12 year old ds disturbing Google search

[SusanSHelit]

I have just checked my voicemail this evening and had a message from 12yo ds head of year (y7) about 'something offensive which was picked up by smoothwall on the school laptop while he was logged in'. In the voicemail the hoy said that no requirement for a set of educational sessions and that he assured her it was a one off.

The message didn't detail what was picked up. I obviously had a conversation with ds about this and first he said he didn't remember what he typed. Then a few minutes later he revealed that he typed in 'is it illegal to put an animal in a blender?'

Im honestly really shocked and very disappointed. I would never have expected this from him. His father and I are separated and have been for a few years and he has pets in both houses (gerbils in his dad's, a cat at mine).

I've spoken to his dad about this, we have a pretty good coparenting relationship. Ds is going to his dad's after school tomorrow as I'm working nights for three nights from tomorrow. I'm going to call the school in the morning obviously but I don't even know where to begin with this.

Ds said he was just messing about with his friends but that he would even think about this has really disturbed me. He's a good kid at home, and this seems very out of the blue. He didn't say his friends typed it in, he said he did.

He's been banned from his PlayStation tonight and I've taken his phone too. I don't know if he will be allowed these in his dad's tomorrow

I think he’s maybe been watching “Gremlins “ don’t worry x

To be fair, I’ve literally never before in my life typed or said “I’ve never put an animal in a blender”… nor has it been a standard I’ve actively aspired to, or a fact I’ve been proud of 😂 the context of this thread is important to that statement.

It'll be a stupid discussion with his friends. They'll probably be talking about a TV show or something.

I dread to think what his school would make of my Google history, as a crime fiction editor..!

Explain it to me. What is he being punished for?

If your child asked you that question, what punishment would you give them? For what wrongdoing?

That is the first thing I thought of too!

OP pease don't write your son off as some animal abusing pshyco off the basis of one out of context Google search. There is probably some innocent explanation.

Wtaf. This is fucking grim. Even more grim is the fact that he had to ask whether it was illegal. He’s not five years old, he’s almost a teenager. I’m not saying he’s a serial killer in the making but this involves extreme violence against another living creature and causing their death which is in a completely different territory to say watching porn for sexual arousal. You need to find out where he heard about doing such a thing or - even worse - viewed it. There is a horrifically grim underworld of sick fucks who commit and share horrific abuse animals online. If he or his friends have already started to go down that rabbit hole you need urgent intervention.

The smooth wall will pick up allsorts, not everything is alarming.
A search of did Henry the 8th murder all his wives would flag because of the word murder.

This just blew my mind. Hadn’t even thought about it that way.

That is bloody disgusting. Why would anyone search that? Why would anyone actually think about that?

I would actually be less shocked if he was looking up boobs or whatever.

I thought my Google history was strange.

I know people aren’t taking it seriously but you know that sadistic people start somewhere. I really wouldn’t trust him around the pets.

If it was done without malice then you can eventually consider whether to loosen restrictions. If nothing else he will have had a shock and hopefully learned that it isn’t acceptable.

However remorseful he is, he did google it (and was stupid enough to do it on a school computer).

But this wasn’t searching history was it?

For looking up something that sick and for even thinking it.

For looking it up when he has pets and therefore it can be seen as a problem. Note he said ‘pet’ so presumably it wasn’t just related to his own pets.

For being enough of a muppet to search on the school computer

Admittedly he is a bit younger but I had to explain to DS2 that they don't mush up entire chickens, cows and pigs to make nuggets, burgers and sausages.

Because of curiosity. I’ve searched it tonight and it let me down fascinating rabbit holes about how the law treats domesticated vs wild animals, the sentience test, species boundaries, what makes pest control and food processing legal and when, and how this differs between the UK and US.

So he might be a budding psychopath, or a budding lawyer, philosopher, animal rights activist, or just a curious 12 year old. Nothing at all to be remorseful of. Nothing unacceptable.

Surely the ‘budding psychopath’ bit would be concerning?

Not everyone who searches this will have ill intent. However people with ill intent do this kind of thing.

Out of interest what would you say if he had searched whether it was legal to put a baby in a blender, when you had babies in the family? Would that just be him being ‘silly’?

Im sure you will all persuade the OP it is nothing to worry about - in which case I genuinely hope you are right.

I imagine it is just stupid kid stuff... but they take this sooooo seriously these days. My friend's son - same age - threw a dart at a wall at school and was promptly excluded and then threatened with referral to an anti-youth terrorism unit (I kid you not)

I’m astonished how many people are laughing this off or treating it as a bit of harmless silliness. Surely you know that there’s a whole industry making and trading animal abuse videos on the internet. Real people torturing and killing real animals.

In 2021, a transgender murderer called Scarlet Blake (described as a woman in court) videoed himself putting a cat in a blender, and shared this online.

He later went on to murder a random stranger he had followed in the street.

At his trial, the prosecution noted that the blender video showed Blake had a "disturbing interest in what it would be like to harm a living creature".

There is nothing harmless about that.

https://news.sky.com/story/scarlet-blake-who-killed-a-cat-and-put-animal-in-blender-found-guilty-of-mans-murder-13078190

Of course they take is seriously.

As per my post above, would you be concerned if he had substitute pet for baby?

Just wondering where the line is?

When I was at school in the late 90's/early 00's the things we would laugh and google would have turned parents hair white.

Eurgh, I'd almost removed the memory of that awful 'steak and cheese' site.

Beastiality, actual death videos/footage, morgue pictures. It was truly monstrous. We thought it was funny at the time and egged each other on, but some of those images still crop up and make me wince even now.

I'm glad that schools now check what is being searched.

You know you didn’t have bad intentions though. (Was it rottendotcom by any chance - a friend once showed me that and I puked).

A 12 yo searching stuff like that has to be cause for concern

@LiviaDrusillaAugusta he didn't say pet. He said animal. He was trying to prove it is illegal

Our Book of Knowledge had no opinion about putting animals in blenders that I can recall!

The section on being a housewife was very clear about having your husband's slippers ready for him when he came home from work and washing your hair at least once a week, though!

I once Googled whether it’s legal to take a road kill deer home to cook. I am a vegetarian and will never do this. I just wondered. I google allsorts, I genuinely cannot believe that most people are not curious about things that are disturbing. That’s why Rotton.com was so massive back in the day.

He only googled if it was illegal- I think that’s fair enough. It’d be worrying if he was asking how you do it.

Yes, if there were signs of him being a budding psychopath then that would be very concerning, but OP has told us that there are not signs of that.

How to teach children to learn and think and question if we punish asking questions?

What he searched is actually a very interesting question and not one on a topic that should be too shocking for a 12yr old to navigate. Not if we also expect them to handle ethics of war, animal rights, injustice, etc etc. Which all seem like great things to be thinking about at that age. And if he was only mucking about his mates? Well that answers itself: he was just mucking about with his mates.

Happy to hear its all been smoothied over.

I'd be disappointed if my kids looked up something like this because I associate animal cruelty with sociopathy.

I'm a bit surprised that posters are saying its normal. If he was checking if all sorts of things were legal or illegal, fair enough.
I'd ask his year head for a list/printout of other searches to put my mind at rest.