Around here, we’re all starting to wonder whether TV will continue to be relevant to our kids who are growing up in the age of online media. In fact, next to playing Minecraft, my tweens’ favorite way to spend their screen time is watching videos of their favorite artists on YouTube. But if you’ve ever looked at the comments, even on the most benign, age-appropriate YouTube videos, you understand why it makes parents crazy.
If you listen to this sh*t, you are dumb, gay, and retarted.
Nice.
Related: Raising kids to be good digital citizens: The only 4 things you need to tell them.
So if you’ve ever wondered how to hide YouTube comments, you can! In fact, I’m thrilled to find this Chrome extension that hides YouTube comments entirely if you’re watching via desktop or a Chrome browser.
Just download it, enable it, and boom — the comments magically disappear. The profane ones, the racist ones, the grossly misspelled ones — all of them.
If for some reason you do want to check out the comments on a video, just type chrome://extensions into your URL bar at any time, scroll down and uncheck the box next to this extension to toggle it off as long as you’d like.
Related: What parents need to know about YouTube’s new parental controls for tweens and teens
Considering the sort of intellectual discourse that takes place in YouTube comments–as in, none at all–let alone the frightening prospects for our nation’s literary skills, I’m calling this extension a big win. Not just for my kids, but for me too.
Download the Chrome extension Hide YouTube Comments on the Chrome web store. It’s free!
This post has been updated for 2021
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