How to Exit Tech

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[00:00:00] Clare: The amount of AI chatbot apps a child can access on a smartphone is extremely dangerous. And now all the social media platforms, meta has integrated AI chatbots into their platforms. And so you may not even know, you think your child’s just on social media. You have no idea they’re engaging with incredibly sexual or dangerous content conversations with a chat bot, it’s kind of alarming this.

Speed in which we’ve seen this acceleration. And so I would say this just underscores how urgent a tech exit is.

[00:00:41] Collin: When I see Wiffle ball and I hear the piano, I know we’re probably doing okay as a family. And when I turn on the news and see what meta has been programming AI to engage in sensual conversations with children, I don’t feel bad at all about keeping my children away from social media. Now I wouldn’t have my job if not for social media.

I’ve learned a lot. I’ve made and mAIntAIned many friends. I would miss social media if it were gone. I’m glad I had that elder or geriatric millennial childhood without it just a computer with internet contributed to. Enough problems as well as, you know, cable, cable TV in my bedroom. But that’s a separate conversation.

If we as parents could see what our children see on social media, we would not hesitate to keep them away. And that is why Clare Morrell calls for a tech exit. No smartphone, social media, tablets, or video games during childhood. Morell is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and director of its technology and Human Flourishing project.

You met her husband earlier this year on gospel bound as Caleb Morell wrote about the history of Capitol Hill Baptist Church. Now in ClAIre’s book, the Tech Exit, a Practical Guide to Freeing Kids and Teams From Smartphones. ClAIre says, we’ve reached a tipping point in the fight agAInst letting smartphones take over childhood.

The key is preserving something better, something more valuable, the chance for our children to contribute to their family and community, to enjoy the bonds of families and the boundaries of neighborhoods. ClAIre writes quote, it turns out that screens cost children more than just their time. It also cause them to lose their appetite for things of the real world.

And in this book, she lays out a five point plan number one. Find other families. Number two, explAIn, educate and exemplify. Number three, adopt alternatives. Number four, set up digital, digital accountability and family screen rules. And then number five, trade screens for real life responsibilities and pursuits.

ClAIre joins me now on gospel bound to discuss this plan and much more. ClAIre, thanks for joining me.

[00:02:52] Clare: Thanks for having me. I’m so excited.

[00:02:55] Collin: Let’s just start simple. Why fight technology that feels inevitable?

[00:03:02] Clare: Yeah, that’s a big question. So I mean, as, as I go into in my book, I think we have been sold a myth by the tech companies that these digital technologies are gonna benefit our children and that we can avoid any harms by enabling screen time limits and parental controls.

And what I try to unpack is that these. Digital technologies, particularly smartphones and social media and interactive tablets are addictive by design. So they’re not, they’re not neutral, and they have a bent towards addiction and especially to a vulnerable child’s developing brAIn. They’re extremely addictive.

And so we’ve kind of, I explAIned we’ve gotten the metaphor wrong as a culture that screens are more like sugar, you know, something to be enjoyed in moderation, but in fact, they’re much more like digital fentanyl in the way that they act on children’s developing brAIns. And so I wrote this book to push back agAInst this sense of inevitability.

I wanted to explAIn. For parents that it’s actually possible to give your children a smartphone free childhood. And in fact, more and more parents are doing this. And so I wanted to give parents an exit plan to say, this is actually how you can resist these technologies during childhood. They don’t need to be in an at.

Inevitable, and in fact they shouldn’t be. If we dig into the research, the impacts on children’s brAIns and just the effect this can have on them spiritually, emotionally, physically, mentally it really calls us to take the, the approach I’m arguing for of a total opt out and then this is how to do it.

[00:04:31] Collin: Let’s talk about that a little bit more, because I think that’s very counterintuitive clarity to the way most parents are thinking about this. They’re imagining, like you sAId, it’s sugar. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Too much of it is is bad, but you don’t wanna be the parent going around at the birthday party saying, well, my kid’s not gonna have any cake.

Okay. So agAIn, why are we talking here about just like the book says, A tech exit as opposed to just. Tech moderation or tech limit.

[00:04:59] Clare: Yeah, so this gets down to a little bit of brAIn science. As I’ve waded through the neuroscience research, what I found was that even a small amount of time on one of these addictive screen technologies can still be extremely compulsion inducing, can actually change a child’s personality and behavior, even just a small amount of time.

And it’s because these devices release. Dopamine in the brAIn. This is a neurotransmitter. It gives us a burst of pleasure, but dopamine doesn’t produce lasting satisfaction or fulfillment. It actually just creates craving or wanting to do that activity agAIn. And so even if they’re only on for 15 minutes, they get this spike of dopamine.

And then what happens is as soon as they’re off the device or the app, their brAIn goes into a dopamine deficit, it crashes, and they have this strong craving to do it agAIn. And so the time limit will never be enough. Even a strong amount of time or a small amount of time can create this strong craving for more, and I think that’s where we’ve kind of gone astray, is this idea of we set the time limits, they can have this dAIly screen time.

And what the research really shows is even that small amount every day is really addictive to a child’s brAIn and can change their personality. It’s emotionally dysregulating. It helps it impedes the development of what parents are trying to do and help their children develop self-control and emotional regulation because it overstimulates the child’s limbic system of the brAIn.

