To think DS is gay and ‘friend’ is BF

He's very young. It is quite normal for good friends of any sex to really love each other.
Remind him of that if he is confused.
Let him be a child and leave it up to him to discover his own sexuality in his own good time.
Kids are inquisitive of so many things and while we might have been looking up words like poofter, coitus and sex in the dictionary at the school library at age 10 years ago, they will look up information on the internet.
Be prepared to answer any questions without prejudging his reason for learning things.

Say nothing, just make sure he is using the internet safely. He may well be gay he also might be starting to question his sexuality. The only thing that matters is that he is happy, healthy and well adjusted.

Oh my God I can't believe some people don't think children can know their sexuality at 10, I remember having a massive crush on Zak Morris from "saved by the bell" in 1990, loads of posters on the wall cut out from magazines, talking in the primary school playground with my friends about boy crushes, and I would have been 7 or 8 when that first came out.

I agree with the conversation about Internet safety and as others have said they might both be gay, but you can still be gay and still be just friends too. I had lots of friends who were boys growing up even though I was heterosexual as were they, and if the Internet was a thing I'd probably have used it to look up pics of kissing (snogging) with them too! 😅

I agree with the opportunity to talk about internet safety.

Because it’s ‘hilarious’

They're 10 years old. Absolutely they might be 'into boys', but they might also just be interested to know what goes on, so to speak. Your son's 10 and you really don't need to worry about this at all.

He’s a child 😭 it could very well be his friend told him what the word ‘gay’ meant so he was curious or they typed it as a joke. Whatever it is, you need to talk about the internet and tje dangers.

1. Whatever his curiosities he has proven himself far too young and vulnerable to use the internet unsupervised as is every 10 year old IMHO. If he was 17 I might give him some discretion but at 10 I don't think you can avoid the uncomfortable conversations. You need to tell him that it's healthy to be having these feelings whether they're about boys or girls but it's not ok to be looking for things like that online. Internet access will be fully supervised from now on. You love him and support him regardless and he can feel safe to discuss anything with you.

2. I think assigning pre-pubertal children a sexuality is a bit gross tbh. I think that we should be avoiding strong labels or identities of sexuality or gender in kids. If you can't explore and change your ideas about these things when you're growing up then when the hell can you?! If we become obsessed with labelling it then we create a generation of kids who feel that they have to fit a certain label and often they might then find it difficult to backtrack from this identity should they want to or they might feel emotional distress at having to meet the expectations of this label. Give them the freedom and safety to explore in a healthy and age-appropriate way, avoid any labels or discussions that sexualise a child (ew!) and what happens will happen.

Your absolute primary concern should be his internet use though. Surely you can see that it's this that is the safeguarding concern

yabvu to give your dc unsupervised internet access

Me too. I knew.

He might be gay but this doesn’t mean he fancies his friend. Gay boys and men have male friends they don’t find attractive. He’s allowed to be good friends with someone without it meaning anything.

There's a lot of horror here at 10 year olds having feelings of attraction, but I'm pretty sure there was a lot of first kisses and boyfriends/girlfriends talk when I was in year 6! It was all very chaste, but denying 10/11 year olds are getting curious about all this is a little naïve. Though I agree to check that what comes up in these searches (again, normal curiosity) is age appropriate.

OP, he might be gay, or straight, or not know yet. It's premature to label this other lad his boyfriend, but if they do both think they might be gay, how lovely that they have each other as friends.

I think the most important thing is that you present yourself in a low-key way as open and welcoming to gay and bisexual people and non-judgemental about their relationships in a matter of fact way. So not "aren't gay people amazing! let's all go to pride next weekend!" but just that there are all sorts of relationships between adults and as long as everyone is consenting and caring, it's all pretty much fine. My experience is that younger kids are themselves incredibly matter of fact about the fact that men marry men, and women marry women, and some people have two mums or two dads.

He's ten. He's exploring. Sexuality is fluid. Unless you think he's in physical danger, leave him alone to get on with it. This isn't something he wants to know mum knows about.

I knew I liked boys at 10, I had feelings of sexual arousal in yr 6/7 I actually think it's perfectly normal to start to know who you are attracted to at that age.

This is key. Do you have parental controls on your computer/Google etc?

Not that poster but all the people I was crushing on aged 10 wasn't because I wanted to fuck them.

Which is what sexuality is.

I wanted to marry Bobby Ball or Barry Gibb when I was 10. It was nothing to do with sex I can assure you 🤣

Hes 10. Just keep an eye on what hes goggling and anyone you dont know messaging him.
Other than that leave it alone

Leave it be. He'll talk to you when he's ready, for all you know it's just curiosity. Ten is too early to start labelling.

When did you know you were straight?

I wouldn't. Ds2 fancied ds1's male friend when ds2 was that age. He's 25 and definitely heterosexual now. Well afaik?
He might get embarrassed?
I've always had open chats with mine about sexuality and that it's ok to like either sex.

A 10 year old isn't thinking of sex.

So therefore it's not their sexuality.

👆👆👆

This.

Also are you sure the search history is from your son and not your DH as another reply mentioned?

He's ten.

Stop thinking about a ten year old's sexuality!

Wait and see, OP. He's curious which is appropriate at his age.