Why This Actress Took Away Her Daughter’s Smartphone
By Movieguide® Contributor
After giving her daughter a phone for her 11th birthday, actress Drew Barrymore decided to reverse course and take the technology away after seeing how unlimited access was affecting her.
“I wished so many times when I was a kid that someone would tell me no. I wished so badly to rebel all the time, and it was because I had no guardrails. I had too much access and excess, and eventually, ‘no’ actually became a challenge…because I had so much autonomy at a young age, I simply couldn’t accept authority of any kind,” Barrymore wrote in a lengthy Instagram post explaining why she is taking her daughter’s phone away.
Barrymore is mom to daughters Olive and Frankie.
“I now have two daughters, aged 10 and 12. And I wonder if my life’s experience was a butterfly net to capture the understanding of what young girls need” she continued. “I know now that I have never wanted to be more protective of my kids in general…Kids are not supposed to be exposed to this much. Kids are supposed to be protected. Kids are supposed to hear NO. But we are living in an á la carte system as caretakers, in a modern fast-moving world where tiny little computers are in every adult’s hands. Modeling that it is OK to be attached to a device that is a portal to literally everything. How did we get here?”
“I came to the conclusion simply that I am not ready to allow my kids to have a phone…I am going to become the parent I needed. The adult I needed. And I want to have the voices in my head saying, ‘I’m trying…I’m trying.” Because that’s all we can do. Try to figure this all out, for ourselves and those we are designated to take care of,” Barrymore added. “Maybe the kids will become the model of balance and take ownership in knowing they are doing something powerful [in not having phones].”
Last year, the talk show host revealed that she keeps her daughters away from iPads too.
“We watch a ton of movies and shows, so I’m not judging anyone about screens,” the actress told Better Homes & Gardens. “But when it comes to my kids, I’m not a huge fan of personal electronics, like iPads.”
“Now, I keep the iPads locked in a safe, and they only come out for special occasions,” she shared. “I’d rather that the three of us all pile into my bed and watch together.”
Barrymore’s decision to take away her daughter’s phone mirrors that of many celebrities who understand the difficulties of living in the public eye. Most of them take the position that technology and social media are not explicitly bad, but when children are exposed to them at too young of an age, it becomes a problem. For that reason, many celebrities are limiting their kids’ access until they head off to college.
HGTV stars Ben and Erin Napier took this a step further and created an organization to encourage and enable other parents to practice this discipline and help their children find community with others who are tech-free.
Movieguide® previously reported:
HOME TOWN couple Erin and Ben Napier have been very open about their stance on social media for their two girls. Now, the two have launched a new nonprofit organization, Osprey, that is dedicated to helping other parents keep their children off social media.
In an Instagram post initiating the new organization, Erin Napier wrote, “My friends parenting smart phone-free middle schoolers have had a brutal experience of seeing their child left out, even though research tells us social media is as addictive and destructive for developing brains as any drug.”
She continued, “This made me think: my kindergartener doesn’t expect to drive a car before she’s old enough. She doesn’t expect to own a house of her own before she’s old enough. If we build a culture in our home and school now where she doesn’t expect access to the entire world in her pocket until she’s much older, we can set her up for success. When the time comes, a simple phone that can just call and text will be great: in the same way she’ll ride a bicycle before she drives a car.”
