To feel scared about having kids, especially boys, after watching Adolescence on Netflix?

Eh? It literally is fiction. It’s a fictional Netflix drama. Facts.

Obviously one should be vigilant about radicalisation through vile people like Tate, but it's not inevitable or unstoppable.

'Adolescence' is an extraordinarily worst-case scenario. My kids have got to 13 and 16 without experiencing terrible bullying, or self esteem problems from social media or in school, and they are both neurodivergent and one is non binary so we're talking about kids who have a higher than average chance of being targets but nothing terrible has happened

HansHolbein

Well, your first red flag would be allowing your 13 year old child to be out at 2230.

watched the first two episodes with 15 and 17 year olds and the first thing they were talking about was ‘how the hell are there 13yo out on their own at night?!’ They went on and on about it!

@atmywitsend1989, do you feel that you have access to any support with your ds, e.g. to help challenge his views? Where a child is showing signs of having been groomed into this shit, what can we as a society do to help them get out of it, and what support do you need as his parent?

It’s not demonising teen boys, it’s recognising what impact various influences can have on them and where these influences can come from.

Because your child doesn’t go out late on a school night doesn’t mean they are safe from influence.

Children are being bombarded with stuff nowadays so much more than we were. Young kids seeing porn. Years ago an 11yo might have caught a sneaky peek of their older brother’s playboy magazine. Now they can see all sorts, and think what they are watching is normal.

Years ago how many children shared photos of themselves nude with another child, how many other people would have ended up seeing that photo.

The list goes on

They absolutely did actually. It wasn't about up skirting the school didn't introduce the policy for that reason, they would've absolutely said that if that was the case they introduced it for notions of decency. The parents were outraged by the sexist attitude of the school, victim blaming so they abandoned the policy, they also abandoned laddered tights policy and girls can wear than now.

This is in no way representative of boys - a vast majority are absolutely normal.

I'm very much afraid this attitude is wishful thinking. It absolutely is not a small minority with the damaging and toxic attitudes. It may be a minority but it's in no way small. And it's growing.

We cannot afford to be in denial about this issue.

I mean, I can honestly say DS and friends (late teens)are disgusted by these attitudes. My DS has a playstation but plays FiFA online, not violent games. He doesn't got to clubs, sometimes plays five aside football, he is on track for As at A level, one of his A levels is Politics, he listens to The rest is Politics, The rest is History, he's on his phone probably too much but is watching Politics Joe and listens to Any Questions on Radio 4 on his phone. He probably has more understanding of these issues (societal and political issues) than most of the adult British population. I think we should be wary of hyperbole and oversimplification of the arguments, it isn't just about having a play station in your bedroom or even a phone, what is happening in your formative years, what is the moral make up of your parents, what is your life like as a young child. I was in a coffee shop at the weekend and watched how a toddler ran out of a loo with his Dad, his Dad was straight back on his phone, the toddler constantly tapping him as his trousers were at his ankles and hadn't been pulled up, he was so fixated on the phone that he didn't even notice his child it was incredibly sad to see!

Sexism is rife. It always has been. Look at how many men criticise everything women do. They hate it when a woman is the lead in a film or tv show. They hate female comedians. They hate female mps. They hate women who wear tight or ‘revealing’ clothes yet they hate women who wear headscarves. They hate women drivers. They hate women for taking up space.
They hold women to different standards.

@Goldenbear did the boys then ask the school what they were doing about upskirting? Did they surround the boys that were doing that to stop them?

It’s great that they were calling out the school on focussing on the girls (although I don’t have a problem with having a uniform policy on length of skirts in the same way you can say no to skinny jeans instead of school trouser) but now we need boys to call out boys’ behaviour.

This is in no way representative of boys - a vast majority are absolutely normal.

There are also toxic teen girls- but they are more psychological in the way they behave compared to physicality of males.

I agree that the toxic shit of incels and misogynists needs to be addressed but we should not be demonising teen boys.

How many times do we see threads on here where posters say ‘it’s just banter’, ‘it’s what boys/young men do’, ‘they all watch porn’. Is that raising boys to have good values?

