".  He theorized that in a world of technology, people long for personal, human contact.

Related article: https://bookpage.com/reviews/779-john-naisbitt-high-tech-high-touch#.WKt03tJ97IU

The different viewpoints were interesting and it is prompting me to write a book about this topic, which is pretty much relevant to parenting in the 21st century.

 Anyways, comments are still welcome in this blog post.



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