The substitution theory, widely used to explain the negative impacts of screens on children, is giving way to another observation that takes different parameters into account. Indeed, the impact of screens on young children is harmful not only because it stops the child from doing something else, but also in the way screens are used. The choice of programmes, interactive or non-interactive tools, being accompanied or not: these are all parameters to be taken into account when speaking of good or bad use. There is one that deserves a closer look: transmission. Would good use by parents lead to good use by children? What is the impact of parents’ use on children’s development? While waiting for studies on the subject, we can immerse ourselves in Delphine de Vigan’s latest speculative novel: Les enfants sont rois.
Immersed in this modern fable with the feel of a well-crafted thriller, the reader becomes in turn a voyeur of a life destroying itself on screen. Well described and well documented, Delphine De Vigan traces the path of decline of Mélanie, her all-in-all fairly ordinary heroine, from the loft in 2001, her starting point for the beginning of this race towards the need to show oneself, to this family tragedy and its consequences in 2030, which raises questions through its sense of reality. Head over heels in love with that first reality TV show in 2001 in which we discover viewers’ pleasure in watching Loana in her swimming pool, Mélanie from then on tries to become famous and above all visible by any means. Having become a mother herself, she ends up satisfying her irrepressible narcissistic urges by creating her channel Happy récré, in which she displays her children all day long. Soon she is followed by millions of subscribers who “like” and comment on her every trip to the supermarket, the “unboxing” videos in which the little ones unwrap gifts sent by brands, lured by these product placements, the challenges such as eating crisps without using their hands or letting the children loose in a supermarket to bring back as many products as possible starting with the same letter, and other challenges celebrating consumption.
Isn’t living a life with everything, in immediacy and anticipating lack, the illusion children have of happiness and the promise of our modern society? What becomes of life when there is no longer any limit and so no more desire, when everything is possible, shared and seen with no space for intimacy? Are children then the kings? Is this the age we live in?
The question is posed by another character in the novel, Clara Roussel, the investigator assigned to the case of the disappearance of Kimmy, Mélanie’s daughter. A police officer of the same age as the heroine, Clara is described as a mirror image, with a reserved personality and a pronounced taste for anonymity. With her, the reader asks the question of the cruelty of this well-meaning mother who wants the best for her children and hands them over as fodder to the consumer society and the dictatorship of the visible. Is Mélanie a victim or an executioner? Clara opens up another possible path, extract:
“This woman was neither a victim nor an executioner: she belonged to her time. A time when it was normal to be filmed even before being born. How many ultrasound scans were posted every week on Instagram or Facebook? How many photos of children, of family, selfies? And what if privacy was now just an outdated, expired concept, or worse, an illusion? Clara was well placed to know. There was no need to show yourself to be seen, followed, identified, listed, archived. Video surveillance, the traceability of communications, movements and payments, this multitude of digital footprints left everywhere had changed our relationship to intimacy, to image. What was the point of hiding when we are so visible, all these people seemed to say, and perhaps they were right?”
Through this novel, Delphine De Vigan explores the possible boundaries. The world of social networks tests our most archaic narcissistic urges, present in each one of us. It is therefore very hard to fight against them. Going back is impossible and probably not desirable. Perhaps it is by experimenting with going too far and exploring the unthinkable that it will be possible to set off again on a path that finds a fair place for our overexposure. In the meantime, let us educate the parents…
Sophie BRUNETEAUX is a clinical psychologist and EDA (Education Développement Apprentissage) practitioner