For the people saying it's fiction, of course it is, but the reason it has made such an impact is because it resonates so strongly with real life. Andrew tate, thr incel movement, the crossbow killer, the boy who shot girls on campus for not sleeping with him... On and on. Its clearly struck a nerve and opened up a conversation, that's a good thing. If it didn't feel horribly relevant we wouldn't be taking about it.

Also for those saying, weird youre worrying about boys when its the girl that gets killed, girls have it harder etc. I do feel the whataboutism derailment makes discussion difficult.

The truth is young girls and women are baring the brunt of toxic masculinity, they are losing their rights and their lives. But they aren't doing it to themselves. By pivoting the conversation to them we are taking about the symptoms not the cause. It reminds me of growing up and being taught how to not get raped, like it was a me issue. Truth is while i can limit risk I can't not get raped anymore than I can not get robbed, not be the victim of someone elses sexism or not get hit by a car. We need to look at the people causing these issues. In this case young men.

Boys and young men are more conservative than theyve ever been https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2024/aug/07/gen-z-voters-political-ideology-gender-gap

Young men feel its harder to be a man than a woman and support returns to traditional gender roles https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/masculinity-and-womens-equality-study-finds-emerging-gender-divide-in-young-peoples-attitudes

We only have to glance at the relationship board to see the effects of these beliefs and trends play out as boys become husbands and fathers. If we want to stop it there is an onus on all parents of boys/ young men to step in and challenge these beliefs.

Hardly. I'd have to live under a rock to not be aware of the extent of male on male violence. I was making a specific point in response to OP referencing a drama where someone's son became a killer and someone's daughter was murdered, so please don't patronise me.

Well that's what the argument was, the school were focusing on the girl's skirt length making it their fault, many parents objected to this belief and the teenage boys felt the same to the the point of gathering around girls to hide them from teachers that wanted to measure skirts and dish out behaviour points.

You bring your kids up to have good values and aspirations and treat them well and expect them to treat others the same and you won't go far wrong.

Maybe this will work for your kids but it wouldn't work for most. You're probably in for a rude shock when your kids reach teenage years 🤷🏼‍♀️

@madamweb I’m not saying avoid clubs, but I think many parents are naive to where influence can come from. If a third of the town’s DC go to that club that is a lot of kids having contact with sexist attitudes, and from coaches and team mates they look up to.

Bit dramatic. You’ve been caught up in the hype mate

It comes down to parenting and setting rules. It is hard work.

Unpopular parenting style but I dont care:

Unless they can afford a roof over their head my house my rules.
No TV in the house, no smart phones until they can afford to buy one themselves with their own money from a job.
Friends are vetted and parents are too.

Homeschooling.

You have been affected by propaganda designed to do just that.

It's not vastly different from parenting girls. The lens of conversations might alter and we have a much bigger focus on the bits that society put pressure on for men/boys. Role models can be lacking but role models can be women too. A great person is a great person. A penis of vagina has very little to do with that.
The main bulk of it is conversations that start early. Empathy building. Regulation skills. Coping with dissapointment. Naming emotions and understanding them.Tackling entitlement. Porn and sex/bodies/social media we start talking about very early. I expect them to do their share of contributing to household running cooking cleaning etc. We talk lots about day to day interactions with society or school. So we are bringing up any boys will be boys type attitudes we encounter.

Our dinner table talk can absolutely be hey mum/dad I heard someone say blowjob today what's that. We chat about periods about pregnancy nothing is off limits. It's no different to how I would raise girls. Just the lens in which they relate to but we absolutely discuss the lens from a womans/girls point of view too.

I said to dh why was he allowed out until 10.30pm, that was never addressed. Far too late for a child to be out.
It was definitely thought provoking that’s for sure.

And the big issue will be that the parents who allow that to happen won’t probably watch it…. However even if a few do that’s a good thing. My dc has friends at school y8 who have similar “freedoms” or when his phone come out of it’s overnight shut down messages from friends ping in allowed there phones overnight sent at midnight, as a family we are watching the c4 USA/uk school swap and the girl in last week’s episode who was addicted to her phone was on it in the early hours. Others have also said the “class” issue of Adolescence is also something to be considered 😥