Yes, smart phones are indeed weapons of mass destruction. They are making people lazy and stupid, and they are causing human interpersonal communication skills to deteriorate. I've seen what they do to people. They've become smart phone zombies.

I refuse to get a smartphone. As long as my old flip phone works (and they are still available) I won't get one. First, because it is beyond stupid to pay $200, $300, $500, $800....$1,000(!!!) for a freaking phone. If you have trouble putting food on your table, but you and your whole family have smartphones....you are an idiot and you deserve to be hungry. Two, I don't NEED a smartphone. NO ONE does. Three, I'm free from all the government tracking and spying without one. Four, there is nothing on a smartphone (that I'd actually want/use) that I can't access from my laptop (which costs less than a smartphone by the way) when I get home. Need to get in touch with me? Call/text. My phone does those just fine. Five, sturdiness. I have dropped my flip phone soooo many times from my car seat I've lost count. It still works and my screen isn't broken. Six, I can text with one hand and without looking. While I try to refrain from texting and driving as much as possible, if I need to do it I can without my eyes leaving the road. Seven, I don't have to worry about updates to operating systems and updates/upgrades. Eight, security. If I lose my phone there is no data or information that I have to be concerned about. Lastly, I don't look like all the other idiots walking around with their face buried into a screen everywhere they go.

If you were a smartphone belonging to Hillary or her posse, hammers are weapons of mass destruction. ;)

The irony for me of this Stream article is that reducing internet use of my phone would mean less reading of The Stream since that's one of my major mobile browsing destinations

A smartphone should be used as a device that improves your life and it means how and what you use it determines the benefits you reap from it.

However, I have observed many people using the phone purely for entertainment and social and nothing else.
This is a huge problem because when they spend a huge chunk of their time purely on entertaining themselves, they are slowing devoid of reality. They don't use the phone to gain knowledge or wisdom.
I see kids having extremely poor general knowledge of simple current affairs but know what is latest fad, fashion, gossips and the cool places to go.

We visited a church recently where the pastor asked us to email our sermon questions... while he was preaching.

This is a symptom, not the disease.
Teen? Well Mom doesn't do discipline well, and Dad only gets them on alternate weekends when he isn't in Jail for some glitch on child support payments.
Meanwhile they've been indoctrinated in the public schools via Common Core and Planned Parenthood to be rutting animals (If I had one wish, I'd destroy the public school system, not smartphones).
And it's not like the phone is any different, there has been an electronic screen as babysitter because Mommy has her high-pressure career and in order to get promoted has to have the report done by tomorrow, so will worry about quality time later, and there is no quantity time.
Smartphones are only toxic because we've created a toxic culture that is just as destructive with or without smartphones. They may even be a way to deal with the ugly reality of their real lives.