Why a classic TV show needs to make a comeback for the smartphone generation – Scott Reid

If you’re of a certain vintage, then the initials Wdyjsoytsagadslbi might jog a memory or two.

"Why don't you just switch off your television set and go and do something less boring instead?" – later truncated to the somewhat more manageable Why Don't You? – ran from 1973 for more than two decades and consisted of “gangs” of kids responding to letters from other kids suggesting things to make, games, days out and the like.

The programme started life in BBC Bristol, but in later years was made by teams in different parts of the country, including Belfast.

Why Don’t You...? ran until 1995 and several of the children who appeared went on to have more substantial careers in broadcasting – such as DJ Gideon Coe and Ant McPartlin.

Smartphone use among children is a mental health concern, warns Scott Reid. Picture: Getty Images

Besides a rather annoying theme tune, the show’s precocious young presenters would likely now have half the audience lunging for the off button anyway. Of course, the irony of a television show urging its viewers to switch off their TV sets was lost on the average 11-year-old.

Some three decades on from its demise, 2023 would seem the perfect time to resurrect the series’ concept – pitching it at the small-screen, social-media obsessed teenyboppers who appear to have been born with a smartphone glued to the palm of their hand.

Why don’t you just switch off your mobile phone and go and do something less boring instead? Easy title change, but a greater messaging challenge perhaps.

In a few short years the iPhone and its Android equivalent have gone from luxury to ubiquity. Peer pressure and pestering has forced the majority of parents to splash out hundreds of pounds on the latest device or commit to pricey monthly contacts.

We shouldn't downplay the benefits of having a world of information and (potential) facts at your fingertips, and any place. Googling has replaced the bus ride to some drafty old library, while having instant contact with your nearest and dearest is clearly beneficial.

However, the obsession with the mobile device is spiralling out of control, with potentially serious consequences for children's mental health, wellbeing and development. No wonder some schools are opting to ban mobiles in the classroom.