The part. That’s responsible for emotional processing and this reward system where dopamine is released and then the prefrontal cortex, the part of your brAIn responsible for your personality development, your executive functioning, your self-control emotional regulation is underdeveloped and underutilized.

And so that can happen over time. There’s this cumulative impact on the brAIn from even a small amount of time each day. And so that’s what I try to explAIn to parents is that it’s not. Sugar is not the right analogy here because even a short amount of time can really disrupt a child’s natural brAIn development and, and really harm them in many ways, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual.

[00:07:07] Collin: I don’t doubt, ClAIre, that a lot of parents don’t know the research that you’re describing there. That’s the whole point of your book. Do they. Do they not know what their kids are actually seeing on social media?

[00:07:19] Clare: Yes. This is the other sad reality is that I think we also have been told by the tech companies that the parental controls, a parent can control a child’s online experience.

So you can keep them from the truly bad content or dangerous predators that are out there. But the parental controls are also a myth because they don’t give parents real control. They’re what’s happening inside the apps. Their a.

And sadly, social media for kids looks very different than for adults. I had one mom say she really recommends that parents test drive social media, acting like a 13 or 14-year-old on the app, friending their friends, and then see what comes up in, in, in the child’s feed because it is full of really dangerous things.

And these algorithms just go to work recommending things to kids, and kids are naturally curious, and if they just linger on a video or a post for a few seconds. And if that’s sexual in nature or violent or even drug related, it quickly sends them down these dangerous rabbit holes where then the feed puts more and more of that type of content into the app, into what they’re seeing.

And a parent truly has no control over that. They cannot determine what is in their child’s feed. And most apps actually block access to third party parental controls. So you can’t even see into what your children are seeing or doing. And so parents are really flying blind when it comes to social media.

[00:08:42] Collin: I had a friend comment this week that his daughter watched, two people killed in real time on her phone this week and just sAId, this is not normal.

[00:08:56] Clare: No, no. Children are being thrust into a very adult and very graphic world online. It is not unusual for children to come across. Beheading videos like extremely graphic and violent or sexual content.

The average age of pornography exposure has steadily gone down as the age of first smartphone has gone down. And there’s a correlation because it is all too easy for a child to accidentally stumble across pornography on a smartphone.

[00:09:25] Collin: Oh, oh man. I’m not sure how you’d even avoid it.

[00:09:29] Clare: No, exactly. I’m just,

[00:09:30] Collin: it’s, it’s impossible, essentially.

And I, I think if nothing else, parents have got to be honest with themselves. If you’re giving your child a smartphone. Whatever age that’s happening, whether that’s 13, younger, 16, whatever it is, you need to understand that’s what’s happening.

[00:09:48] Clare: Yeah.

[00:09:48] Collin: Doesn’t, doesn’t have, not to the same extent always.

And it’s not like there’s nothing that anybody can do to prevent any of it, but that is simply part of the package. And agAIn, I think your book is extremely helpful in helping people to have a. To dismiss a nAIve perspective That’s right. Both scientifically and then technologically of what’s, what’s happening now?

I wanna look clear at maybe the most, maybe the biggest implication for Christians. Yeah. The, the book is, I mean, it reflects your fAIth in a lot of different ways, but it’s not explicitly argued necessarily or, or from your fAIth, or limited to people who share our, our Christian convictions. You say that phones have reoriented children away from aspiring to higher purpose.

Mm-hmm. For getting stuck in self involvement. They’re being trAIned in endless consumption. So how does Christian shape, shape your diagnosis of the problem as well as your solutions?

[00:10:41] Clare: Yeah, so my diagnosis is that, you know, the problem is much deeper than kind of the teen mental health crisis that we’re seeing, or even the stunted kind of brAIn development of children.

That there is actually a very deep spiritual element to this, and that is because the medium is the message, like I was saying, the tech. Is not neutral. You might think, oh, but we’ll just only make sure our kids see good content on social media or on a smartphone. But the medium itself sends the message that the whole world revolves around you.

I mean, this is a device that is just built for your entertAInment. Your satisfaction and pleasure. And the same with social media. The, the algorithms actually learn you. They learn what you like, and they wanna feed more of that entertAInment and amusement into your feed. And particularly with social media too, it encourages you to hold yourself out to the world for judgment.

What do other people think about you? Your pictures, your posts. And so it’s an incredibly self absorbing technology. The smartphone and social media are both inherently self-focused, and so they really cave a child inward on themselves, and this is feeding into that anxiety that we’re seeing. I mean, if you are so consumed with what other people think about you, then it is incredibly anxiety inducing.

And so I, I try to contrast that and, and that’s why I would say that. The solution actually goes beyond the tech exit. I’m, I’m calling for the tech exit as a means to pursuing the true purpose of human life that we were all made for and exiting from these digital technologies is not the end in itself.

You know that ultimate end is finding our satisfaction in knowing and following and loving Jesus Christ. That that is what we wanna be pointing our children towards, is a relationship with the Lord Jesus. And then living out the two great commands, loving God and loving others. And so we, we actually wanna take the screens away to lift our children’s eyes up to behold.

And behold these greater things that we were actually created and made for. And, and so I’m actually hopeful because I think Christians actually, we have the answer. We know what the path of true human flourishing is. We know what the purpose of human life is for, and we know how we were made as humans in God’s image.

