Kate Winslet banned her kids from social media because eating disorders
I saw Steve Jobs a few weekends ago and I thought Kate Winslet was okay in it. Even though her promotion around the film was all about how “brave” and “without ego” she was to dare to wear brown wigs and play a character who was Polish-American (how shocking), at the end of the day, I found myself wondering how I would have felt about the character if the part had been played by a different actress. I do think Winslet was miscast, her accent work was hit-or-miss and the wigs were kind of terrible. Another part of the Winslet’s promotional work? Talking about how her kids don’t have iPhones or… any phones, I guess. She’s “relented” and admitted that they need computers, but no smartphones. And no social media, apparently.
She stars in Steve Jobs, but that doesn’t mean Kate Winslet is a technology superfan. In an interview with the Sunday Times, the Oscar-winning actress revealed that she has completely banned all forms of social media in her house.
“It has a huge impact on young women’s self-esteem, because all they ever do is design themselves for people to like them,” Winslet, 40, said. “And what comes along with that? Eating disorders. And that makes my blood boil. And is the reason we don’t have any social media in our house.”
The actress is mother to daughter Mia, 15, and sons Joe, 11, and Bear, 22 months. She also told the Times that besides limiting social media, she and her husband Ned Rocknroll also try to cut down on their family’s usage of phones and tablets.
“Let your kids climb trees. Take the device out of their hand. Play Monopoly!” Winslet says. “You go to a cafe and grown-ups are at one end of the table and children the other, on devices, not looking up.”
She continues, “They go into a world and parents let them. … It takes every member of a family to be a member, and there are too many interruptions these days – and devices are a huge interruption.”
However, Winslet was quick to add that she doesn’t want to come off like a spokesperson for being anti-digital and that she’s not “another celebrity on a soapbox thinking they’ve got the answers.”
I always feel like it’s a bit tricky to say “social media causes eating disorders” or “social media destroys kids” or whatever. Social media is a tool, like anything else, and it can be used for good or for evil. Social media doesn’t CAUSE eating disorders but the media and social-media-industrial complexes contribute to girls and women having low self-esteem, just as social media has become a TOOL for bullies and trolls. Anyway, I don’t really blame her for not allowing her kids to be on social media – that’s her right and she can parent her children however she sees fit. But you know Mia is going to be on Facebook/Twitter/whatever in a few years anyway (Mia is 15 years old now).
Photos of Kate from the Elle Women in Hollywood event on 10/19, courtesy of WENN.
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