Pay Attention All the Time
09/28/15 • 24 min
Parents of young children have an especially fraught relationship with their smartphones. On the one hand, these devices are indispensable tools for getting things done and staying connected to the adult world while in the midst of childcare. On the other hand, the culture is constantly telling parents, and particularly mothers, that they’re too distracted by these devices, that smartphones are stealing precious attention away from our kids.
But the idea that parents should be focusing so much attention on their kids is itself a modern invention. In fact, our current understanding of parenthood and childhood is, in a very real way, the product of technology.
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Subscribe (or write a review) in iTunes
Links:Moms, Let Go of Your Smartphone Guilt
Music:Opening Credits by johnny_ripper
Spring Solstice by Podington Bear
Cylinder Three by Chris Zabriskie
The Dark Glow of the Mountain by Chris Zabriskie
Walkin Flags by Sealadder
Button Mushrooms by Podington Bear
Stuck Dream by Podington Bear
88 by Podington Bear
What True Self? Feels Bogus, Lets Watch Jason X by Chris Zabriskie
Parents of young children have an especially fraught relationship with their smartphones. On the one hand, these devices are indispensable tools for getting things done and staying connected to the adult world while in the midst of childcare. On the other hand, the culture is constantly telling parents, and particularly mothers, that they’re too distracted by these devices, that smartphones are stealing precious attention away from our kids.
But the idea that parents should be focusing so much attention on their kids is itself a modern invention. In fact, our current understanding of parenthood and childhood is, in a very real way, the product of technology.
Support Anxious Machine on Patreon
Subscribe (or write a review) in iTunes
Links:Moms, Let Go of Your Smartphone Guilt
Music:Opening Credits by johnny_ripper
Spring Solstice by Podington Bear
Cylinder Three by Chris Zabriskie
The Dark Glow of the Mountain by Chris Zabriskie
Walkin Flags by Sealadder
Button Mushrooms by Podington Bear
Stuck Dream by Podington Bear
88 by Podington Bear
What True Self? Feels Bogus, Lets Watch Jason X by Chris Zabriskie
Previous Episode
Do You Feel More Like Gods?
This past week, my kids went back to school. Summer vacation has come and gone. And that’s gotten me thinking about the very idea of summer vacation because every summer, for the past several years, my wife, her sisters and our families have had this tradition of going to a cabin for a few days to get out of the city. We don’t own a cabin. We have to rent one. And this year, the process of finding it, looking at pictures of all the possible cabins on all the possible lakes, made me wonder about this particular, middle-class American ritual of going into the wilderness for vacation, where that ritual came from, and what it says about our relationship to modern life.
Support Anxious Machine on Patreon
Subscribe (or write a review) in iTunes
Patrons:Special thanks this week to new Patreon supporter Matt Holliday.
Links:Where Was the Birthplace of the American Vacation?
Working At Play: A History of Vacations in the United States
Music:Gentle Chase by Podington Bear
Arrival by North Hive
Tam by LJ Kruzer
Electron by Podington Bear
Halflight by Podington Bear
Tamz by LJ Kruzer
88 by Podington Bear
Next Episode
If You Could Do Anything?
Sometimes in your life, you reach a crossroads, go on a men’s weekend, spend too much time alone in the forest, have a mid-life crisis, and start thinking you can change the world with your podcast. This episode is about that happening to me. Part one of a three-part series.
Support Anxious Machine on Patreon
Subscribe (or write a review) in iTunes
Links: Music:Opening Credits by johnny_ripper
Divider by Chris Zabriskie
Audrey by johnny_ripper
Mario Bava Sleeps in a Little Later Than He Expected To by Chris Zabriskie
Black Book by johnny_ripper
The Dark Glow of the Mountains by Chris Zabriskie
A Void by johnny_ripper
Program Reverie by Podington Bear
Massive by Podington Bear
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