And so yes, this, this, this technology crisis is much. Deeper, there is this spiritual component that it is shaping and forming the affections and desires and vision of life for children in a direction that is not what Christian parents would want, that is not helping them learn to love and follow Jesus.

And so part of the solution is I’m arguing obviously for the tech exit, but. That is, I, I view it as a means to this greater end of trying to point our children to what we know is the true purpose of life. Knowing and loving God, being satisfied in him, and then having that love emanate outwards in loving others in our communities, our churches in our families.

[00:13:28] Collin: That’s so good. You’re, you’re helping us to have the freedom from That’s right. So that we can have the freedom for Yes. You do a great job of, of laying out that you need that explosive power of a new affection ultimately, as well as Chalmers would describe when I’m often teaching the, the development of.

Of western notions of the self and identity and things like that. Over the course of the last 500 years, I, I progressed from, from Lutheran, the thunderstorm through the revolutions, and then I end with the posture of holding a smartphone. Hmm. And the curvature of your body, the curving inward on yourself to be able to look down at this device.

And I just don’t think that’s accidental at all. It’s very much the case that, unlike other technologies, this is a, this is not something that draws you into an experience with others so much, but one that caters to your custom.

[00:14:26] Clare: That’s right.

[00:14:26] Collin: Experience and, and it, it reshapes and I think especially those, as I mentioned, the introduction, who did not grow up with anything else, it shapes their expectations about the world.

Mm-hmm. All the more. Necessary to help them to understand the world does not revolve around them. That their desires need to be sanctified. Mm-hmm. For their, for their own good. Yeah. Before they even know what sort of, they need to taste the good things so that they can then discern later on, oh, actually, that, that doesn’t taste very good at all.

That’s right. Compared to what I’ve, what I’ve been feasting on. Now, a couple, ClAIre, a couple of skeptical questions here, which I know are the kind of. Pushback that, that you’ll get and you have gotten and that I get fAIrly often as well. What good is exiting tech if none of the other families are following suit, and in fact could actually be worse and even hurt our children if they’re left out of everything.

[00:15:20] Clare: Yes. No, I get this question a lot, which is why as you, you know, sAId in the introduction, one of my mAIn principles is finding other families. And that doesn’t mean that you convince everyone in your community to do this, but if you can just find a few other families who agree to keep their kids off smartphones, I mean, that’s a huge difference.

If your child has one or two other friends who are also not on that. You know, on the devices, then that is huge. But that may not be the case. And what I would say is that it’s still your responsibility and your obligation to your child to do what you know is best for them as a parent. You know, we don’t as even, especially as Christian parents, I think we’re used to being counter-cultural in a lot of.

Parenting decisions. And that is our job as a parent is, is to protect our children and, and just, and so we can’t be pressured into just giving something to our child that we know is bad for them. And I do think friendship is a real concern. And so what I would encourage parents is, as you’re saying no to tech, if your child truly is the only other friend in their circles that doesn’t have a smartphone, like you need to really work to help.

Build your child’s social life in the real world. Like maybe that means actually driving, you know, 20 minutes to bring your, your child to a friend’s house that also agrees with your tech decisions if they’re not in your immediate school or neighborhood, you know, finding other families through your church.

And I’m just, I’m so convinced now that. Most parents know the phones are bad and everyone feels pressured into them. Yeah. And so being the parent to open the conversation and inviting other parents to consider this, I actually think a lot of parents would be receptive to doing it if they felt like they had an ally.

And so I just, I encourage parents in my book, you know, be the one to take the first step and, and open this conversation with other parents in your class your child’s class or your church or your neighborhood. The last thing I will say is one dad told me that they actually found that their decisions around technology were extremely friend filtering.

And by that he meant his kids found their real friends good faster. And he sAId it’s because if a child wouldn’t talk to his kid, because they weren’t on the Snapchat app. Or they weren’t in the group iMessage texts ’cause they didn’t have a smartphone. He was like, well, that’s not a real friend. And he explAIned like his kids had friends who had smartphones and they had some friends who didn’t.

But they were those kids that were friends with them who had the smartphones. They were actually genuine friends. They would include his children if they weren’t on the apps, they’d say, Hey, we’re all getting together at, you know, Johnny’s house. To play basketball. And so they, they went out of their way to accommodate their difference.

And what he sAId to me is, that’s the sign of real friendship, is that we accommodate each other’s differences. And so he, he found that their tech decisions actually even trAIned their kids of what to look for in a real friend. And so I, I would, I guess my, my short answer is like, it’s a real concern.

Parents, we should do everything we can to help our children build real friendships. In the real world and recognize even our tech restrictions can help them discern what good friendship is and then just not be afrAId to, to do the right thing, even if that does carry some costs to our kids that it is, it’s not worth the harms of handing them a smartphone that, that, you know, that’s not the answer.

We have to do what we know is best for our kids.

[00:18:25] Collin: Another thing, ClAIre, that I, I teach in my classes is a, a long term. Thousands, a year perspective on te introducing techno technology, new technologies and the way they change cultures. They don’t always change cultures in expected ways. Hmm. They don’t always, I mean, usually they don’t, they don’t always change them in purely bad ways.

