Kids & Cell Phones

The shops selling Cell Phones are increasing day by day. It will not be wrong if we say that it is the time of cell revolution. With the advancement in technology and increasing competition the Cell companies always try to introduce new features in their Cell Sets. Various new features offered by the cell phones are the main reason for their popularity. You can use it as a camera, a handy game, a diary, a phone book, stopwatch, alarm clock and many other ways.

But the question is why these cell phones are so popular among kids?

If a kid is asked, what he/she wants on its birthday?

The common answer is surely a "Cell phone". Cell phones have become so popular these days especially among the adolescents that cell phone companies' sales have increased by a huge percentage in the recent years. It is because cell has become a style symbol. Formerly it was a need but now it has become a luxury. Every kid today longs for a cell phone whether he needs it or not and parents too fulfill each and every need of there child.

The trend started from the children of VIP's for whom it was a need due to security reasons. But slowly widespread use of cell phones started. Now a day every teenager wants to have a latest Cell Phone. This trend is commonly seen in Asian Countries like India, China and many others. And now the condition is that approximately every fifty among the hundred teens have the cell phones.

Let's talk about parents. Parents don't have any problem with their kids owning cell phones. If there are three teens in a family then all the three are having their own cells. It is because parents are worried about their child's security in today's fast moving world where number of accidents is increasing day by day. With the evolution of cell phones parents can now remain connected to their children every second. Also a child now itself can call police or ambulance in case of emergency. These days child kidnapping is increasing and with the help of cell phone the child can be easily located and kidnappers can be busted.

As there is counter side of every aspect. Similar in the case of cell phones. Let us take an overview of various problems arising out of cell phones' use: -

1. Littered school systems: - There's lot of disturbance in schools due to cell phones. The head masters daily deliver lectures on this issue but the problem seems to have no solution. Some schools even have levied fines on the use of cells in the classrooms or even in school. School administrators are bothered about this problem. But if parents are considered they too carry the phones themselves and also back their children. So this should be forbidden. And kids and parents must support the school administration in maintaining the discipline.

2. Adverse effects on health: - In Cell phones the data transmitter and receiver use microwaves for the purpose. Or you can say two cells gets connected through the microwaves. These are very short wavelength waves and cause heating effect. Although the effect of cell frequencies is very slack but is sure enough more harmful for kids due to immaturity. So prolonged use of cell phones can cause severe health problems. This has been proven by many worldwide studies.

3. Loss of study: -These days children wish to converse with a friend on the phone, do net surfing or to play game than to concentrate on studies. Some even have plans that cell to cell are unlimited. And many of the plans have free night and weekend plans. Which would mean, you might never get the child off the phone over the weekend! Remember one thing: They spend hours on chatting on the cell phones. In today's scenario cell phones have greater charm than studies. Hence use of cell phones pose loss to child's study.

4. Increase in expenses: -Greater the number of cell phones in a home greater is the bill. Children don't care about how much their parents will pay for their luxuries, they are careless and don't most of them have sense of responsibility.

5. Increasing electronic waste: - As the use of cell phones is increasing so is increasing the number of disposed off cells. Today every second person is keeping a cell phone, and when a person is all done with his cell then it's nothing more than a scrap. This electronic waste is posing huge danger to the environment.

6. Pornography: - A few filthy People use pornography to earn easy money but they don't know how they are breaching the world culture. Primarily porn was propagated on the cyber world. But these days the vulgar MMS's are also circulating on the cell phones. Kids find fun in these kinds of activities because they don't sense or signify the vulgarity of porn. In my views whatever is the country or state, children are the building blocks of the society, economy, politics etc. and if they indulge in the pornography you can predict how coarse the future of world will be.

Well as there are some aspects against cell phones but it doesn't mean that we eliminate cells from kids' life. The ails of cell phones can be avoided by taking following measure:

The problem of disturbance from the ring tones can be handled by the use of the vibrator. You can use the vibrator when you are in the school, class, and office or in the meeting. It won't disturb the people around you and you can take your cell with you every time. Also there are various facilities with which you can who tried to call you when your phone was silent or even switched off.

Well health is the most important asset of yours so you cannot compromise with any thing harming your health. The effect of using cell is although very slow but you can remain fit if you just acquire right habits of using cell phones i.e. avoid placing cell near significant organs of the body like heart, brain etc for long time. Especially for kids as there organs are much softer and under development.

As far as the loss of studies is concerned the parents must keep checking that their child isn't using the cell frequently. Also parents should recharge the phone every month as part of their allowance. This will give child a feel of being checked Because, when the talk time is finished then it's all done and they will get the new recharge only by the next month! This will hopefully build a level of responsibility.

Pornography on cell phones is the biggest matter of concern. You may have listened about many such incidents. Now parents supply their kids with the latest mobiles having all the new technologies in order to exhibit their status but they don't even try to see what their child is doing in his bedroom. I think parents must feel their responsibility to monitor if their kids are indulging in any dirty business.

Most children don't care about the parents' pocket they just want their cell charged so parents can make use of the shared plan. Using a prepaid phone will give the kid a certain amount of minutes per month. After that, it's up to him to use their pocket money to recharge the phone time if they need to.

Also roaming fees is another headache. If someone isn't in its "area" as defined by the cell service provider, he will have to pay the roaming fee for incoming and outgoing calls. To avoid the roaming charges you need to do is to simply buy a phone and then buy minutes, as you need them. Most of them include roaming as well as nationwide coverage.

Any material thing becomes a junk after its lifetime so is the case with the cell phones. But throwing out the worn-out cell is not the solution at all. It will lead to the problem of electronic waste as many countries are struggling to manage increasing computer waste. So the worn-out cells must be recycled instead of being thrown away.

By Kanwal Rathore