Big Brother Down Under: Is it 1984 Already in Australia?

In 'The Anxious Generation', Jonathan Haidt examines the sudden decline in the mental health of adolescents starting in the early 2010s. He attributes this decline to the shift from a 'play-based childhood' to a 'phone-based childhood', highlighting mechanisms such as sleep deprivation, attention fragmentation, addiction, loneliness, social contagion, and perfectionism that interfere with children’s social and neurological development. Haidt proposes four simple rules to address this issue: no smartphones before high school, no social media before age 16, phone-free schools, and more opportunities for independence, free play, and responsibility. The book offers a clear call to action for parents, teachers, schools, tech companies, and governments to restore a more humane childhood and end the epidemic of mental illness among youth.

Published in 1949, '1984' is a cautionary tale by George Orwell that explores the dangers of totalitarianism. The novel is set in a dystopian future where the world is divided into three super-states, with the protagonist Winston Smith living in Oceania, ruled by the mysterious and omnipotent leader Big Brother. Winston works at the Ministry of Truth, where he rewrites historical records to conform to the Party's ever-changing narrative. He begins an illicit love affair with Julia and starts to rebel against the Party, but they are eventually caught and subjected to brutal torture and indoctrination. The novel highlights themes of government surveillance, manipulation of language and history, and the suppression of individual freedom and independent thought.

In 'Paranoid Parenting', Frank Furedi argues that contemporary parenting is characterized by a 'culture of fear' where parents perceive their children as perpetually at risk from various threats. This fear, fueled by exaggerated media reports and the advice of numerous child-development experts, leads parents to restrict their children's freedoms and inadvertently harm their development into independent adults. Furedi contends that by insulating children from risk, parents retard their full development and create anxious, risk-averse children. The book is based on sociological research and interviews with parents and experts, aiming to bolster parents' confidence in their own judgments and promote the raising of confident, imaginative, and capable children.