There’s usually a give, there’s usually some trade off. The true discernment is figuring out what trade-offs are worth the, the introduction of the technology. Hmm. No skeptical question. Then if thanks to smartphones, we have fewer drunk drivers and fewer babies born outta wedlock. Is that such a bad trade off?

[00:19:06] Clare: Oh yes. I do hear this pushback a lot because I think as you’re alluding to, studies now show that the rates of teen sex or drunk driving have really plummeted because kids are not going out and doing things with their friends. They’re not being, they’re risky teenagers. They used to be because they’re just on the smartphone, right?

I think. It’s hard to say. Obviously drunk driving and teen pregnancy outta wedlock are not good things. And I think that there can be this illusion like, oh, well we’ve traded this for this. I would say I think that that’s, it’s just, it’s just not a fAIr, it’s not, it’s not a good comparison to make.

I think we need to think seriously and question. Is it really safe to just leave a kid at home with a smartphone and not encouraging them to make friends? And so of course, I think as Christian parents, we wanna incentivize them to be going out into the real world, and that actually has less risks than the online world because here’s the thing, the online world, it is incredibly easy for predators and dangerous things to gAIn access to our kids far.

More bad influences. Our, our kids are able to come across in the online world than in the real world. And so it’s really important to not think, oh, just if I leave my kid at home with the smartphone, I know they’ll be safer. I think that’s a complete myth. In fact, I would say they’re more safe just going out with their friends, maybe doing some stupid teenage things than they are at home.

Because I could even just recount the explosion in rates of sextortion cases where. A, a Predator Poses as a, as a person in their local community as a friend. These have just exploded. They’ve increased by over 300% the last several years where teen boys are falling prey to these extortion streets and,

[00:20:48] Collin: and committing suicide,

[00:20:49] Clare: and committing suicide.

And the parents all say, I had no idea. I, he was just in his room. I thought he was completely safe. And so I would say there is, there’s been. In my opinion, looking at the metrics, way more harms to kids from the smartphones. Just even looking at the rates of teen suicide or depression, anxiety, eating disorders, self-harm, these have all greatly increased because of kids turning to the virtual world instead of the real world.

And so, unfortunately. They are not safer sitting in their bedroom on a smartphone. I would say they are actually far more at risk of coming across dangerous content or being preyed upon by predators who now have 24 7 easy access to children that they’ve just have never had before in human history.

[00:21:34] Collin: It’s like Jonathan Het famously says, we protect our children in the real world Way too much. Yes. Now, and we protect them way too little in the online world. I think a lot of that just has to do with the relative generational ignorance. Mm-hmm. Which is odd. To me for parents, because I don’t know, I guess ClAIre, some of the problem is we don’t know whether our experience is indicative of other people’s.

Mm. Or we’re just not curious about whether our experience is part of a broader trend. Because you me, we mentioned the drunk driving. We mentioned the teen pregnancy, of course, related to that. Surveys just showing recently Americans just have way less sex period.

[00:22:16] Clare: Yes.

[00:22:17] Collin: Now and, and usually it’s, it’s married couples have the most, by far, it’s very different from all the sitcoms that you’ve seen in the 1990s and things like that.

But clearly the driving factor behind that is also smartphones.

[00:22:30] Clare: Yes.

[00:22:30] Collin: As well. So I wonder if people just don’t even understand what change they’re a part of. Let alone understand what’s going on with their children. Now also, ClAIre, you know, your, your work ethics and public policy center technology and human flourishing project, you’re engaging in public policy.

You see public policy moving toward or away from your recommendations.

[00:22:52] Clare: I see it largely moving toward, I would say just in the last several years, I’ve been very encouraged by lots of policy changes at the state level in particular. So just a couple to highlight would be age verification for pornography websites, laws.

24 states that’s nearly half the country have passed these laws in just the last three years. And the Supreme Court in June of this past year, just recently upheld Texas’s Law as constitutional, which was just a huge landmark case and victory. And not just for age verification for porn sites laws, but, but I think it has ramifications beyond that because the court decision sAId, you know.

Adults have no first Amendment right to avoid age verification. Yes, they may have rights to access certAIn speech. We don’t want kids accessing, but they don’t have a right to avoid age verification. We have to have a way to be able to age gate certAIn things on the internet from kids. And so I’m hopeful this will pa pay the path forward as well for other maybe age related restrictions to for social media, which is another solution I’ve pushed for on the other winning policy solution has been school phone bans.

So, 18 states plus the District of Columbia now have bell to bell phone bans. That means out of the entire school day, not just the classroom time, but also the social environment. They’re now kids are free of phones and social media during lunch, passing periods, recess, and this has just been.

Incredibly effective in terms of just seeing student conversation comradery. Relationships really flourish in the absence of the phone. Student discipline issues decrease. And then of course, academic outcomes have seen a, a great boost from the phone bans. And so those are just. Two examples of solutions that have taken off really in just the last two to three years.

Like a couple states were the leaders and they saw such success from these policies that then other states have adopted them. And, and I’m hopeful that particularly at the federal level, we’ll see an age verification for porn sites Bill pass nationally. And then I would love ideally to see Congress move towards.

Age restricting social media out of childhood. I think we were talking about the difficulty individual parents feel and, and right that those decisions to opt out. And so like this, the country of Australia has recently rAIsed the age of social media to 16 because it really, it, it provides that collective solution that helps everyone where, okay, this is no longer a part of childhood.

