Confessions of a ‘phone zombie’

Alyson: Parental restrictions do not always achieve what they set out to do.

A MOBILE phone quite literally serves as a teenager’s lifeline.

It provides a platform where we can connect with family and friends from all over the globe and make use of just about everything on it: video games, educational apps, personal digital assistants, social media, online shopping websites, fun camera filters – you name it.

But this is not always viewed as a good thing, especially by parents. I was 15 when my dad enforced parental controls on my smartphone.

At first, I was “rightfully” outraged. In my eyes, it was a violation of my personal rights. And the fact that there was almost nothing I could do about it frustrated me to no end.

I began rebelling at every opportunity I got, in a show of protest.

I turned off my location access so the app wouldn’t be able to track wherever I was, watched every YouTube tutorial I could find on the art of bypassing these controls, and even tried sneakily learning the passwords my parents used through the screen recording function.

None of these tactics worked, so I fell back on loudly complaining to my friends whenever my parents were around.

But my folks simply chalked it up to me being in the midst of my “rebellious teenager” phase.

Finally, after many months of fighting against my cyber binds, I accepted the reality that as long as I lived under my parents’ roof, I was probably never going to attain the complete freedom I sought.

Now if you think that this was the moment I realised the extent of my Internet addiction and achieved some self-discipline, you are mistaken.

Things never got any better for me. In fact, it took a toll on both my attitude and outlook on life.

My days consisted of me constantly checking how much time I had left before I could freely use my phone once again.

This cycle continued over and over. Soon, the curb on my screen time caused me to value it way more than I should.

I strained to maximise most of what came by and got extremely ill-tempered, snapping at my parents whenever they asked me to run an errand as I believed it’d be a waste of any time I had on my phone.

Needless to say, I became more of a phone zombie than I ever was.

Then, when Covid-19 came, these parental restrictions served as more of a hindrance than a benefit to my well-being.

It was the peak of online learning where my schoolmates and I were forced to do practically everything with a keyboard, screen and working Internet.

I struggled to complete assignments under limited screen time and was always late in handing them in; my devices would lock when I was right in the middle of class. I stopped revising regularly because I didn’t have easy access to the materials my teacher posted in our digital classrooms.

As a result, my grades started dropping. But I couldn’t care less.

The mindset I found myself in back then was not the best one. Convinced that I could blame everything on my parents, I idly watched all my ambitions slip by without a second thought.

I made countless excuses. The reason for my poor performance, decrease in productivity and overall lack of motivation – all of it was on them.

After all, I wasn’t the one in control; it was my parents.

Admittedly, there definitely was a reason they decided to resort to these drastic measures in the first place.

I was constantly glued to the screen and had been going to bed progressively later in the days leading up to the decision.

Ever since then, it feels like a huge gap had been wedged between my parents and me. We can’t see eye to eye on this and it is impossible to find a middle ground.

I’ve been living with parental locks for over a year and still resent my parents for their decision. Some may agree with me on this but some may see this as just another impulsive rant by a teenager, but if there’s one thing I’ve learnt from my ongoing experience, it’s that parental restrictions do not always achieve what they set out to do.

Alyson, 16, a student in Kuala Lumpur, is a participant of the BRATs Young Journalist Programme run by The Star’s Newspaper-in-Education (Star-NiE) team.Now that you have read the article, test your understanding by carrying out the following English language activities.

1. Let’s test your knowledge of nouns, verbs and adjectives. Could you find five examples of each in Alyson’s article? List them in your Star-NiE scrapbook. Next, have a conversation with an activity partner using at least three of the words you have just identified.

2. Read the title of the article again. Do you understand the meaning of “phone zombie”? Write down your definition of the phrase. Then, look up the meaning online and compare it with your definition. Did you get it right? On a scale from one (not at all) to 10 (very much), how would you rate yourself as a “phone zombie”? 3. In the article, Alyson wrote that she and her parents can’t see eye to eye on the issue of having parental controls on her phone, and that it is impossible to find a middle ground. If you could reach out to Alyson, what suggestions or advice would you give her? Write a letter to her in not more than 350 words. When you are done, have your activity partner read it and give you his or her feedback on your letter.

Since 1997, The Star’s Newspaper-in-Education (Star-NiE) programme has supported English language teaching and learning in primary and secondary schools nationwide. Now in its 25th year, Star-NiE is continuing its role of promoting the use of English language through a weekly activity page in StarEdu. In addition, Star-NiE’s BRATs Young Journalist Programme will continue to be a platform for participants to hone and showcase their English language skills, as well as develop their journalistic interests and instincts. Follow our updates at facebook.com/niebrats. For Star-NiE enquiries, email [e-mail].