These past few weeks have led to several conversations being held within the Patterson home among our three children.
There was the killing of Iryna Zarutska on the train in Charlotte, North Carolina. Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian refugee, was fatally stabbed. The suspected assailant, Decarlos Brown Jr., was arrested upon exiting the train and charged with first-degree murder. And the horrible act was shared with world via video footage.
With the anniversary of Sept. 11, our three children asked my husband Jason and I many questions about that tragic day. Where were you when the planes hit the towers? Were you scared? Did you know anybody there? Along with several documentaries and news footage of the tragedy, some of the images seen by our oldest son James and daughter Elsie led to even more questions.
There was the fatal shooting of activist Charlie Kirk. The graphic video of the incident spread as quickly as the news itself. The horrible footage of his murder was made available instantly online.
And with all of these tragic events came a river of commentary on social media. Some were prayerful remorse and support. Others were celebrations. There were political ideologies. There were differing opinions, debates, arguments.
And all of these images, messages and commentary particularly impacted James and Elsie because it all came to them via their cell phones. Our youngest son Jase does not have a cell phone so with careful monitoring of the television, he was not exposed to the recent tragic events’ instant footage.
There has been some commentary made that the graphic images and video footage should be readily available to the public. The opinion is that the world needs to see the impact. One can’t help but remember Jacqueline Kennedy refusing to take off her pink suit after her husband John F. Kennedy was assassinated. The First Lady continued to wear the outfit covered in her husband's blood to convey a message and as a way of coping with her own trauma. Her message? “I want them to see what they have done."
According to a CBC report, the American Academy of Pediatrics estimates that by the time children reach middle school, “they may have watched as many as 8,000 murders and 100,000 other acts of virtual violence through the media.”
I personally have not seen the video of Kirk’s assassination. I choose not to watch the graphic footage. It is perhaps easy as adults to turn away.
But for our children and teenagers, most of their social media feeds are so tailored with sophisticated algorithms, exposure is almost certain.
Following the tragedy, Gov. Spencer Cox of Utah called social media “a cancer on our society” and urged people to “log off, turn off, touch grass, and hug a family member.”
These were uncomfortable topics to discuss with James and Elsie this week. But it also opened the door for conversations surrounding our Christian faith.
I know it is impossible to place your children in a bubble, shield them from everything. But as a mother, I still see the innocence in my children’s eyes.
And although I would love to have shielded my two oldest children from some of the images and commentary they were exposed to, particularly with Kirk’s assassination, maybe it will produce something else. Perhaps it will influence my children, and other members of the younger generation, to commit to the kind of life Kirk urged.
I know there will be some who disagree with me on that. But I want and urge my children to look to God and live a life of purpose and meaning.
As a parent, I want to be a bigger influence than Big Tech to my children. I want discuss these difficult topics with them. I do not want to leave it up to the social media algorithms to create the narrative.
Despite the ever-present social media cameras, I intend to use family and faith to reframe events through a hopeful lens.