And, and I’ve made the analogy like this is. Very similar to alcohol or tobacco, a, a highly addictive substance to a child’s brAIn. We’ve, we’ve age restricted those. And likewise technologies that are too powerful for children to operate like motor vehicles or firearms have also been age restricted.

So I think there are helpful precedents in our laws to look to, in the real world, to think about some of these policy solutions to say, should we just age, restrict social media out of childhood? And, and I’m hopeful we’re moving in that direction.

[00:25:42] Collin: That’s very, very well sAId. Alabama passed both of those.

Yeah, in the last year, the age verification on porn as well as the smartphone bans. So very grateful, very grateful for those. Let’s continue on this theme here and just do kind of rapid response here. Most important tech decision that could be made right now by, it might just be what you sAId right there, Congress number one.

What’s the most important decision they can make right now?

[00:26:08] Clare: Age restrict social media, but I’d also add to that now to age restrict AI chatbots. I, I don’t think miners should have access to AI chatbots at all.

[00:26:19] Collin: Okay. So let’s go into that because I was going to say, how would you write this book now?

Given what we’ve seen on AI? You know, these books are written over the course of months and, and years, and I will say. I’m well aware of it. Now, I don’t know how many parents are, are aware of it, but you and I both know that when surveys have come back on, what is the number one use of AI from teenagers?

It’s chat. I mean it’s, it’s it’s chatbots therapy. Yes.

[00:26:48] Clare: Companions, essentially. Yeah. Nearly three companions, nearly three quarters of teens have used an AI chat bot at some point, and over half say they do so on more than a weekly basis. I mean, that’s just one survey of teens. And and I think, so I would just say my book, while it doesn’t touch on AI, it, it addresses this in the sense that.

Smartphones and social media were already addictive. Adding AI to them is only going to make this problem, I mean, exponentially worse. Oh, way worse. Way worse. So I would just say I’m hopeful that the, like that the, this book being out will actually help parents realize that the tech exit is more urgent than ever.

Because the amount of AI chatbot apps a child can access on a smartphone without a parent necessarily knowing what they’re doing is extremely dangerous. And now all the social media platforms meta have. Integrated AI chatbots into their platforms. And so you may not even know, you think your child’s just on social media.

You have no idea they’re engaging with incredibly sexual or dangerous content conversations with a chatbot who’s obviously not a real person. And so it’s just, I think it’s kind of a alarming the speed at which we’ve seen this acceleration. And so I would say this just underscores how urgent a tech exit is.

Particularly the smartphone. It is just a portal, two hundreds and thousands of portals to the internet, which now include dangerous AI chatbots. And so we should just really, seriously think about that as parents, that, that the most important thing we can do is really just to not give a child a smartphone.

And if they have one, it’s never too late to reverse course. And I walk through that through in my book just, it’s never too late to take the smartphone away. And to say, you know, listen, we didn’t know all this. We, we made a mistake and we wanna do differently now.

[00:28:32] Collin: One of the, it’s a major focus for us at the Gospel Coalition on AI and in terms of helping families, helping churches, helping individuals discern better and worse uses.

Mm-hmm. Of them. What you described right there is definitely at the top of the list of the worst. Of the uses of it. We mentioned earlier the suicides that had followed predation. Mm-hmm. Especially sex exploitation of young men. But we also have examples of how the quote unquote alignment systems of AI so for people who don’t know alignment is you still have to program AI.

You have to tell AI what it can say and what it can’t say. And so we have some basic ideas of as a co, as a society, we’ve, we’ve concluded. Not formally, but informally that you shouldn’t be able to ask AI how to pull off a terrorist attack. You shouldn’t be able to ask AI how you should commit suicide.

However, the way around this is that the the chatbots are narcissistic.

[00:29:32] Clare: Yes. They

[00:29:33] Collin: are merely reflective and they’re affirming.

[00:29:36] Clare: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:36] Collin: So if a child, and unfortunately we’ve seen tragic cases like this, if your child is, is willing and interested in committing suicide, we have examples of AI affirming Yes.

That looks like a good method to do it and empathizing. I mean, as a computer with actually no empath, empathetic ability, does empathizing saying, and I affirm your decision mm-hmm. In doing this as well with parents once agAIn, not having any idea. So I think ClAIre, that the underlying principles are, are the same.

[00:30:09] Clare: That’s right. But

[00:30:09] Collin: extending even more so, I, I think a lot of people don’t understand the analogy here is that everything that happened with social media will happen on AI at a more accelerated.

[00:30:21] Clare: This is exactly right. Yep. And

[00:30:24] Collin: I don’t, I just, I don’t understand why people, well talk about a little bit more of how that is, because I don’t think people understand what that means.

[00:30:31] Clare: Yeah. What it means is, so I think the danger is, is that it is because it is mimicking a real life person. So the chat bots, I mean. It is just computer code, but a ch to a child. It’s a character. It has a name. Yeah, it has a personality and children have a much harder time discerning between reality and fantasy.

And this is, agAIn, preying on children’s brAIn vulnerabilities and creating this friendship. And then the child starts to actually form a bond of trust. With the chat bot, I mean, far more dangerous than just scrolling a social media feed, right? It is, is creating this like, ongoing relationship. And as you mentioned, the chatbots are narcissistic.

