My child's watching porn

[Rosieperhaps]

My child 13 is searching porn on his tablet and phone, this results in long conversations and removal of devices, but every time he asks to be trusted and we give him another chance he is back on it. Parent controls deactivated when he turned 13 all I can do is reset his age to make him younger and put them back on, but I think he has created a new Google account. He says he has been influenced by a new school friend, we have blocked the friendship outside of school and spoken to school in detail, but I know from WhatsApp he is still in contact at school, same year group. Not wanting to permanently remove tech equipment if I can help it, what would you do, reset his age or provide him with a phone that does not go on the internet or ban all devices. I feel sick to my core that he is watching this

I’m with BT. You can log into the router and change the parental controls there.

the issue is his obsession with porn though. That’s a huge problem something I’d seek professional help for.

and of course completely remove all devices.

Ages ago, I rented a room in a Sri Lankan household. Mum was semi-literate, from Sri Lanka, had an arranged marriage with a doctor in the UK and ran a newsagent's. Her 16-year old son was caught with pornography (magazine) at his boarding school. He was passing it to others, she told me. He medicine was: to remove him from his boarding school and put him in a local comp. But before she did it, she beat him with a belt or something of the sort so hard, she told me, that his skin on the back was peeling off. I was shocked at the savagery and told her so, she told me 'that is why your British society is going down the pan, not because you are worse than us, but because you don't deal with evil in the same way we do'.

I don't think you understand how fast things changed. I am 48 so only ten years older than you (and my child is same age as OPs) and absolutely NOBODY had phones even at university!

My DD did it and we removed all access. Dumb phone for a while!

The keeping him busy, lots of social outlets that build resilience yes absolutely!

"tell him 'This is for treating perverts', call a spade a spade. This is not 'pornography', this is human exploitation and he is a pervert, sorry.

If that does not work, tell him that you are thinking of going to school and embarrassing him in front of his teachers by telling them what sort of problem he has. And mean it." Absolutely do not do this part!! The last thing you want is to shame him and shut the conversation down and make him believe this about himself!

If all else fails then yes seek support from an accredited therapist or from his school but this needs to be done in a way that he feels safe to actually engage with! The last thing you want is him believing there is something wrong with him and compromising his mental health.

Porn will wire in his sexual tastes before he has even had a chance to have sex. And it will wire it into sex where women are degraded and abused and dominated.

He will need to seek out more and more extreme content as he becomes desensitised.

I really think porn, and the damage it does, should be regarded as a public health issue.

I'm actually quite astonished by the majority response. ALL teenage boys will seek out and watch porn. It's totally normal. Both of my sons did. What is really important to have a conversation about the consumption of porn and how it does not represent sex in normal relationships. He'll only find another way if you try to remove all access to it.

Internet Matters website is great. You can go into parental controls step by step with their guide for different phone providers broadband providers etc.

No phone at home. I would be tempted to buy a phone that can only call and text to be honest. We have a rule that there are to be no phones taken to bedrooms at all. My eldest is in year 7.

The issue is that op has basically done this and her ds is continuing to seek it out and disable the safety measures she's putting in place. Plus the issue of what he's watching and where he's watching it. Is it your run of the mill normal sex or is it violent mysoginist unrealistic material or worse? When we talk about porn it's really important to remember that is a really broad term and a lot of it you wouldn't want a 13 yo regularly exposed to.

Is this a joke?

Why won't you remove his device? You can't have your cake and eat it.

You give him a device - he WILL watch porn. He's proven that.

This could damage him emotionally and relationship wise for life. Start parenting and remove his devices.

Jesus Christ I’m sick of seeing post after post about parents failing their children when it comes to the internet.

A Smart phone is a privilege not a necessity. Get him a phone that doesn’t have the internet.

Any devices at home have to be used in a family area and have parental controls on to the maximum, even to the point that if he tries downloading a new app, going on a website that he should be it’s flagged to you to ok it. Delete all social media accounts as well.

