The Screen Time Panic Sets Parents Up to Fail

2026-02-09

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Patrick Klepek on the reality of parenting in the age of Roblox and YouTube. I listened to hours of podcasts about how screen time affects kids of all ages and how parents should manage screen time but I still felt completely unprepared for this challenge when I had a kid. I think the reason for that is that there’s a lot of reporting about how screens are impacting kids, and a lot of reporting about the research into this subject, but rarely did I encounter a conversation between pa...

Patrick Klepek on the reality of parenting in the age of Roblox and YouTube.

I listened to hours of podcasts about how screen time affects kids of all ages and how parents should manage screen time but I still felt completely unprepared for this challenge when I had a kid.

I think the reason for that is that there’s a lot of reporting about how screens are impacting kids, and a lot of reporting about the research into this subject, but rarely did I encounter a conversation between parents that talks about how any of that information can be realistically applied in the real world.

This week on the podcast we’re joined by Patrick Klepek in order to have the kind of conversation I wish I heard before I became a parent, but I think there’s something here for everyone. Patrick is the cofounder of Remap, a website and one of my favorite podcasts about video games, and the writer behind Crossplay, a newsletter about the intersection of parenting and games. Patrick is also my former colleague at Vice, back when I worked at Motherboard and he at Waypoint. Patrick has been reporting about video games for most of his life, is a wonderful writer, and a parent. I find his perspective on many of these issues—screen time, parental controls, YouTube, Roblox—extremely useful and interesting, and I hope you do as well.

YouTube Version: https://youtu.be/LjK1Swsm1m4

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