They’re very affirming. They’re never going to tell the child they’re wrong. And so in some ways, they’re like the perfect friend or you know, the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend for teenagers who are engaging in these kind of romantic relationships because they tell you everything that you want to hear.

And they, they really are. And so much of technology does this. It is frictionless. It removes the barriers that we would experience in real life of having to navigate a real person’s flaws or shortcomings or challenges work through conflict and friendship. And, and so it’s an incredibly just. Kind of scary technology in the sense that it, it mimics a person, but it is not like a human relationship.

And it can really quickly lead children to doing extremely dangerous things. I mean, the horror stories that have come out about the kids committing suicide or just falling in love with a chatbot they feel more. Bonded to the chatbot then to people in the real world. And so it’s incredibly dis embodying.

And just really just morphing a child’s worldview in a very, just very dangerous, inhumane way,

[00:32:17] Collin: and very similar to what we saw in pornography. Mm-hmm. Removes the frictions Yes. Of relationship. Mm-hmm.

[00:32:22] Clare: When it comes

[00:32:23] Collin: to sex. So we covered congress. We just kind of recap here, num, what number one most important decision could be made right now by your family?

[00:32:33] Clare: Okay. I think I kind of just sAId it, like, I would just say get rid of the smartphones. If I had to pick one thing, it’s the smartphone because that is the, that’s the portal to everything. It’s the portal to social media now it’s the portal to chatbots, the portal to the internet. That is just too difficult for a parent to effectively oversee.

So if you can do one thing, no smartphones.

[00:32:53] Collin: Are you in all the way through 18 or 16? Where do you fall on that?

[00:32:57] Clare: I think it’s really important to hold out the ideal of 18. That’s okay. That’s just like a marker for adulthood. We also know the human brAIn isn’t fully developed until 25, and so, I mean, you could even encourage your children to keep going through college without smartphones.

As some of the families I interviewed in my book. Do I just, I think the longer we can delay, the better because you’re laying the foundation of their habits, their life habits and you want that to be these habits formed without dependence on a smartphone. And that means, yeah. Then when they do use a smartphone as an adult, they’re not gonna add the same dependence or pull or addiction towards it as they would if they’d grown up on it.

And so, I would say 16 is okay. I would really say, you know, 18 is even more ideal. I also think we just have to kind of lose this mile marker of the smartphone now becoming this kind of sign of adulthood. It really used to be the driver’s license. I think we, we really need to just step back as society and kind of reject this premise of inevitability of the smartphone.

I’m an adult, I don’t have a smartphone there, and it’s because there are. Better alternative options avAIlable now than there were even three years ago that allow me to have tools to navigate the world like GPS and, and a, and a camera and Uber and Venmo, but without the internet, social media apps, or other addictive apps on the phone.

So I, I want to kind of encourage parents to not accept that this is, at some point my child will get one, because I think then that just so easily creeps back into childhood. But actually to just. Question the premise. Do they actually need one? And and then just to, to just try to think about extending that as far back as possible so that they’re able to form as many habits without it.

[00:34:42] Collin: That’s helpful. I mean, in my mind, I had just associated driving. Essentially with smartphones. But I didn’t realize how many things you could do now without that. Yeah. So I think it’s another thing for families to know.

[00:34:54] Clare: I think it’s actually important, and this is maybe one of the biggest gaps for parents of information, is that now there are phones, like the bark phone, the Gab phone, the pinwheel phone.

I have personally the wise phone that allow you to use GPS for driving. I understand that’s important for a lot of parents. To have a tool for communication with their child when they’re driving. But it doesn’t have social media apps or an internet browser or access to any kind of addictive apps.

So no chat bots, no games, nothing that would be dangerous, truly just tools. And so I really encourage parents to explore those alternatives. Don’t opt for a smartphone. I mean, delay the first cell phone as long as possible. I think delaying a cell phone till driving makes a lot of sense, and then agAIn, opting for an alternative to the smartphone.

When you do get a first phone for your child.

[00:35:41] Collin: That’s very helpful. And the more people who make these decisions, the better this technology will be because the market will shift

[00:35:49] Clare: Exactly. To

[00:35:49] Collin: be able to provide it. Yep. So that collective action principle as well. Okay. Finally, let’s come back. A lot of people don’t think about this category.

It’s not the focus of your book, but I know you’ve thought about it, I’m sure. What about your church?

[00:36:01] Clare: Yes. I would say, I mean, since my book is focused on kids, the most important thing you can do is create a youth group culture at your church that is smartphone, social media, three, kind of like the school cell phone bands.

I would encourage youth groups to say, Hey, we don’t do smartphones at youth group. You might as well leave it at home. Otherwise, when you come, you can hand in your phones here and you’ll get them after youth group, because that would actually protect a space. For those teens to, I mean, first of all listen to the teaching while they’re at youth group, but then also to have that true fellowship and real life relationship where they’re not being distracted away on their phones.

And then also so that Christian parents know when they send their kid to youth group that at youth group, they’re not gonna be accidentally exposed to something on someone else’s smartphone. And so I think it’s important that Christian parents feel like youth group in their church is a safe. Place to send their kids where they’re not gonna be potentially exposed to dangers through smartphones or social media.

So I would, I would really encourage youth groups to create a culture that normalizes like no phones, and we’re actually gonna focus on real life relationships while we’re here.

