Daughter and friends excluding boy - okay or unkind?

[Kirstenwe456]

My daughter, 9, had her four friends (3F 1M - Yrs 5&6) the house earlier and they were playing in the treehouse but I noticed the boy, 11, was left outside. I asked him and he said the girls didn’t let boys in the treehouse. I told my daughter that’s not nice but she said she wants it girls only so they can talk about “girl stuff”. She also didn’t let him in her bedroom and forced him to sit in the bathroom while they made TikToks in her room. The whole thing was embarrassing.
In one way I can understand why she and her friends would want girl spaces but I don’t want her to come across as a bully! This is not the first time it has happened, she did this with another 12 yo boy at the local park. Advice?!

She needs to be told how horrible it is to exclude, not protected from embarrassment.

This, I’m afraid. It’s not like dealing with another adult. You are her parent (and were effectively in loco parentis for that boy - you had a duty to look after him too while he was in your house).

OP of course you need to apologise to the poor boy's parents and your DD should be apologising to him. You say that lots of kids her age are on tik tok, but so what? What is relevant here is that your child needs some clear parenting and something has already done horribly wrong. Unless she has some neurodiversity, she knew this boy was upset and she did not care. Perhaps she can't cope with tiktok at such a young age, even if others can (and in reality there were 3 people either bullying or allowing this bullying so clearly something has gone wrong for the other girls too). If it were me, I would think she is not mature enough to have group play dates. I'd only allow her very highly monitored single play dates until she has developed empathy or reconnected with the empathy she used to have. I'd also be wanting to talk to her about this a LOT. Something has gone wrong and this needs to be a serious shot across the bow for both of you. She bullied him. You facilitated it. If you want things like that to NEVER happen again, you need to do some serious thinking together. Firstly think about why you privileged your DD's emotional wellbeing over the boys.

lots of kids have TikTok now. She doesn’t view bad content.

Lots of kids do lots of things that aren't age appropriate.

She absolutely could view bad content and you wouldn't know.

If she doesn't 'like' a post, she can still have watched it and even if you logged in as her you'd never know as it wouldn't be in her liked posts so no way of tracking what she's watching.

You sound a passive parent who is prioritising what makes your daughter feel good / makes her like you in the moment over doing what makes her safe, secure and decent in the long run. It's not decent to bully people. And she's being taught that if she does so, even in front of an adult, she rules the roost.

It's all so unhealthy.

If that's your response to me then you clearly haven't got a clue. My DD is 9 there is absolutely no way on this earth she would have TikTok, we have to protect our children not try to be their friends. It's so beyond inappropriate, you need to do some serious research into the harms of social media and young people, and don't be surprised when she continues down the path of inappropriate, bad behavior.
TBH your not exactly modeling good behavior though so poor kid probably doesn't stand much of a chance.

That poor kid must have felt sad and humiliated. Especially being banished to the BATHROOM. which was particularly spiteful.
Also, at best he must have felt angry and frustrated about being a spare part (one of my biggest pet hates). He could have done something else fun or constructive if he wasn't really welcome.

That poor boy, this should have been billed in the bud there and then. Your child should have been given a stern talking to in front of the friends and told under no certain terms do they bully in your home or at all. Forced him to stay in the bathroom, what the hell?
Your daughter sounds horrid and white frankly it's down to poor parenting. Not wanting any embarrassment? You should be embarrassed that you handled the situation appallingly.

As for tiktok, she's far too young. Get her off it asap.
She goes to the park unsupervised with other children and older children? You also need to get this nipped in the bud too.
Sounds like 'out of sight, out of mind parenting'

So she has bullied this boy twice and another boy once before and you haven’t dealt with it yet? C’mon this is not right. You need to sit down and tell her it’s not on and find out WHY she’s bullying boys for no reason. Then you’ll find out why she’s feeling the need to behave like this.
Get to the bottom of it OP and nip it in the bud asap!!

@wellhelloitsme This is interesting because I was under the impression that your algorithm is based on your likes and engagement? Her algorithm is mainly nothing more than dancing and Disney stuff. I’m definitely looking into this now.

@SacredDeer The local playground is next to the school and many of the children play in there after school as well as secondary kids. There’s often parents in there so it’s not remote or unsafe.

@Kirstenwe456

This is interesting because I was under the impression that your algorithm is based on your likes and engagement? Her algorithm is mainly nothing more than dancing and Disney stuff. I’m definitely looking into this now.

Yes, the algorithm that is based on what you watch but she could be actively seeking out literally anything else and watching it. It may affect the algorithm if she did that a lot but that wouldn't stop her seeing stuff.

It's scary she's on there at nine and you haven't done due diligence looking into how it works. She's so young.

Here's a question, would you let her have free access to Instagram? Because that's the same - your home feed is people you follow and targeted ads based on what you've interacted with, your discovery page uses the same algorithm to show stuff you are likely to enjoy based on your engagement... but you could proactively look up pages for anything - 18+ TV shows, porn stars, gambling sites, violent content... I'm not saying she'd look for that stuff at 9. But she could.

Would you let her have an Instagram account? Hopefully not. And if not, she shouldn't have a TikTok one either.

As a parent, you need to wise up on social media.

Have you read about Molly Russell OP? I strongly suggest you do.

This tragedy prompted us to have a conversation with our tween and teen earlier in the week, and to establish some new rules around phone use.

This is interesting because I was under the impression that your algorithm is based on your likes and engagement? Her algorithm is mainly nothing more than dancing and Disney stuff. I’m definitely looking into this now.

The algorithm will mostly show things she’s interested in, but it also shows her random new videos based on any random subject just to see if she is interested.

I don't think you should be worrying about embarrassing her for behaviour like that, some things warrant being called out immediately and on the spot. If being embarrassed happens then so be it.