I hate it as an app.
Loathe it.
DS is 14 yrs old, in year 9.
My reasons for hating it are that it encourages yet more time looking at a phone; I hate the disappearing messages after 24 hrs - I just feel really suspicious about this set up; I hate the location tracker; I hate the streaks thing where you're encouraged to send loads of messages to get a streak; I hate the stories I hear of bullying on snapchat; I hate the stories I hear of perverts pretending to be kids on snapchat; I hate the stories of grooming; of drugs; of county lines; and I absolutely hate the videos that feature on the snapchat screen, from random online reels.
I set it up on my own phone to look into it, and I set my DOB on the snapchat profile to make me 14 years old. As soon as the app was up and running, my snapchat videos (are they called stories?) were filled with reels of highly 'adult content' clips, in no way whatsoever safe or appropriate for a 14 year old that the app settings thought I was.
TBH, that's my biggest fear about it - the video reels. I cannot knowingly expose my DS to this visual content. My reels/clips/videos showed pornographic content and adult violence.
How did this happen when I'd put my age in as 14 - does anyone know?
How the hell do you stop adult content clips/videos/reels appearing? Surely all these mums with responsible parenting aren't just allowing this? It's really confusing me!
Anyway, DS has been asking for it for 2 years and it's been a hard no.
Now he's 14, he's talked to me maturely and has explained that he's genuinely missing out on so much social stuff at school by not being on snapchat. He says he walks in to the social hub area where they hang out before roll call, and his mates are laughing about a snapchat conversation the evening before, or a meme shared, etc. and that he feels permanently out of the loop and just stands there not 'in' on the joke. He's missing out on social plans being made on snapchat. He's missed meet ups that have been spontaneously made on snapchat like "Meet in an hour" and the mates all meet but DS doesn't as he didn't know about it, then they're all talking about it the next day.
It's all very well me, as a 48 year old woman, thinking "Well for goodness sake, they could just send a text message to DS to tell him what's been planned on snapchat", but I've got to be realistic about the fact that 13/14 year old boys are impulse driven and don't carefully think things through enough to separately send a text message to DS.
His mates are asking him on a weekly basis why he hasn't got snapchat and they keep on telling him to get it so that he can join in with things.
I'm genuinely baffled as to why they can't simply text him. Meanwhile his mates seem genuinely baffled as to why DS still doesn't have snapchat.
He is starting to make new friends too, he'll be out on the field kicking a ball around with boys he's just getting to know and they say "I'll find you on snapchat later and message you!" DS has to say "I'm not on snapchat" to which they apparently say "Oh" and look confused.
When DS tells me, I say "But why can't you just swap phone numbers with these new people you're meeting and just text each other?" And he says "No-one is allowed their phones out in the school day, so we can't get our phones out and swap numbers. No-one is gonna remember my number if I tell them what it is when we're on the school field -they're not gonna remember 07691 481720 all the way from the field back to the classroom when they're chatting to mates and then remember to write it down. And no-one carries pen and paper on them out on the field playing football!"
I've told DS to write his phone number down at home, take it into school and hand it to these new friends, but this was met with a reaction that was akin to me suggesting he commit social death.
DS is shy and reserved by nature, he is a sensitive and gentle boy, but he loves having friends, it's really important to him, and he loves socialising with them, and he really wants to fit in and be part of things.
The other day, a group of 8 boys spontaneously turned up on the doorstep to call for him. Some good friends, some new friends. DS didn't know they were coming and we were in the middle of eating an early dinner together as a family. He told them he was eating but would join them after. They all said ok and walked off. Took DS 30 mins to finish eating and get changed, freshen up and head out to find them. Took him another 15 minutes to locate them as none of them were picking up when he was calling them, then he found them at the park all kicking a ball around. He was greeted with a cheer and fist bumps, and joined in with the game. Half an hour later they all went home for dinner. So it was nice, but he missed half of the meet up. Turns out it was all spontaneously arranged on snapchat, but of course DS wasn't on snapchat.
It's really nice that they walked to ours to call for him, but it meant he missed half of the time, and quite honestly I can't expect those boys to always be thinking about walking over to ours to call for DS every time they arrange to meet via snapchat. They simply see it as a hassle that he's not on it.
So what do you do when you don't want an app that has the potential for harm and for exposing your child to seeing images/clips that are wholly inappropriate and risks him seeing things that are harmful, but your DS is telling you that it is now feeling like social exclusion?
The thing is, I know a lot of the mums of DS's friends, and they are all responsible parents. So surely they can't all just be allowing this app on their kids' phones if it's as unsafe as I think it is?
I'm feeling like a massive dinosaur right now, whilst at the same time wanting to do everything I can to safeguard my son's mental health and development.
Sorry for the essay but I wanted to explain properly and give context.
So, AIBU??