Another day, another set of smug Instagram parents with a brand new baby, ready to tell the world the best way to raise a family after spending approximately 12 nanoseconds on parenting!
Today.com reported that Dave Neal, a podcast host, went viral for his remarks about how he and his wife will be a “coloring book family” instead of being those terrible, awful, no-good parents who let their kids have… gasp… screen time. In the video, he said, “I don’t mean to ruffle feathers with the moms of Instagram, or the dads, but I have that opinion that if you let your kid use a tablet or a screen while out to dinner, you’re not a bad parent, but it’s bad parenting.”
He then pointed to his wife, Courtney, who was nursing their eight-week-old son, August. “I think I want us to be a coloring book family,” Courtney said, and Neal agreed, saying, “We’re going to be a coloring book family!” Then, of course, they waxed nostalgic about the good-old-days before tablets and screens, where they colored on tablecloths.
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But fear not, terrible screen time parents! Neal came back with another video, where he reassured us that there “may be situations” where it’s OK to let your kids have access to tablets and screen time. Phew. But then he swerves back, posing the incredibly-interesting question of, what if we just threw something like, I don’t know, brownies at our kids every time they threw a temper tantrum?
Because, you know, that’s what us screen-time parents do. Our kids throw temper tantrums, and we just toss them the tablet or Nintendo Switch to shut them up. Who needs real parenting when you’ve got a tablet, amiright?
Then, in another video, he said that no one actually disagreed with him, they just didn’t like hearing his opinion because he only has an eight-week-old. “I see a lot of tired and angry parents out there; I’m not your enemy,” he said. “The tablets are.” It’s an interesting take from a social media influencer with a podcast, who posts multiple times on Instagram every single day.
And it gets better — in his interview with Today.com, Neal doubled down even more with his self-righteous attitude, saying the only reason people were “triggered” is because what he said made them feel “guilty.”
No, my dude. Your smug videos went down like a lead balloon because you have one child, a baby, who can barely even move yet, which somehow does not keep you from giving parenting advice to others with older children, often multiple children, when you have no idea what it’s like. And the insinuation from Neal here is that all these other parents are using tablets as a crutch, as opposed to one of many tools in our arsenal when it comes to parenting.
I’m curious: does Mr. Smug Instagram Parent have any clue, at all, what it’s like trying to, say, work from home over the summer with a bunch of kids around the house? Or maybe how difficult it is to cook dinner when you’re solo parenting and your kids are bouncing off the walls? Oh sure, they’ll have them “foster creativity” (eye roll) and be a coloring book family. I bet they’ll preach about the importance of playing outside and other solutions that every Perfect Parent comes up with when their baby does absolutely nothing but sit still and look cute. Real life, unfortunately, is not like that. And if absolutely nothing else, this man needs to check his damn privilege. Not everyone has the ability to put their entire lives on hold to cater to their children in a desperate attempt to keep them from ever getting bored, all while simultaneously keeping them off all screens. I’d love Neal to go tell a single mother with three kids that no, her kids shouldn’t be on tablets while she’s trying to get a healthy dinner prepared because, you know, screen time is bad. Or that the neurodivergent family who use tablets as communication devices maybe aren’t just throwing screens at their kids because they were pitching temper tantrums in a restaurant, despite your judgmental, holier-than-thou assumptions.
Yes, everyone in the world knows by now how bad excessive screen time is. We’re all aware. But us parents, we’re just out here doing our best. Neal has no clue right now. That’s not being snarky or mean; it’s just reality. We all had newborns at one point; we all made a million vows about the parents we were going to be. But until you’ve experienced one kid coloring on your walls with a Sharpie, while another kid is screaming from the bathroom about how they need toilet paper, and a third kid is crying because they wanted that banana instead of the one they got, all while you have to pee, laundry needs to be changed out, dinner is on the stove, there’s clutter everywhere, and you haven’t had a moment to yourself in seven years… maybe sit down and take several seats.
