When I was a kid my parents used to tell me not to sit too close to the TV. Apparently sitting very close to a screen was bad for my eyes or something?. But then one day a strange thing happened. They simply stopped worrying about it. Sitting close to the TV was suddenly no longer such a big deal anymore. Something happened in our house around that time that caused my parents to completely change their minds...
We bought a computer!
I was reminded of this recently because I have been reading old 1950s parenting guidebooks (just for a bit of fun) and I've noticed one common piece of advice that crops up in every one of these books: Make sure your child has plenty of fresh air. It seems like people were obsessed about fresh air back then. Which is ironic, because these days - when we get far less fresh air than previous generations - people have stopped caring about it.
It seems that as long as something is optional we should worry about it. But as soon as it becomes a necessary or inevitable part of our lives, suddenly we don't need to worry about it anymore.
Remember all the hype in the 90s about mobile phones causing cancer? (that was before everybody had one/needed one)
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