We all remember that one childhood craze. For some that included skipping ropes and bucket races, Pokemon, or the classic "red light, green light". In my own generation, break and lunchtime were once synonymous with elaborate loom band creations and enthusiastically run "slime shops" (don't ask). 

The thing about games, however, is that there's a very thin line between entertainment and what society deems as beneath it. When we dismiss things as being “for children”, we sometimes run the risk of being blinded by our own assumptions, falling victim to our own bad press.

Sometimes, what we call a game is anything but. 

Case in point (and our titular craze) fidget spinners. Tiny contraptions you could spin around your fingers for hours and hours, some papers dubbed them a teacher trap - within a week of them whirring around the classroom, they were banned definitively by several schools in the area. The creator of them, Catherine Hettinger, intended a completely different response. 

Fidget spinners, as she says in this 2017 Guardian report, emerged from the origins of  “one horrible summer” when she was suffering from myasthenia gravis, an autoimmune disorder that causes muscle weakness, and was also caring for her daughter Sara. The project aided her with attention span and coming to terms with her illness. She also references how the devices' intent - helping fidgety kids - could aid children with attention deficit disorder, autism, and other conditions.  “I know a special needs teacher who used it with autistic kids, and it really helped to calm them down,” she says. 

So why were they banned? Because, as Hettinger alludes, it was a trend. I'm inclined to agree. fidget spinners are noninvasive under the table; the only noise they emit is a whirring sound in the air. They're small, compatible - easier for sheer kids with attention or focus issues to use. That's a growing trend when discussing mental or emotional challenges to our health; implements to cope are often stigmatized and alienated by bodies of authority often unwelcoming to such a change. Fidget spinners to this day, are still most prominently marked as toys, rather than genuine aids. 

You might think (and here's the trap) so what? It's just a game. But no. Children with ADHD generally fall behind their peers in education, as research shows; the classroom setting as a whole, in general, an environment that bars movement, filled with distractions and stimuli, is alienating for them. By barring simple means of aid for kids with ADHD or other disorders, or even just fidgety, their education can severely be impacted. So can their quality of life. It's anything but a game. 

So if you see a kid squeezing a stress ball, spinning, or messing with a cube - let them. It can't hurt more than stopping them will.