I just watched Adolescence - terrified!

[irisetta]

So I'm a Mum of 2 boys, both pre-teen (9 and 10). I remember reading stuff online that horrified me 10, 15 years ago - V Roosh, the Return of Kings site, etc - the precursor to the Andrew Tate horror - jfc, where have we gone wrong?! My boys are beautiful, kind, loving souls, right now - but teenage years wreak havoc on us all, and I am absolutely petrified. What does shine through to me is the essential sadness of these men - their self worth can only be defined by dominating, seducing and "owning" females - but since when was that a marker of self worth, for any bright, articulate, intelligent human being? I'm so worried, because it is affecting our kids, even the cleverest ones. Girls too. What do we think, Mumsnet?

Unreasonable - the kids will work it out, stop panicking (or thinking about panicking)

Reasonable - panic isn't the answer, but we need to address this now

We only need to look at Brexit and the shit show that is America to understand the deep harm that social media can have.

Regarding the shitshow in America... remember the social media frenzy about Peanut the Squirrel?

It's strange how many people seem to be treating this fictional story as a primary source. There's no new information there, just the writers' and actors' opinions and a trace of the real-life cases they used in their research.

They've created a story about a kid with a stable home and no prior history of violence suddenly murdering someone over a minor insult because that makes a good story. Cases of that happening in real life are vanishingly rare.

The ONS has a time series of homicide rates going back to the 70s, and the trend is downwards.

There are a lot of very motivated individuals who would love to find some kind of smoking gun proof that seeing something dodgy on a screen turns people into homicidal maniacs. They've been looking for it since VHS came out, they haven't found it yet, and that ONS time series is still trending downwards.

I don't let my teenage kids watch crap on the internet, and they didn't get phones until they started making their own way to school. But it's the effect on their education I'm concerned about. It's not going to turn them into violent criminals.

Homicide rates are down (a global trend. Not just UK) What about other violent crime and sexual assaulted? What about other types of domestic abuse and violence? Coercive control, trafficking, child sexual exploitation. Extremist misogyny does not just (or even often) lead to murder but it always leads to some kind of aggressive assertion of power OVER usually women and girls but also boys and men. This is not nothing. EDIT: Although I agree with your point looking for the "smoking gun".nsocial media is one part of this. But it's not the only thing.

I heard someone refer to it this morning as 'parents are now panicking after not paying any attention at all to what has been happening on the Internet for the last 10-15 years' 😂. The situation is the same as before you watched it. You need to be aware of what's going on, have open channels of communication with your kids and be all over what they see online, equip them to be critical thinkers, make sure no one in their life is modelling misogyny, or that at least they are aware of what it is. Limit what social media they can access, control the phone, etc. You can not just be terrified, but actively support your kids to be the antidote to this way of thinking and behaviour.

I haven't read all the replies but you are being more than reasonable. The whole point is the door was closed, the device was in his hands - they didn't know what was going on with him.

I thought it was utterly chilling.

A weird thing that came up when chatting to my kids, said very casually, that people don’t like boys/ men and assume they’re all going to attack people/ steal/ be boy racers and in general be criminals. They said everything now is about how girls can do or be anything and the world is their oyster whereas boys are looked on with mistrust and I found that sad. They said they’d never got that from us but in general in the media and when they were in primary (mixed), the girls were told that eg universities and jobs were looking for more women as there wasn’t enough women in the workforce/ stem etc. I talked to them about it but I do wonder and worry that boys/ teens/ men feel like this is a woman’s world and with the crap on the internet they’re being goaded on

They've created a story about a kid with a stable home and no prior history of violence suddenly murdering someone over a minor insult because that makes a good story. Cases of that happening in real life are vanishingly rare.

It showed how seemingly minor things - volatile temper, clueless parenting, shitty school, inappropriate online content and low key bullying - turned into a toxic cocktail that resulted in a murder. Rare chance, but never zero