Do some research on the NSPCC or other websites to find out how to educate him properly on the topic of pornography asap.

You have a very small window to turn this around (if you still can) before this effects him forever and shapes the adult male he’ll be and how he’ll view women.

You are his parent NOT his friend. Stop being afraid to be seen as the bad guy and do what’s right by your child.

How do parental controls deactivate when you're 13? That's ridiculous, the whole point of parental controls is that you control what your kids have access to! In our house everything is blocked for every person of every age who doesn't know the password - porn, gambling or anything of a questionable nature. Even DH can't access them (he hasn't asked for the password). Our wifi is with BT and I control this from my BT account, but I'm sure every wifi company offers the same. What kind of parental controls are you actually using? Also our wifi is set to be blocked to certain devices at a certain time every night so no night time access for anyone under 18.

Not sure exactly how this would work as I don’t own one but there is a decide called ‘brick’ which enables the user to set any phone app to be disabled until it is unlocked again. It can be locked in the ‘brick’ app from anywhere but the only way to unlock it is to tap it on the physical brick device (which you could physically keep on you). I don’t know if/ how this works with controlling another persons phone, ie can you lock their phone using the app on your phone: that’s something you could look into.

I don’t know if banning access is necessarily going to get to the root of the problem though? I am not saying not to do this, but is it one of those things where if they really want to, they’ll find another way to access it.

Unless you want to see him being arrested, then take his devices off him permanently! If he were my son, I’d also be locking him in his room 😳.

I don't know what the answer is - but statistics show the average child nowadays has seen violent porn by the time they are 8 years old. And that's average, there'll be younger too. Most parents are unaware.

We really need to educate kids on pornography

all I can do is reset his age to make him younger and put them back on, but I think he has created a new Google account.

No. Not all you can do, at all.
My 11yo searched the word 'sex' on-line - kids at school had been talking and he was curious. The next day we had a chat, set up/double-checked internet filters and began allowing him online access only when we were in the room. He searched it once more in the following 6 months, and we are now absolutely vigilant about him never having internet access without an adult in the room. He has a brick phone for out and about, uses a spare phone for music downstairs when we are present. It has a lock code and he makes himself look away every time we type it in. If he's listening to music on it, we unlock it while he looks away, he chooses his music then we lock it again. When I leave him at home alone, every single device internet-based device is either password protected, and those that aren't are locked away and the key hidden or taken with me. If I can't lock everything away, I will unplug the router and take it with me!
He's now 13 and I'm pleased to report that porn plays absolutely no part in his life, and it won't for as long as I'm responsible for him. Honestly, if you don't take serious measures you are not just allowing but enabling your child to continue watching porn. He needs more from you.

This. You need to educate them around porn and the issues with it, not just confiscate it. I posted upthread but the latest stats show the average child has seen porn by the age of 8, which is shocking

'We really need to educate kids on pornography'?

Mental. No. We really need to protect kids from pornography.

Let them find out about sex from books and fooling around with each other.

Dont let their introduction to sex be misogynistic hardcore content that they simply aren't old enough to understand.

Well the current approach is clearly not working if most kids have seen porn by the time they're 8 and their parents have no idea...

Remove all devices and turn off WiFi.

Totally agree with this. Unlimited access to any kind of porn that is out there online is very different from eg the magazines boys would occasionally get a glimpse of when we were that age. I would remove tech, get a basic phone and laptop/desktop for HW that is downstairs only.

The current approach isn't working because kids have way too much internet access way too young. It's not because they need to be educated about pornography at the age of 8 ffs

Well, permissively allowing your children to wander around on the internet hoping they won't fall into internet holes isn't great care.

Jesus Christ just be a bloody parent. There is absolutely ZERO excuse for a 13 year old to watch porn.

also, way to go allowing misogynistic unrealistic images of women in his head at the tender age of 13! That's gonna go well when he's older when he treats women like she should be in porn.

as PP said.. parent!!