..to be absolutely horrified at what I see some 11yr old girls post on facebook?? ...

[nelehluap]

My eldest DD is 12yrs old. A lot of her mates are still 11. These same 'mates' have facebook. like DD1 does. DD1 rarely goes on her facebook because she finds it all rather boring and all too easy to see friends fall out because of comments put on there and she hates being dragged into fall-outs.

Last night I decided to have a look around her facebook (she knows I do this and because she rarely goes on it she's not that bothered that I do, and even asks me to have a look)....

I was SHOCKED.....some of her 'friends' on there (girls she knows from school but not exactly close friends) have photos of themselves (bearing in mind they're only 11yrs old) - somewhere in the region of 200 photos each - of just themselves - taken with the use of mirrors in various rooms (ie photos of them holding their cameras/phones using reflections from mirrors) wearing the skimpiest, shortest, most revealing outfits and standing in some of the most provocative poses I've seen from such young individuals. One girl - she has about 187 photos of just her...wearing really tight extremely low cut tops (she is well developed) with the pictures of just her breasts...pictures of her in tiny short black dresses holding up the hem of her dress (more like a t-shirt) with nothing on her legs....and the make-up is plastered all over her face...

I see photos of girls taken in changing rooms of places such as primark - whereby they choose clothing off the rails, go to the changing rooms, get changed and take photos, only to get changed again with another outfit (you can see piles of clothes in the changing room) and then walk out in their own stuff, leaving the piles in the changing rooms.

The language that is used on facebook between themselves is shocking also....words such as 'biaatch', the f-word gets used a great deal too and is often seen used in 'rofl', 'wtf', 'lmfao'....AND THEY ARE 11? I even saw one girl say to a friend 'oh, did you suck him off then?' ....

I will be talking to DD1 this morning with the view of pressing the delete button a few times on her facebook today...to remove some of these so called friends that she knows at school....but I'm half afraid it'll only leave her with a handful of friends on there...the classic comment that I saw last night was....'hurry up crimbo, I want my stuff'....how rude and disrespectful is that? I'm the least religious person out there but is that how they see Christmas? Clearly it is.

What has happened to the kids in them? What has happened to the nice, sweet, innocent, naive kids? I was too busy out there playing, making dens, having fun, CHATTING to my mates.... Or am I just becoming very old-fashioned???

Er Madonna like a prayer was pretty risque....

usualsuspects You're quicker than me!

callisto how do social networking sites encourage this behaviour?

'Anyone can register on facebook'

Only if they lie when they click 'I agree to the terms and conditions'

Have a look here, section 4.5 ...

'You will not use Facebook if you are under 13.'

Before mtv and the like (showing my age now) pans people were always prancing about on TOTP in skimpy costumes..so its nothing new really

...here's another word I don't like on facebook....'frape'....I know what it means but who else does???

I think most teenage users on FB know what it means

It's a sort of cold coffee isn't it?

What you have said confirms my concerns about FB. My DSs won't be having it until at least 13, and then closely monitored.

Girls in my year 5 son's class have it, (age 9 or 10). Some of them have teen siblings who the lot of them are "friends" with (I hate that bloody term, actual when referring to children attempting to collect popularity). They have access to language and attitudes, which IMHO they are too young for. Some of them are bitchy and image-obsessed as a result.

< adjusts bee-filled bonnet>

It's a different world, isn't it? :( My mum handed me the Avon catalogue aged 11 and told me I could have any "one" thing. I chose a lipstick called "Moody Mauve".

nelehluap - wtf is "frape"?

Oh, and it seems the perfect medium for bullying. Already had enough of that, thanks very much

I do think facebook (especially) DOES encourage nasty behaviour between girls...because what I see they've written to each other I'm pretty sure (in the majority of cases, but not all prob) they wouldn't have the nerve to do face to face. It's called Cyber-bullying and whilst the schools are doing all they can to prevent it from happening (they have done in both the schools my two DDs go to) its a pointless task if parents are not monitoring what they're kids are doing at home. We have had letter after letter suggesting to us parents to watch our kids on computers at home...falls on deaf ears when they have mobile phones/netbooks etc...that can get onto the internet without parents knowing and that are not required to go thru a home-based wi-fi etc....

About 3 weeks ago I could see someone had gone into DD's facebook and added herself as a friend to DD (a girl DD simply cannot stand) and managed to also, whilst on DD's facebook, add a profile status about something quite rude. It was done at 1am on a Sunday morning.

I knew someone had done this other than my DD because she was in bed fast asleep.

I managed to work out who it was and true enough it was her. The silly girl didn't realise I could see the various amendments and friend request emails (DD's facebook is set up to send all correspondence to my email account)....and during that same day DD rec'd four texts from this girl claiming that DD had accused of her hacking...a word even DD doesn't know the meaning of.

After a while I'd had enough as had DH so (shockingly so...DH doesn't usually step in)...DH rang the girl's parents and asked that she stop texting DD and to leave the matter be....and do you know the response he rec'd?....the girl's father said...'ok, well I have no idea what she does on the computer, I thought she was asleep, I don't even know how facebook works and I've never sent a text in my life and wouldn't know how to'.....but agreed she was to leave my DD alone, and she has, although I did later hear she was having a great time complaining to all her mates at school that my DD had falsely accused her of 'hacking' and that it was out of order.

