Joe Hildebrand comment: Five exciting things kids can do to fill the social media void

The social media ban is about to arrive, which is akin to the end of the world for most kids. Luckily, Uncle Joe has some heart-starting and spine-tingling range of exciting activities for you to try.

Hey kids, it’s time to read a big rectangle with words in it. Picture: ISTOCK

Good news kids! The social media ban is about to arrive — which obviously, like not getting McDonald’s, is the end of the world.

But do not fear my beloved youth demographic! Your cool Uncle Joe is here with a plethora of ways to pass the time and still be the hippest little dudes and dudettes on the block.

Yes, that’s right I’m speaking your language — or “lingo” as you guys call it. And yes, I also know that calling people “guys” is a gender hate crime.

So let me introduce you to a heart-starting and spine-tingling range of exciting activities that can fill the imaginational void of your long-lost electric dreams…

Don’t be so sad, there’s plenty of exciting things you can do away from the screen.

1. Read a book

A “book” is big rectangle with lots of words in it which my generation once used for entertainment when the midday movie was on television. It can take you into magical fantasy lands like Narnia or Middle Earth or crime-free Melbourne.

Another fun activity is to pause whenever you come across a word you don’t know — such as “plethora” — and look it up in a dictionary, which is another rectangle with words describing other words. Scientologists have discovered that this is a surefire method of 100 per cent eliminating a child’s love of reading.

2. Have a conversation

There is nothing funner and cooler than saying something to someone and then listening to what they say back. This is what grown-ups call a “conversation”.

Some adults are so good at this that other adults stop having their own conversations just so they can listen to more interesting ones. We call these people “podcasters”.

Other adults prefer to just talk to people without listening to whatever they say back. We call these people “wives”.

However the best conversations you can have are those with your parents, which is always an enriching experience. For example just last week I had the following exchange with my 12-year-old son:

ME: So is Kevin nervous about starting high school next year?

SON: I don’t know. Why don’t you f***ing ask Kevin?

We both learned a lot about each other that day.

3. Go outside

You could even... go outside.

“Outside” is a place that kids used to go to before mobile phones were invented. It has things like trees and playgrounds and, if you’re lucky enough to live in Melbourne, violent crime.

There are lots of things you can do outside, such as kick a ball to someone and wait for them to kick it back. This used to entertain previous generations of children for days on end.

However nowadays there are important rules for going outside, including always wearing a SunSmart burka, not climbing any of the trees you see and never going further than five metres from your water bottle.

4. Play with your friends

Of course most kids already know how to do this but in the olden days friends weren’t just Fortnite users dressed as Santa Snoop Dogg but actual real-life people who existed in what we called the “real world”.

You could touch them, chase them, wrestle with them and, most fun of all, dack them. And then, when someone inevitably got upset, you could fix the problem with what experts call “emotional intelligence” and “conflict resolution”. Or you could just dack them again.

5. Get a job

Why not get a job?

Back in the good old days before social media kids were put to productive use, like doing household chores, helping out on the family farm or working in one of Australia’s many world-class coal mines.

Now that the ban is in place we can return to this halcyon age where children earn their keep — although family life has changed and parents might need to think outside the box.

For example my own father came up with an ingenious incentive scheme in which he paid me five cents for every fly I swatted in the Queensland room.

Of course I had to show him the body of each Diptera I dispatched as proof of death but that is simply the sort of quality control you would expect in any modern workplace — and it did wonders for building up my natural immunity.

And there you have it my young funsters: Just five of countless ways to entertain yourselves in ways that TikTok and Twitter and Facetime could never dream of.

So if you think life is tough now, just imagine what it was like growing up in the 80s.

And I haven’t even got to rollerblading.