What is Your Stance? (Part 6)
Many of our everyday decisions generally have a mundane quality to them. What are we going to eat for dinner? When shall I mow the grass? How can we get my son to football practice while getting my daughter to choir at the same time? More existential decisions usually pop-up in times of crisis. For instance, a job loss or health emergency may prompt deep soul-searching. Christian theologians have spent copious amounts of time on a topic called “the problem of evil,” (sometimes known as theodicy) in which the great love of God is held in tension with tragedies among the innocent. This kind of soul-searching is needed and can be quite helpful.
In between the mundane and the existential lies a grey area that may be difficult to navigate. Consider, for example, how much screen time to allow children and teenagers (and ourselves!). Some young people are maturer than others, and they handle online content rather effectively. Yet, many reputable studies continue to illustrate the negative effects of too much online content on the mental health of youth.
This is where our “stance” comes in handy. We’ve been visiting on the blog over the past weeks about ways in which biblical stances help us. A stance describes a particular way that a Christian may practice or apply biblical teaching and doctrine, especially when right decisions aren’t so clear. We’ve spoken more than not in this blog series about the stance of Christian realism. This stance holds the ideal and the real in tension.
Let’s reflect more on the decision regarding screen time for our kids. In an ideal setting, we would set all content filters to have a maximal effect, and we would exercise mature parenting in content controls. Yet, we know that negative and even harmful content can still appear and have a corrupting influence on our children even with the greatest amount of controls in place. What are we to do?
A Christian realist stance would likely shy away from our becoming Luddites. That is, we ought not throw the baby out with the bathwater and chunk our phones into the ocean (although this doesn’t sound like a bad idea!). The technology available can have positive effects on our kids, too. Take, for example, the enthralling science and math content available online. One’s STEM interests can be greatly piqued by this content, which leads to a thirst for more knowledge and application.
But, training the child to handle scary or sexualized content is a must. Even the most benign children’s games can have unsuitable and inappropriate situations. How would you teach your children to respond when an unknown person attempts to text them, or when they encounter a phishing scam?
It is also helpful for the parent to monitor the child’s mood. When do they become overstimulated? What about setting a timer to limit screen time?
Remember, the realist stance is about a both/and. We see both the ideal profit in today’s technology, and we are aware of how content creators can function from a perverted point of view.
We will move our attention to another pertinent topic next week as we continue our Lenten journey towards Easter.