ExH allowing 12 and 8 year old to play GTA

[DontMissHisJowls]

My ex is allowing my 2 young sons to play Grand Theft Auto during his contact time with them. I only discovered this when checking my son's phone - they have all kept it from me because they know I wouldn't approve.
I am so worried about the impact of this horrible game on my boys and I wonder what else they are being exposed to. My older son already has evidence on his phone of searching words like torture on multiple occasions.
What can I do about this? My ex is very unlikely to take any notice of my request to stop this. Do I have any legal recourse? I do have a solicitor but asking the question would cost me £150 so I thought I'd see if anyone else here has experience of this.

Playing GTA is not more likely to cause long term side effects than most tv shows, as long as they are taught to differentiate real life from games it’s fine. I played GTA from about 6 and I’ve never had an urge to steal a car get in a fight or rob someone.

Maybe the odd urge to turn the car off road and trek about the fields but thats a different story

The worst part about this is that he has convinced your ds' to hide something from you. That is very very dangerous to teach them that that's ok.
I overlooked this with my ex and he ended up giving drugs to our ds at age 10 and turned him into a drug addict.

I wish I had stopped contact much much earlier.

@Wonderland18 I'm sorry I just can't agree with you there. My question is not whether this game is inappropriate for children, it's what I can do about it.

And yes, the deceit is awful.

Honestly?

Pretty much nothing.

If he’s a good dad in all other aspects then cutting contacts extreme.

You can’t physically stop it unless you cut contact and be prepared for a court battle for custody which is likely to still end in him having some overnight access if he’s a decent human.

I don't think your problem is entirely about the game or your ex husband it's about your eldest DC.

Do you really think the game is urging him on to search for things like torture?
That's the issue that's needs to be raised and he needs to see someone. Really not normal for a 12 year old to be searching torture on multiple occasions.

There's nothing that you can do.

Wonderland18- if you mean you were playing the original GTA, that's very different to the current ones. No 8 year old needs to know about drugs, strip clubs, prostitutes and know the difference between a shotgun and sniper (although plenty of 8 year olds will know this as their parents allow Fortnite)
It is possible that the boys are driving around and shooting rather than doing the actual missions which may be too difficult for them. I have a son who used to watch YouTubers play it and they'd do non-mission like try and get to the top of the highest mountain on motorbike and see how far a car can jump off a cliff sort of thing. On the pc version they can use silly skins and be Harry Potter with a gun etc

Looking up torture is really worrying though. I would be getting outside help with that question because it's not normal.

My exh did this, I was the uncool dm while df was just listening to the ds wants.
Well it backfired because a new game he got ds caused him to scream. I heard this crying suddenly ds came running to me from the living room telling me to turn it off.
Ds is 14 now and still remembers it. I turned the situation around and told him as much as he loves his df and his df loves him that lying and hiding things from me is not allowed.
Exh didn't learn because he didn't see the situation, never does and took ds12 to see the joker the other day.
There isn't much you can do when at df but make sure that at home they have other options - like roadblox's and family game night.

First of all i'm quite young guy that had loving mother, too loving in fact... let me ask you this, how dare you invade your children privacy by checking his phone? honestly, from experience i know that it will only make him hide more from you and destroy any trust that he might have along with you making it difficult for his father to have a good contact with sons.
As for games? mother worked nearly all day so i played whatever, really, any game far more brutal, bloody etc. than simple GTA, games dont make anyone act like that in real life with exceptions of people with mental issues to begin with.
Made account just to throw that in and make you think a lil bit because i cant even say that i love my mother anymore just because of childhood controlling that made long lasting issues.
PS: As for torture its quite normal for children to get intrested in really all sort of stuff like beheadings etc. probably everyone that age seen something like that.

how dare you invade your children privacy by checking his phone?

You really shouldn't speak to people in that way.

PS: As for torture its quite normal for children to get intrested in really all sort of stuff like beheadings etc. probably everyone that age seen something like that.

Erm, no that really isn't normal!!!! At 12 I can reassure you I never wanted to see any form of torture or beheadings wtaf.. seriously.

how dare you invade your children privacy by checking his phone?

I hope you're not a parent. Totally normal to keep an eye on what 12yo and 8yo are looking at online.

As for torture its quite normal for children to get intrested in really all sort of stuff like beheadings etc. probably everyone that age seen something like that.
12 yo showing off and pretending to have watched gory horror films is normal. 12yo starting to be interested in true crime/serial killers not unusual either.
Watching beheadings is not normal at all.
OP has an 8yo too and 8yo should be satisfied with the violence in 12a movies like Star Wars and Marvel tops.

What way? it's not an insult in any way and gives weight to the sentence because privacy and overcontrolling is very serious issue.

Also what is normal and what not is semi-debatable, but i can assure you that most kids seen far worse stuff than this at that age, especially when it comes to boys.

Seems like i won't be winning an argument here on a forum like this, but let me just give a tip that might improve the situation instead of checking search history and probably i can assume all the other stuff.. just talk with children, have a "meetings" and assure them that they can speak with you on any subject, anything, that is really the only possible way to make things better, probably start with speaking about GTA like grown ups.

Police recommend parents check children's phones because sadly there are a lot of adults out there grooming or otherwise taking advantage of naive children and teenagers. And we are all vulnerable at those early stages of brain development. I agree privacy is important but the internet and social media is a public arena not a private diary.

I think it's fin for a 12 year old as long as he understands it not real and hasn't got any disabilities, but it's really up to the parent or parents.

When I was around 12 I was looking that sort of thing up for my homework.