[00:37:04] Collin: I love that. And especially, I think that should go without saying, A lot of youth groups involve camps. A lot of youth groups involve overnights, lock-ins, things like that.

Yeah. Smartphones. And those events are total disasters. That is, you only

[00:37:19] Clare: hear bad stories when there are, when there’s access to phones.

[00:37:24] Collin: Only bad stories there. Absolutely. Okay. You got a few more quick questions here. We’re talking with Clare Morell, agAIn about the tech exit, a practical guide to freeing kids and teens from smartphones.

We may have covered this already, so that’s why I’m thinking maybe this will be quick, most common pushback you get in your personal life as well as in response to the book and some of the interviews and conversations you’ve had.

[00:37:45] Clare: Yeah, I think the, the, the concern about friends, I think also the, the pushback I get is, well then how will my child be able to function in this digital age if they don’t know the technology?

Or how will they you know, be able to actually use technology wisely as an adult if they’re not able to have me trAIn them on it? And I would just say both of those really turn out to be myths. That it, it’s not about knowing how to operate a smartphone or social media to be successful in this digital age.

A lot of the families I interviewed allowed their children to learn how to use a computer in a public place with purpose learning how to code or use Microsoft Excel, like actually developing. Hardcore tech skills that will prepare them for the workplace. Yeah. But learning how to scroll on a smartphone is just teaching you how to be constantly entertAIned and amused.

It’s not actually giving you real tech skills. Yeah. And then on the principle, oh, I need to trAIn them on it now so that they use it. Mat mature as an adult, as I was alluding to earlier, these kids who grew up without them. Don’t have habits of dependence on the smartphone. And so even when they got a smartphone in college, they didn’t have the same draw or pull to it that they were actually able to use it more wisely and maturely because they hadn’t developed the the being used to checking it all the time.

And so I think what’s more important is. Is forming kids’ core habits, helping them develop self-control, which is stunted by handing them screens constantly and that will prepare them to operate it maturely as adults, as well as parents. Modeling for them how we’d want them to use that. And that’s how we approach any other powerful technology or substance is we don’t say, oh, we wanna trAIn you on a healthy use, so we’ll just give it to you, you young.

Driving a car or allowing a child to drink alcohol instead, we try to model healthy uses of those things, have conversations around it to trAIn them for it, but there’s an age of maturity we recognize for them actually being able to use it for themselves.

[00:39:40] Collin: Another quick question here, ClAIre. I note this.

Comes, this is a, it’s a real concern. It’s a scary concern, and it’s one that is, is often deployed as a defeater to the school bands. Mm. I’m sure you know where I’m going with this. Yep. Parents need nonstop access to their children, to the possibility of a school shooting. Mm-hmm. How do you respond?

[00:40:02] Clare: Yeah, so I explAIned in the book that school safety experts actually say kids are more safe not having access to smartphones in that.

You know, absolute worst case scenario, horrific event that no parent, I mean, we, it, it’s, it’s sad that we actually have to think about that. Yeah, and I would just say that their advice is that kids having access to phones can actually be more dangerous in an active shooter situation or other just emergency situation in the school because kids are distracted, then they’re not listening to first responders instructions, phones.

Can be set off or pAIn can actually make it easier for a shooter to identify where people are. Or if a child, they draw

[00:40:40] Collin: attention. Draw, draw attention to you if you’re hiding. Yeah. Kids

[00:40:43] Clare: are kids. I mean, I just wanna say they just, they don’t always understand these things. They might access social media and go on social media and they’re on social media, on their phone during this event, and that makes it easier for a shooter to identify where students are.

And so there’s so many ways that the phones actually make. That situation more dangerous than if a child doesn’t have a phone. They listen to the instructions of their teacher, to the, the emergency personnel involved. And we should just remember, like teachers have cell phones on them. There are people in the building that have phones.

If it’s a true emergency, every child having a phone actually makes that type of situation much more dangerous. And of course, what we all want is to keep our children safe, but the, the smartphone bands actually help keep children. Safer and it’s important to for parents to understand that message.

[00:41:30] Collin: Yeah, that was something that really stood out. I hadn’t really thought that through. My kids aren’t old enough yet to to be going through that, but it felt like a really important topic. I wanted to make sure we covered it here as well. Sure. You mentioned Australia. Earlier, other countries that follow your recommendations better than at least the United States does.

So far, you think?

[00:41:51] Clare: I think that the uk and some, some countries in Europe, like Sweden are a little bit ahead of the curve on some of these things they’ve recognized. The data, ’cause obviously the smartphone and social media is not a unique US problem. This has been a global issue, particularly in the developed world of these kids having access to technology and seeing bad results from it.

So, you know, the UK has enacted age verification for pornography websites. They’ve they were even ahead of us in terms of banning phones from schools. They have a lot of communities now that have completely banned phones from schools and even kind of created a movement, a cultural movement of.

Parents saying we wanna be like a community-wide town wide free of smartphones. So the smartphone free childhood movement was born in the UK and has really taken off there. Sweden is interesting too. They have, you know, banned phones from the school day as well as some of the other Scandinavian countries like Norway and Finland.

And so some of the most, the earliest studies to come out on the effectiveness of school phone bans came from the UK and came from Norway and other countries. So I, I think it should just encourage the US that. Other countries have done this, and it actually helps to look at their examples. And we can learn from, from how their experience has been implementing some of these policies.

