In China 2019, it passed laws limiting minors to less than 1.5 hours of online games on weekdays and three hours on weekends, with no game playing allowed between 10 pm to 8am. Now Tiktok has limits usage to just 40 minutes for minor under 14 years of age.
Now in 2021, the new restrictions forbid children under 18 to play online games from Monday through Thursday, effective Sep 1. They can only play for one hour, between 8pm and 9pm, on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays.
The reality is bleak as many children are spending more and more time in front of screens, be it smartphones, consoles, computer, tablets etc. Something must be seriously wrong for China to implement this as a law.
By limiting games playing to just 3 hours a week, they are reducing the numbers of hours minors can play the games. However, as with everything in demand, the minors will always find ways to circumvent these measures either by using their parents’ phones or another adult sibling’s devices.
These laws could also backfire. Anything in shortage will fuel more wants. As these children grow up to crave playing games as it has become a luxury limited activity now, as soon as they reach 18 years of age, the time spent on online games will sky rocket to the moon.
There will be no reason to put any limitations on them then because that would be detrimental to human rights.
I feel that it is quite important for parents to instill the right culture in dealing with this problem. By communicating with the children and getting them to understand that there is life beyond devices is super important. We cannot just live our entire life online, on a device.
Yes, many aspects of our lives now are slowly being eroded by online interactions but we need to remember a device with a screen, no matter how attractive and how addictive it is, it will never replace real human interaction. Parents should show children how being in the present with a human presence is irreplaceable.
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