- Would you allow an active pedophile talk regularly and alone with your child?
- Would you allow a gang member who kidnaps children and women to sell them into the sex trade in your home?
- Would you watch your child wander off with a convicted murderer and simply laugh, “Kids these days”?
- Would you watch your kids throw knives at each other and dismissively walk away saying, “I’ve never been good with knives, my kids just pick them up so naturally? What can I do?”
I doubt any of you would so lightly treat any of the above situations.
In the first instance, you would never allow your child anywhere near a pedophile, and certainly not alone.
You would protect your family from slave traders until your last breath sooner than let them in your home.
You would snatch your child away from a murderer and take them to safety.
Children need to learn how to safely use knives to cook, so you would train them how to use them responsibly and safely.
Yet when it comes to technology all to often the ridiculous scenarios I described above play out.
Since my children were born I knew a day would come when I would need to educate them about technology. But I don’t think anyone anticipated the dangers of social media, online gaming, and game consoles.
As more and more stories appear on the news about those dangers, it has been on my mind to post something.
My goal with this post is to primarily wake you up to the dangers if you’re not already aware of them, and to encourage you to take action. This article is not as planned and thought out as I would like, but I felt I needed to add my voice to the chorus of others who are raising the alarm. In the future I’ll post more and provide some more details about helpful resources.
It is true that we need to protect our children from themselves. We need to warn them about seeking out destructive things on the internet.
And while you may say that your child knows better, you’ve raised them right, you trust them. Great!
But what about others they meet online? Do you trust them?
Without a doubt, there are predators in the world that want to harm your children. There are predators using the internet to find, deceive, take away, and then do unspeakable things to your children.
In recent months I’ve heard of children being groomed and then kidnapped and abused through being contact on all social media platforms, Snapchat, Instagram, Youtube, X-Boxes and other game consoles, and online games such as Fortnite.
Parents report letting their children watch something as innocent as Peppa Pig on Youtube only to find that every few minutes a clip of a man teaching how to commit suicide interrupts the program.
There are stories of young people being groomed, drawn into a world of evil and then those same children being used to lure other children into the same cycle of destruction.
So, it is not just adults contacting your children you need to be suspicious of, but what about the other young people they are in contact with?
There are predators online just as there are in your community and it is your responsibility to protect them from predators near and far.
All of the scenarios I opened this blog post with are happening with social media and online gaming. The very same parents who would not allow these things in “real life” are allowing them to occur to their children online.
(In this post, I will not touch on the addictive nature of social media, which has been compared to the effect of drugs. But that is another area where you must educate yourself.)
I’m going to make a strong and potentially hurtful statement, but stay with me, and understand it comes from a desire to help you and your family. I’m going to highlight it for emphasis:
If you are not monitoring your children’s use of technology or staying one step ahead of your children in the world of technology, social media, and online gaming then you are neglecting your responsibility as a parent and offering them up to predators online on a silver platter.
So, what can you do?
- Use filters in your home and across all your family’s internet-connected devices – laptops, Desktop computers, Mac or PC, mobile/cell phones, game consoles, Android or iPhone tablets, and more. Do your homework and find resources like Net-Nanny, Disney’s Circle, and built-in family filters that Windows, Mac, and Android offer.
- Consider if your children really need data on their phones. If they have them for safety, wouldn’t a regular phone call or text message work just as well?
- Educate your children about the dangers. Teach them how to react when a stranger contacts them or invites them to meet them alone.
- Let your children find in you all the affirmations and love they need. Don’t allow a situation where they find compliments and the lust of a stranger be a substitute for the comfort and confidence they should get from you.
You cannot afford to turn a blind eye. You cannot use the excuse that technology is hard to learn and your kids seem to find it so easy. You cannot be too busy or too lazy to protect your children.
Evil always seeks out the innocent. You must be the barrier between the wickedness of the world and the innocence of your children.
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