Children of the Matrix

We invited an Egyptian couple to lunch after church and their 4-year-old boy fussed so much that the father, with evident reluctance, pulled out an iPad, and with the flick of a finger to a Spider-Man game restored tranquility to the room. The man apologetically explained he had tried to pull the plug on his son’s use of the device, but it was too late.

Recently I visited a cousin in Rhode Island and sat next to her 3-year-old granddaughter at a barbecue. The child amazed me with her skills in changing hairstyles, gowns, and shoes on Disney princesses on a handheld screen. “She’s on it all day long,” her mother said, explaining the proficiency. The princess wannabe passed me the tablet and I tried my hand but hit a wall at a punky multi-colored do. “You can’t do that; it’s locked,” the savvy swiper said. I was relieved when the steaks and baked potatoes arrived.

People all over the country (and evidently Egypt too) are buying peace and quiet at home and elsewhere with absorbing phone and tablet apps connecting children, like so many human Matrix batteries, to alternate realities. But what will be the bill for this convenience?

How many problems do we have on our hands here? Intense indoctrination of toddlers into crass consumerism, age-inappropriate fixation on outward adornment of the seductive kind, the use of children to aggressively market to parents, the absorption of children into unreality, and rank addiction.

I decided to read the online reviews of the princess dress-up app:

“I downloaded [the] app and paid to unlock all the princesses and remove ads. … Then I updated it to the new version. The app locked up the princesses I had previously paid to unlock. What a disappointment. …”

“I got this app and was frustrated. The boutique was too limited and kids play with the same dresses over and over again. The carriages are spunky and odd looking. Not some sort of thing that a little princess would want to ride to a ball in.”

“I would have happily paid for this app, instead of being crushed with the Walmart ads required to make it free. Could have been fun. I don’t even want to play this for my 3-year-old. … [S]he will want to pick the dress that is locked and I will have to go to Walmart to buy something to totally use this app.”

“I hate [when] the princess says ‘hurry up,’ or ‘it’s so crowded in here!’ Wow do these princesses know their manners! And make the prince say more things.”

“This game is fun but after you play it 5 times it gets boring. It wouldn’t be so boring if you had more than 5 things unlocked.”

In a 1991 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation,Wesley Crusher, on break from Starfleet Academy, boards the Enterprise and is perplexed to see that the entire crew is absorbed in a computer game that 1st Officer Riker brought on board with him. The gist of play is alarmingly like what I observed in my 3- and 4-year-old companions—selected elements of the ersatz world are instantly responsive to the will of the godlike player, and the reward center of the brain is stimulated. Thus the player is further drawn in, leaving reality and responsibility behind.

In the case of the Star Trek episode, Wesley discovers that the game is a plot by aliens to take over the spaceship. Evidently iPad addicts can’t conquer worlds. All ends well because someone in the story is still awake and has not been sucked in. What are we doing to the generation not yet old enough to tie their shoes? If all become hooked into the Matrix, will there be a single Wesley left to save the day?