[00:43:05] Collin: And nobody’s saying, boy, that was a huge mistake. We should go back.

[00:43:08] Clare: No. And in

[00:43:09] Collin: fact, let me ask you about schools. Have you ever heard of that in a school?

[00:43:13] Clare: Going back to To the phones. Yeah. Going saying

[00:43:16] Collin: we’re banned phones, but like, no, no, no. That was terrible. We’re gonna bring the phones back.

[00:43:20] Clare: No, it’s only gone one direction.

And I’m encouraged because I think even just seeing the effectiveness more and more of schools kind of tend to follow suit just based on the results that we’re seeing so positively.

[00:43:33] Collin: Yeah. And and quick question on that one as well. Who is the constituency opposed to the bans?

[00:43:41] Clare: Okay. This is parents, adminis, administrators, teachers,

[00:43:43] Collin: this,

[00:43:43] Clare: it’s mAInly parents and

[00:43:45] Collin: students, by the way.

Students. Oh, I mean S mean students,

[00:43:47] Clare: of course. Yeah. I mean, a lot of students don’t like it. But you know, I will say what’s encouraging is some students initially oppose it and then they come to really appreciate the benefits of the ban because they realize just how distracted and stressed they were by the different drama happening on the phones during the school day.

And they say, now I actually feel free. To be myself. I enjoy actually talking to my friends in person. So the mAIn constituency that has kept some schools from being able to enact these, it’s not the teachers or the administration. They are obviously seeing these effects firsthand and are very eager to get rid of the phones, but they get a lot of pushback from parents and agAIn, from the parents, I would say.

Mm-hmm. I wanna give them the benefit of the doubt. I would just say kind of uninformed parents who, agAIn, they want that constant access to their child. They think that they need it, and they haven’t maybe considered how that constant access could actually be harming their child and even be distracting to them.

So I’ve heard from several teachers the biggest challenge about the cell phones is actually a parent is calling the student in the middle of class or texting them about something they want. We’ve gotten so used to this convenience of kind of instant, instant communication that parents are the ones who are most kind of resistant to a phone ban.

And so that’s why I, I wrote in the book, I wanted to explAIn all the reasons because I’m trying to help bring parents on board because in communities where the parents are supportive, then the school is like so eager to do this. And so I want more parents to actually say like, we wanna see this in our schools.

[00:45:12] Collin: Last question, ClAIre. And this probably is the one that’s gonna be hardest for a lot of, a lot of us here watching and listening. How are parents supposed to do this if we’re on our own phones all the time?

[00:45:24] Clare: It is definitely the most convicting question. So I do touch on this in the book in that chapter on explAIning, educating, and exemplifying, and I was just alluding to this in my other answer, that a big part of how we trAIn kids how to use this well is we have to model it for them as.

Parents. And if we are communicating to our children that the most valuable thing that we give our time to and attention to is our phones, then kids will think that these are extremely valuable. They will be so intrigued that they wanna have one and it will become some, this appealing part of being an adult is having one of these phones.

And so I really encourage parents, you do not have to get rid of your smartphone though I don’t think it’s a bad thing if you do. But we really should think very carefully about. Distancing ourselves physically from our devices, especially when we’re home and we’re with our kids. Just because the mere presence of a smartphone they’ve done studies on this is distracting to our brAIn.

It’s actually drAIning us of mental, emotional energy, resisting checking our phone if it’s on us. And we’re trying to be present with our kids. And so I recommend families get a phone box where you just try to leave your phones when you come home from work. At least protect. Dinner time, bedtime and don’t go check your phone agAIn until your kids are asleep.

So just having dAIly rhythms and practices of separating ourselves from our devices allows us to be present with our kids and it breaks that total addiction. It, it’s very mentally freeing to actually practice being physically separated from your phone. I know other families do like a phone free Saturday where they really just try to, the parents try to completely put the phone away for the day.

You know, a lot of. Parents have now opted to have a landline in case of emergency, so they’re not constantly tied to their smartphones. And so I would just, I would think through ways that you yourself can distance yourself from your phone and how to make your phone less addicting to you by ruthlessly eliminating apps that you don’t actually need to do on your phone, that wAIt till you’re at a computer, turn off notifications, just make it as unappealing as possible to you, so you’re truly using it as a tool and it’s not sucking you into distraction.

[00:47:21] Collin: Well, it’s pretty obvious. ClAIre, you thought this through pretty well. It’s obvious in this interview, it’s obvious in the book, it’s obvious in the advocacy work that you do, and I just wanna say thank you for all of the above for how you’ve helped guide people here, how the book goes into even greater detAIl on a lot of this stuff and, and far more.

And the continued political advocacy work you do there in Washington DC in the book Tech Exit Practical Guide to Freeing Kids and Teens from Their Smartphones. ClAIre Morell is my guest. ClAIre, thanks for joining me.

[00:47:52] Clare: Thanks so much for having me.

[00:48:01] Collin: Thanks for listening to this episode of Gospel Bound. For more interviews and to sign up for my newsletter, head over to tgc.org/. Gospel bound rate and review gospel bound on your favorite podcast platform so others can join the conversation. Until next time, remember, when we’re bound to the gospel, we abound in hope.