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.
It’s probably more the awful sh-t they say about mum and her job and how people would target her own kids because of how famous she is that frightens celebs about social media…it would drive me insane.
I’m just glad i grew up when you had to go outside and create your own entertainment and fun and my parent’s weren’t expected to pay ridiculous money for devices. They didn’t have the money anyway.
I cannot stand her acting. She over-acts every film she is in, I can’t even watch.
Really? Even in Sense & Sensibility? Little Children? Eternal Sunshine of the Spotlessmind? Titanic? I can’t think of any performances where she overplays it.
Probably a white lie. She also claimed that she gave birth to her daughter in a bath tub….and then had to admit she didn’t. Love watching Kate;I think she’s lovely. But she’s neurotic as hell.
She’s also said she doesn’t have a nanny, then admitted she does. She also says she doesn’t diet or exercise, then clarifies it. For Kate, truth is more of a concept then a concrete thing. The only truth that exists is that she’s normal. She’s so, so normal. Just a normal mum. 😀
haha so true. I think it’s Matt Damon (persona no grata on celebitchy) that said something like famous people are emotionally stunted at the level of maturity they were at when they first became famous. I think it’s true here; Kate’s just kind of stuck in this people-pleasing insecurity mode that us plebs have the pleasure of growing out of by 40.
Or,
interviews simply freak her out and so she bullshits through them.
That’s so funny – I’d heard Matty D say that myself, but I’d always thought as extremely negative, like it meant you were a douchey Bieber-style brat, I hadn’t really made the link between your insecurities and self esteem, and public persona. That actually explains a heap of celebs!
That’s probably the way I’ll think of ol’ Kate now, cause although I think she can be unbearable, she’s actually never given a bad performance, and I do want to like her.
Well. I find it highly amusing when celebs ban their children from what’s helped make / made them famous. Or, she is terrified they will read about her. She’s an odd one anyway.
I don’t think social media made Kate Winslet famous though. She’s not a Kardashian.
I think her stance about social media makes sense though, whether you’re famous or not — the kids should be doing their homework and, uh, resting their eyes. I think using social media makes sense for networking purposes, but I do also think it wastes a lot of time too. And a lot of it is kind of boring once you’ve been exposed to it over long periods of time. I also don’t see the point of anyone, famous or not, young or not, getting into Twitter wars — another waste of time!
Kate was a big star before people knew what social media is.
Eating disorders, bullying, low self-esteem all existed prior to social media.
Too right! When I was a teen everyone was worried that magazines and supermodels would give us all eating disorders
So we are going to pretend that advertising where actresses appear selling cosmetics and perfumes has no impact on this, right? There are no impossible standards being perpetuated in fashion/beauty magazines, right? So it’s all on social media…. The hypocrisy or ignorance on this truly surprise me.
She didn’t say it’s all on social media though. She just gave an example of why social media doesn’t appeal to her in response to a question surrounding digital media because of the Steve Jobs movie. I don’t think she ever said that this problem is exclusively in the domain of social media.
In the past, she’s mentioned when a magazine has air-brushed her to look thinner (maybe it was on Letterman?) so I don’t think she’d disagree with the influence other kinds of media coverage has on people.
I think her stance about social media makes sense given her kids’s ages. I think monitoring your kids social media usage is no different than when parents monitored how much tv their kids watched (remember when that was a thing?). It just seems like the discussion has shifted from tv to other technologies.
I think it’s a good idea if she’s keeping her kids off of social media. I know people my age (28) that spend 1/2 of every event they go to taking the perfect pics and filtering them or whatever. They miss enjoying life so that everyone else THINKS that they’re enjoying life. Add teenagers with even bigger self esteem issues and I think it’s a recipe for body image issues and chasing non existent perfection. So good on Kate, in my opinion!
I’m glad we were relatively low-tech when I was a kid. TV with three fuzzy b&w channels was enough of a distraction. (I was so addicted that I gave up TV for Lent one year, and couldn’t go cold turkey but would listen outside the room for a while before I kicked it…) There are only 24 hours in a day, and you have to toss some activities to make room for another one. Don’t know how well I would have done with all the cable channels, web sites, e-mail, video games today. Even as an adult, it can get pretty overwhelming. I don’t do certain things like Facebook and Twitter because of that, communication overload. I don’t even like talking on a phone (I was a very unsatisfactory teenager). There are many good things that come along with all the electronic connections, of course, but I’m not so sure I would want to have missed the stuff I did without them.
Yeah, in today’s tech-y era, I think parents need to be strict with the boundaries — otherwise I have no idea how kids today would get their homework done. I feel like my own time management skills have gone off the rails with so much technology around.
In 1976 I thought I *invented* bulimia. Eat all you want, take laxatives and/or throw up and stay skinny. There was no social media. I just wanted to be one of the skinny girls cuz I thought nobody could love a fat girl. To blame social media for my insecurities isn’t fair. It may be harder for girls these days….God knows I wouldn’t want to have to navigate these social media waters. However, we all had issues long before Apple created the first computer with a dot matrix printer.
Hmmm…seems a bit overkill to me. The image of women she talks about is on T.V., in magazines, on posters, music videos, everywhere and always has been. Eliminating social media doesn’t eliminate the threat those images have on young women. Also, I’m pretty sure that her daughter is not climbing trees because she can’t use a smart phone. I’m trying not to be judgy but when Kate says that women design themselves for people to like them, hasn’t she done that very thing – we know she’s had work done and continues to have work done and if that isn’t designing yourself, I don’t know what is. Her overboard take on social media is confusing to me. Either your kids have healthy self-esteem or they don’t. I don’t see how barring social media is an answer.
