IÂ was on the #10 going home late afternoon, and you boarded the bus with your one-year-old, who immediately began screaming bloody murder. Your immediate response was to quickly dial something up on your smart (?!) phone and hold it in front of his face for the entire duration of the trip. He sat slack-jawed and glazed-eyed, slumped in his stroller for the rest of the journey. From Barrington to the Bridge Terminal in Dartmouth, he literally did not blink once. Do you realise that you’re messing with the delicate neuro-circuitry of your baby’s developing brain? It’s appalling that Gen Z kids are drugging their babies with smart phones like a narcotic, propped against their eyeballs, to comfort or silence them: trying to fill their gaping lack of parenting skills.
—Crabby Commuter
This article appears in Aug 22-28, 2019.
Welcome to 2019 when more people eye fuck their cell phones than make direct eye contact with a real live human being.
Well I want to personally thank that Mom for not subjecting everyone else on the bus to her crying kid instead of thinking everyone is as numb and shellshocked to it as she is. And the kid won’t grow up to be one of those strangers who strikes up a random conversation and makes the bus ride awkward.
As if people haven’t been plopping their kids in front of TVs for DECADES.