'frape'...as I understand it, and I might be wrong so please excuse me if I am...means 'Facebook RAPEd'...meaning someone else has managed to get into your facebook and add something you wouldn't normally put yourself....aka hacking.

You only have to read on here the thoughtless way that adults behave on FB and the hurt caused as a result, to know that children just aren't equipped to manage their relationships online. It worries me a lot.

I agree with what Nancy Drew said. Are we seriously getting nostalgic for the sweet innocence and eternal childhood of the er...80s and 90s?

Unfortuantely how we were at 11 is not how current 11 year olds are, technology does that.

You have to remember that girls are 3 years more mature than their actual years.

Whilst it is upsetting generally what you don't know doesn't hurt you and you should not have looked.

Just removing them from facebook won't mean they are not friends anymore.

Imagine how they are in the flesh, what you saw is probably tame to how they really are.

You cannot cover her in cotton wool, what you see she faces every single day.

All you can do is bring her up properly to understand that sex means something.

Let her grow at her own pace and not the pace of her friends if you can.

"Unfortunately how we were at 11 is not how current 11 year olds are, technology does that.
You have to remember that girls are 3 years more mature than their actual years."

And your evidence for those assertions ...?

fabbychic...'what you don't know doesn't hurt you, so you shouldn't have looked'

...oh yes I will look and I will continue to do so....I'm sorry but that all falls within my meaning of the term being a 'responsible parent'.....

PRECISELY MY POINT! If all parents looked at what their kids put on the internet we would not have this problem now or atleast, if they don't give a stuff, we can only hope they might actually ask their kids to cover up and try to cut back on their swearing...but then again are these kids a product of what they have at home?

Tonde - my mum told me that 30 odd years ago.

How I was at 11 is totally different to how 11 year olds are nowadays.

I didn't wear makeup until I was 16.

Nelehluap - I understand wanting to look and if I had a daughter that age I would have too, and I'd be mortified. But, give some thought to what goes on off of Facebook and what they talk about face to face, you can monitor Facebook but you cannot monitor what happens on a daily basis at school.

My mum told me that at her convent school in the 1950s, three girls were pregnant at 14. Shows how helpful anecdotes are.

I think today that it's better having facebook as you CAN see what they get up to and you can teach them how to deal with it.

Neleh - that's a really smart move having the emails sent to you! I will have to remember that one!

I was horribly bullied at school but at least I was able to go home at 3:40 every day and not have to face it until the next morning. I dread to think what it's like now. :(

How about if all these 'responsible' parents also stopped their DC from signing up to sites for which they are too young?

None of these 11 and 12 y/o's are supposed to be on FB to start with. Probably you think it's OK as long as you keep an eye on them but actually what you're doing is teaching them that it's fine to ignore age restrictions and to lie to gain access to inappropriate sites. I'm sure you'd be the first to complain if your DC just went ahead and clicked an 'I am over 18' box and gained access to something truly nasty but you're not setting a very good example.

If you really care about this, stop wringing your hands and just report all these underage accounts, including your DD's.

So many girls have those provocative photos! It is frightening how mature some of them look. I believe you absolutely need to have Facebook yourself if for no other reason than to be 'Friends' with your children so you can stalk supervise them. (And their friends).

My twins have a habit of "liking" all sorts of nonsensical groups on FB. They both "liked" one called "It is no coincidence that No-Parts spelt backwards spells Strap-On ".

Bemused, I asked them if they knew what a Strap On actually was? They didnt, so I enlightened them. You have never seen two girls run faster to get on the computer to delete the post from their pages!

Facebook itself is not the bogey man. It provides valuable opportunities to teach your children right from wrong, and to be able to observe other children who are in your child's life.

I know a few children who have been banned from having FB - they have it anyway. Their parents have no idea. Better to allow it, but with conditions IMHO.

I should mention that my girls are old enough to be signed up.

Yes I know I can't see what goes on day to day at school and I'd probably be even more shocked at what I'd see/hear but DD tells me how it is at school and she is definitely in the minority when it comes to not swearing, remembering manners and covering up.

As regards the email part - I have two email addresses....one of which is used for DD1's facebook comments/friend requests/correspondence etc so I can see, without actually going into her facebook pages, what has been said, loaded etc...

I do not plan to 'wrap her up in cotton wool' and nor would I wish to....she has to learn herself the difference between right and wrong and she is by far no means perfect...yes we get the attitude, moods, hormonals ups and downs, answering back etc....but I will always try my level best not to let her fall into a trap whereby she acts/behaves like others in order to be accepted. She has even admitted that she sometimes acts the idiot at school so to be included in a group and then when she's not and she's quiet they all gather round her thinking something is wrong, when in fact there's nothing wrong, she just wants to be her normal self....and behaviour like that is all down to immaturity of an 12 yr old (DD) and we, as parents, have always told her to be her normal usual self all the time and not to change her ways in order to be accepted...so you could say she's already started to fall into this trap of being the same as....

Yes this sort of behaviour (provactive comments, photos, swearing etc) has probably been around for many years but all I have to compare it to is how life was when I was this age (30+years ago) ...this is the first time I've been a mum of an almost teenager..I'm still very much learning about parenting...I still have a lot to learn and I'm sure I've got a lot of mistakes to make along the way...

This is all as much of a learning process for me as it is for DD1....another interesting factor in all this is that DD1 told me this morning that those girls that she knows that behave like this either have older siblings or relatives (girls) that also behave like this in the higher years at school