I'm 24 and I've used internet heavily completely unsupervised since around 7-ish years old. As I've grown older I notice myself using my phone and be on the web less and less, it is a conscious decision. My access to youtube is blocked except on my laptop, though I have noticed not watching any videos for weeks now. My phone is B&W and has it's browser disabled. Being more mindful of technology use is definitely a positive trend within my generation.

But as I near parenthood, I feel conflicted. I'm still young enough to remember my state of mind in the early teen years. I remember being surprised at the amount of attention the level "No Russian" from MW2 got. I thought - "It's just a game, why would anyone be offended by this?". Now, having seen similar things happen in my lifetime, it seems very distasteful to me. Even seeing a kid with a realistic looking toy gun gives me mixed feelings. The idea of having my kid being on tiktok for 6 hours unsupervised with all the people feeding their agenda to young impressionable minds makes me uneasy. And I was the one who spent good portion of his day being on 4chan.

My question is to parents of HN - how does one find balance within their parenting? I don't want to be a helicopter parent who blasts their child for not falling in line with all their demands, torturing them with endless extracurricular activities for their own good. At the same time I want them to learn a little discipline and not hate me for forcing things on them. I had zero limits on my screen time, and I'd say I turned out perfectly fine, though I did poorly in school and was a troublemaker. I found my love for studying only after I turned 18 and had some time with my thoughts after I moved out and stopped hanging out with deadbeats. Frankly, I'd say my upbringing was a little too lax.

Younger me would feel betrayed by my changing attitude towards raising kids , and that's what worries me - the disconnect that leads to the repeating cycle of parent-kid conflict. I don't think a parent usually thinks that they'll try to be the world's shittiest parent, yet so many of them are.