Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem have always kept their children’s lives private and say they will continue to do so.
The actress who shares son Leo, 10, and daughter Lena, 8, with Bardem, opened up about why their kids will not appear on social media.
“I have a strange relationship with social media where I use very little of it in a very careful way,” Cruz told “CBS Sunday Morning” about her Instagram account with 5.8 million followers. “There is something that is not making sense, and it is especially affecting younger generations.”
“I feel really bad for the ones that are teenagers now. It’s almost like if the world was doing some kind of experiment on them. ‘Oh, let’s see what happens if you expose a 12-year-old to that much technology,'” Cruz told correspondent Holly Williams.
“The lack of protection that it is for a 12-year-old to be involved in social media, any form of social media, there’s no protection for them, for their brains that are still developing, and how that affects the way they see themselves, everything, like, related to bullying. So many things that are not the childhood that we had,” she continued to explain.
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The 47-year-old mother revealed that her kids are not permitted to use social media. “I’m very tough with technology, for example, with my kids… It’s like, yeah, we’re going to watch movies sometimes or some cartoons. How can I not let them watch movies?” she said.
“That has been, like, some incredible moments of happiness since I was a little girl. But not phones until they are much older and no social media until at least 16. I really see that that is, like, protecting mental health, but I seem to be part of a minority. I don’t know,” Cruz added.
In the interview, the “Pirates Of The Caribbean” star also discussed her career, life in Spain and acting with her husband Bardem, 52.
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“Naturally, like, we don’t look for projects to do constantly,” Cruz said. “And in a way, it would be more comfortable and easier for schedules but, no, I think it’s a way to also protect, you know, the relationship, not to be working all the time together.”
But the actress shared that she and Bardem agreed on working together “once in a while,” like “once every four or five years is okay.”
