BRIGHT STUDENTS BRACES : MASTER [2] ESSAY

 

"IN SEINE - PORT, a town outside Paris, France, they're trying to ban smartphones,'' Student Lane said.  '' I want to see if it's working.''

THE LUDDITES CLUB : TWO years later, people still want to know : Did they stay on the Luddite path? Or were they dragged back into the technological abyss?

I put those questions to three of the original members. ' Student Watling, James Butler and Logan Lane,  the club's founders - when they took some time from their winter school breaks to gather at an old hangout. Central library in Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn.

They said they still had disdain for social media and the way it ensnares young students, pushing them to create picture-perfect online identities that have little to do with their authentic selves.

They said they still relied on flip phones and laptops, rather than smartphones, as their main concessions for an increasingly digital world. And they reported that their movement was growing, with offshoots at high schools and colleges in Seattle, West Palm Beach, Fla.; Richmond Va.; South Bend ,Ind.; and Washington.

The Luddite Club is better organized these days, they said, with an uncluttered website to help spread the word.

Student Lane,19, is in the last stages of registering it as a nonprofit organization.

'' We've even got a mission statement now, '' said Ms. Lane, who is studying Russian literature at Oberlin College in Ohio. '' We like to say we're a team of former screenagers connecting young people to the communities and knowledge to conquer big tech's addictive ideas.''

The club also publishes a newsletter, available in print, called The Luddite Dispatch.

An article in the first issue, headlined '' Recent Luddite Wins,'' highlighted a recommendation by the  United States surgeon general, Vivek Murthy that social media platforms should carry warning labels to inform users that they are '' associated with significant mental health harms with adolescents.''       

'' For our next issue, I'm planning to travel to France to this town outside Paris, Sine-Port, that's trying to ban smartphones,  Ms. Lane said. '' I want to see if it's working.''

''  ESTEEMED STUDENT LANE had started a branch of the '' Luddite Club '' at Oberlin, student Watling, 19, reported that she was having some difficulty getting hers off the ground at Temple in Philadelphia, where she is majoring in Sociology.

'' SOMETIMES I think I sound a little crazy to Philly people,'' she said. " Because I'm always like, ' I'm alive. You're alive. It's beautiful. That's why we shouldn't be consuming life through technology.''

Unlike her fellow students, who do their banking on their smartphones, Student Watling uses A.T.M. a baby boomer might. She said her biggest challenge was navigating dating and nightlife.

'' Raves are big in Philly, and it's a big part of the student life in Temple,'' she said. '' You can end up in the middle of nowhere in some abandoned building for the rave everyone's going to. 

I don't know I'll get home safely.''

This Master Global Students, and Mankind's Essay and Future, continues to Part [3]. The World Students Society thanks Alex Vadukul.