“Adolescence” writer Jack Thorne took a public stand against smartphone use among young children and incel culture Sunday when he joined the Smartphone Free Childhood Pact, a campaign supported by over 100,000 parents who have pledged to not give their children smartphones until age 14.
“I think SFC is a remarkable group and the parent pact is a remarkable idea,” Thorne told the Guardian. “I know it’s one that I’m going to engage in as our kid reaches the critical age of smartphone want. I am terrified of what comes next and think empowering parents is a vital ingredient in this struggle.”
The topic is one of importance and concern to Thorne, the father of an 8-year-old, and is a central theme of “Adolescence.”
The four-part Netflix series is about a teenage boy who is accused of killing a female classmate. It’s quickly established the boy is guilty, and over the course of the four episodes it becomes clear he fell victim to the discourse pushed out by those at the head of incel culture, such as Andrew and Tristan Tate.
Smartphone Free Childhood began as a Whatsapp chat between three parents, who believe premature smartphone use can damage children’s development. The cause is not without opposition, including internet safety proponent Ian Russell, who has argued banning smartphones before age 16 isn’t helpful. As Russell has explained, children will encounter potentially dangerous ideas and people online no matter what age they first access a smartphone — the onus is on parents to teach their children how to watch out for such behavior in the first place.
Incel culture wasn’t always part of the story of “Adolescence,” Thorne told TheWrap in March. “It was someone I worked with called Mariella [Johnson] who said, ‘You need to look into incel culture,” he explained. “As soon as I started looking into it — and I spent a long time down some very dark holes — the thing that I discovered was this isn’t as easily othered as I thought it would be. This isn’t as easy to put in a box and go, ‘Oh, this is just crazy people thinking crazy thoughts.’ Actually the logic of what they’re talking about, I could understand the appeal of it.”
Incel, a word that blends “involuntary celibate,” is a reference to an online subculture that is marked by misogyny and hostility toward women. Several mass murders have invoked the ideals of incel culture to explain their crimes, including Elliot Rodger, who killed six and injured 14 others at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2014, and Jake Davison, who killed five people and injured two in England in 2021.
