You have to let him play video games. He’ll be a social outcast.

[Anonymous]

Do I really need to buy a video game console and let DS play video games in my house? I don’t enforce whether he plays at friends’ houses but I know a lot of his friends have Switches and PS consoles.

Has anyone (in recent times) done no video games? I’m hoping to do zero games for as long as possible and maybe put off the cell phone for later middle school or early high school.

[Anonymous]

Yes do it! 🙄

[Anonymous]

My kids don’t have video games and have lots of friends. I, too, am putting it off as long as possible. My oldest is 10.

[Anonymous]

My dh’s nephews are addicted to gaming and living with their mother in their 30s, unemployed and playing games literally all night long. It’s a bad situation.

I’m not saying don’t let your DS play, I’m saying keep tight control over it if you do.

[Anonymous]

He won’t be a social outcast but it’s what a lot of his friends do. Do you want him to be left out? That’s what will happen. Not everything if he’s a social kid but some conversations and playtime he will be.
You can put limits on it. Doesn’t have to be no time or 4 hours a day.

[Anonymous]

Bring on the parents of screen addicted children.

[Anonymous]

We try to be a low screen family and keep these under pretty tight limits. But I think yes, let him play, just keeping a strict eye on time limits and content of games, say no to ones that are likely to be a bad influence and offer something better from what's popular or that your husband knows is good from before.

[Anonymous]

You can let him have videogames but limit the time he gets. With parenting, be strict to protect your kids but not so strict to seem crazy.

[Anonymous]

As long as he has other activities with kids his age outside of school that he actually likes to do, he'll be fine socially. Sports, boy scouts, robotics club, whatever.

Do what you can to hold off on phones and video games until late middle school if you can. No social media until HS.

Our family rule with video games and social media is that the kid has to be able to explain to us how the app/company makes money before they can access the game or site. They don't need to understand everything fully but they need to be able to comprehend the basics e.g. "Instagram makes money by showing me people who have really cool stuff and so that I want to buy it too. It's just like the commercials on TV"

[Anonymous]

We allowed Minecraft because unless you're just using it to kill creepers, it's an intelligent game. Lots of games build skills, OP, but addiction is a very real possibility, so please use video game time as LEVERAGE.

[Anonymous]

We don’t either the video game kids are weird AD

[Anonymous]

I held out for a long while (until middle school), but did allow Roblox on the iPad (which was password protected, so that DS wasn't sneaking around with extra screen time).

No cell phone until 7th or 8th grade (but he does have an Apple Watch).

However, it does depend somewhat on what his peers are doing. It's much harder to enforce when so many peers have access. For that, what can make a difference is a better neighborhood (not necessarily more richer, just more... conscious).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I held out for a long while (until middle school), but did allow Roblox on the iPad (which was password protected, so that DS wasn't sneaking around with extra screen time).

No cell phone until 7th or 8th grade (but he does have an Apple Watch).

However, it does depend somewhat on what his peers are doing. It's much harder to enforce when so many peers have access. For that, what can make a difference is a better neighborhood (not necessarily more richer, just more... conscious).

I should mention that DD was never interested in video games. Even now that we have the Switch, she rarely plays. but DS is in deep. Most of his friends do play.

[Anonymous]

No, a lot of the kids use PC's for games. We have consoles and our kid only uses his PC.

[Anonymous]

I think depriving a kid of something pop culture that literally all other kids do is going to be harmful unless it’s legitimately part of an overall alternative family culture. Like I have a brilliant friend whose parents were Russian Jewish intellectual refugees in the 70s who never watched TV in the US because they spoken Russian and did art and read books instead. She’s a unique individual from a unique background. That’s much different from purposefully isolating your kid from what all of their peers are doing just to ward off some imagined bad result.

Let them have video games. Go ahead and put strict limits on it, but unless you are a goat-farming off-the-grid family on a commune, you shouldn’t force your kid to be so different.