Her kid is the daughter of a famous person though. I could see weird people out there being cruel enough to call her daughter ugly or whatever else (I don’t know what she looks like) just for the heck of it. For that reason, I think not allowing her kid on social media makes sense. Conversely, she probably wouldn’t want her kid getting false praise just for being the kid of a famous person.
Because her kids are still young, I guess her opinion about banning social media doesn’t strike me as really odd. Sounds no different to me than some parents not allowing their kids to watch tv when they were growing up. I remember finding it a little funny when Madonna said she wouldn’t let her kids watch tv (or something to that effect) given the mediums that Madonna works in, but her daughter seems to have turned out well in comparison to other celebrity kids so whatever she decided to do seems to have made sense.
I’m a fan, but lately she comes off as preachy. She doesn’t just say what she does, she imparts her wisdom and makes pronouncements about what everyone should do.
She does realize that she is not keeping her children (especially the 15 yr old) totally away from social media, right? Their friends are probably on it and share it (you can have a FB account at 13) and there are computers in school and there are all kinds of ways of getting around the blocks on certain sites. The school I taught at banned all sites that had anything to do with nudity, etc and all they had to do was google “Pam Anderson” and it was right out there for them. Just saying. I would introduce it a little at a time and control how much they are on it. I too am glad all we had was black and white tv and 4 channels that all turned off at midnight.
Yes, that’s what I was going to say. If Mia is 15 she is on Instagram one way or another. I think Kate should let her do what “normal” kids her age do and monitor it occasionally, which is what I do.
Most kids I know get out and do things/live life and also use social media, it’s not an all or nothing proposition. I think only a few get really sucked in. Like everything, it’s about balance and moderation. Banning her will only lead to resentment and rebellion and isn’t going to solve the “eating disorder” problems Kate worries about.
Seconded, Esmom.
You can’t enforce a ban without being some kind of weirdo, uber-controlling parent, even if you’d like to – which I don’t.
Of course, you don’t want them to spend too much time on social media, any more than you want them to spend too much time gaming or watching TV. But that’s your job as a parent, isn’t it? To monitor time spent and if it’s getting too much, to provide an alternative that will attract them. That can be a tough ask but if you aren’t finding parenting a tricky business, you should probably worry more about yourself than them!
#1 reason not to allow your children on social media: Kylie Jenner. If you follow her on Instagram, you will see that every single person that comments try to completely emmulate her with their vapid selfies. I don’t want daughter to idolize that crap. It goes against every value I’ve instilled in her.
kylie jenner is a human litmus test.
if you like her, you are one of the wastes.
if you don’t like her, the humanity has hope.
She THINKS her daughter doesn’t have social media.
^ lol this.
I promise you, Momma Winslet, that you will never have control over what your kids do online. It’s cute of her to think she has that power/authority, though. Very 90s, that digital optimism!
If she thinks her kids won’t google her, she’s crazy. They can go to the local Starbucks wifi and do it if they wanted to.
Ha! This reminds me of the early 2000s when my mom was hell-bent on keeping me off of AOL Instant Messenger and chat rooms and all that. Sorry, Mom, I did it anyway! And it didn’t corrupt my youth. I think if you give your kids limited access to technology and social media while actively having a dialogue about how it can become destructive, then you shouldn’t have too much to worry about. It’s part of the world now, there’s no use trying to shut it out completely.
It is very odd and a little bothersome to me that people are laughing about her kids disrespecting their mom and rules because that is what kids do. Yes kids push limits and yes breaking rules can be expected but sometimes there are rules in place for a reason and if you explain why if your kids were taught respect they will not break them. My daughter due to bad circumstances with her bio dad was not allowed any social media until she was 18. After she turned 18 and we started het a facebook account him and his family tried contacting her and causing drama. She decided to block them all. She was so glad she never went behind my back to do a facebook before she was 18 because it just made it to.easy for them to find her. My daughter respected my boundaries and she doesn’t feel like her teen years are less because she didn’t have social media.
I can fully understand her wanting to limit her kids on social media, and spend less time on devices in general – I think both are a good idea, especially for the child of a famous person. Beyond that, print media and the fashion world are much larger contributors to eating disorders and body image problems, IMO, especially when the magazine alter even the very thin and beautiful. I’m sure social media can contribute to that, but the root of the problem is much deeper.
She probably doesn’t like the the threat of cyber-bullying on social media. Selena Gomez complained about it, and most people agreed with her. In light of that, I don’t think Kate Winslet’s opinion on social media is that strange.
lol…..if she thinks “banning” them will get them off social media completely, oh honey, no…
They’ll just find a stealther way. Her kids know more about online life than she does, I guarantee it.
We limit the kids’ online/social media time. My daughter is on facebook, my son is not (he’s not interested, he is on Instagram, though.) They are allowed an hour of social media per day (that I am aware of, they could sneak more, but I don’t really think that they do) and I have to be on their friend list. When we are in the Bahamas, I don’t even think they are online for more than a few minutes except for their schooling. They just have too many other things to do. Outright “banning” social media isn’t the answer, it just makes it forbidden fruit and that’s always the tastiest fruit there is.
Women who worked at Apple in the early days dig Winslet’s performance. http://recode.net/2015/11/02/women-from-apples-early-days-recall-life-with-steve-jobs/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social
Kate in every interview is proud to share her negative feelings and thoughts towards naturally thin and slender women. She doesn’t want her daughter who has the same body type to have the same issue but her mission will fail.
I agree with her. Social media is an awful thing for little kids who haven’t learned basic socialisation skills yet and don’t know how to deal with the world being right in your face. I don’t know about banning, but definitely heavy monitoring and restriction.