People Without Children Are Now Complaining About ‘iPad Kids.’ Please Be Quiet

Wake up, babe—a new way to mom-shame just dropped.

They’re known as iPad kids, and if you’ve been on TikTok recently you may have seen Gen Z creators warning against this scourge. These children, they claim, are the progeny of millennials and are a group of poorly behaved, unintelligent menaces being unleashed upon society mostly thanks to unmitigated screen time. Why are they this way? Their parents, of course. But really, we all know this just means their moms.

“I am one hundred percent judging the parents whose kids are addicted to their iPad that in order to get them to start behaving in public or stop having a temper tantrum, they need to shove a screen in their face,” posted one creator, noting she’s not a parent, but she doesn’t care if her comments make people mad.

“Ipad kids” as a meme has been ongoing, but the concept has taken on new life in recent months, likely because of a viral TikTok by creator Gabe Escobar. Escobar, a 21-year-old actor, got 20 million views on his video, in which he tells millennials that their kids are “bizarre and terribly behaved.”

“You’ve been shoving media and screens in these kids’ faces since birth,” he continued. “They probably have no imagination because their brains haven’t actually been forced to come up with any original thought.”

He concludes: “Gen Z isn’t allowed to raise iPad kids.”

K.

It’s an interesting time to be a parent, especially a mother. We, and the generation of young kids we are raising, have more access to technology than ever. I don’t know how I would have survived without my robot nanny rocking my daughter to sleep or my apps that helped me track every diaper and feed she had in those confusing and overwhelming newborn days. But this access is also a curse, as it means screens are lurking around every corner, ready to ruin our children’s brains irreparably before they even start school.

As every mom of a young child knows, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents limit their childrens’ screen time in various ways as they grow up. Before a child is 18 months of age, it is recommended that babies are only allowed to watch a screen if they are FaceTiming. After that, children are recommended to be allowed a slowly increasing number of minutes of screen time according to their age. My daughter is almost 18 months, which means her screen time should be “limited to watching educational programming with a caregiver” (i.e., don’t just set her in front of a device on her own; try to make it a shared activity). After she turns two, I can allow her an hour of screen time per week and three on the weekends.

TikTok content

This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.

At least in my circles, one of the things moms are stressed about the most is screen time. In Reddit forums and Facebook groups, moms hem and haw and worry that they are somehow setting their kids up for a lifetime of attention disorders and bad behavior, and probably, if we are being honest, turning them into mini serial killers, because mom lets them watch Ms. Rachel or Cocomelon.