a) Many places are still going in/out of lockdown or are schooling remotely and so their phone is the only way for them to communicate with their friends. Depriving them of social contact is incredibly unhealthy and harms their development.
b) For better or worse apps like Tiktok are a huge part of their culture and the popular dances etc are often known by everyone. Being the only child who is out of the loop can cause serious isolation.
Children are growing and making them not feel like they are part of a social group is incredibly harmful and can have permanent effects in adulthood. Giving them a phone but monitoring their activities is likely to be the least harmful approach.
I still don't understand how there are people on HN who think that giving their kids less access to technology is somehow a virtuous position to take. When I was the same age as my kids I could have gotten into all sorts of shit on a BBS or Compuserve forum -- my parents had no idea what was going on, but they'd given me a basic sense of right and wrong, and somebody to talk to if I was concerned. You've got to educate them about the world, but cutting them off from it is not the way to do that.
You've never considered that maybe growing up apart from the groupthink would be helpful to a child? Did you ever wonder why Jobs and all of the other tech ceos don't let their kids have these consumption devices? They're in charge of of this stuff yet they keep their progeny from utilizing it. But you actually want to give it to them as if there were nothing wrong with it because it's socially acceptable?
Your line of thinking is ridiculous but please continue.
there is a really easy solution to this problem