Only God may have the answer to the smartphone mental health epidemic
by Fraser Nelson, Telegraph:
A new book exposes the link between phones and misery. So why might religion offer protection?
The Shabbat dinner table is more important to Judaism, I was once told, than the church is to Christianity. The ceremonial handwashing, the welcoming of angels, the paean to the women, the singing: it’s no less of a ritual than commemorating the Last Supper and something I’ve long wanted to see. When I was finally invited to one last month, I thought I was fully prepared but I’d forgotten one thing. No mobile phones on the Sabbath. “We were a few centuries ahead with this digital-detox thing,” my host said.
The outside world is steadily catching up with this rabbinical wisdom. Smartphones have been banned from British classrooms and Florida has this week outlawed all social media for under-14s. A body of evidence about the harm caused to children seems to be growing all the time. An explosive new book by Jonathan Haidt, The Anxious Generation, argues that children are being damaged after being left to play with digital tools which are too sharp for young minds. The result? An epidemic of misery, anxiety and self-harm.
Read here (£)
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