My 11 year old son has an old android phone, to keep in touch with his friends and family.
He does not have access to any form of social media.
His friend list is limited to people he knows irl.
Activity on all devices is monitored (Google family link) and controlled (pi-hole, DNS blocking, ad blocking etc).
The internet is a cesspool and I agree we should limit children from free access to this - but telling kids to stick to pen and paper until they are 13 isn't the way to do it.
tmpz22•20m ago
Definitely agree. Kids are not prisoners and will react predictably if you try vainly to lock them down. Theyll find vpns, save money for their own phone, barrow a friends ipad, google the simplest way to jailbreak a cheap IoT device, or any of dozens of ways to subvert lockdown.
Or worse the kid wont be subvertive. Theyll be supplicative, submissive, and compliant.
Maybe just spend a few less hours in the office or on netflix and develop a trust filled relationship with your child, prempting the biggest threats with candid conversation about sex, drugs, risk analysis, and the fact that as a parent we broke all those rules too.
tomjuggler•29m ago
He does not have access to any form of social media.
His friend list is limited to people he knows irl.
Activity on all devices is monitored (Google family link) and controlled (pi-hole, DNS blocking, ad blocking etc).
The internet is a cesspool and I agree we should limit children from free access to this - but telling kids to stick to pen and paper until they are 13 isn't the way to do it.
tmpz22•20m ago
Or worse the kid wont be subvertive. Theyll be supplicative, submissive, and compliant.
Maybe just spend a few less hours in the office or on netflix and develop a trust filled relationship with your child, prempting the biggest threats with candid conversation about sex, drugs, risk analysis, and the fact that as a parent we broke all those rules too.