Wwyd - phone prank

[whattodoijustdontknow]

Name changed as I'll probably talk to friends IRL about this too.

DS (13) is at a friends house. I've only met the friend in passing, but they are good friends at school and usually hang out at another friends house (who I know).

My phone just rang, it was DS calling. I answered and heard a voice (not DS obviously)say "I'll rape you", then they put the phone down.

I called back straight away and told DS to come home right now. He said that it was his friends little brother who took the phone as a prank, I said I don't care it was absolutely unacceptable and he needed to leave now. His friend called back about 10 mins later to say sorry it was his little brother and he'd heard stuff on the internet. I said thank you but DS needs to leave now. He's on his way home.

What the actual fuck?! I am both flummoxed and horrified. I've not had to navigate anything like this before. What do I say to DS when he gets home? I won't be letting him go back to that friend's house, which will go down like a lead balloon but I don't really care about that. I'll be explaining to him in very clear terms why the prank call was utterly unacceptable, and also about keeping his phone on him at all times. I have to give him the benefit of the doubt that he wasn't involved.

Is that ok? Enough? Too much? Help!

You call all the other parents and tell them it happened. They then speak to their sons and explain how disgusting their behaviour is.

I’d speak to the parents and shame them. It’s disgusting they’ve raised a child that would do that.

Maybe there is a need to make sure he is living in a safe environment.

@Lovageandrose yup. This.

When does shaming people ever work?

It's awful what this child did, but better to inform and support (if possible) rather than shame.

’Informing’ parents that their child threatened rape would be pretty shaming. Even you would be ashamed if your child did that, wouldn’t you?

I mean I’d feel the exact opposite! For me a teenager who thought it was appropriate (even as a joke) to call up and threaten to rape me would simply never ever be welcome in my home. I guess perhaps your thinking is that you can watch them in your house though - but if they decide to do something similar again, say to a girl from school or a young girl from your area, I wouldn’t want to be the parent in charge of them when that happened.

Have you asked him straight if this was reciprocal/any other calls were made? I think it’s important to know just in case they’ve made these calls to anyone who isn’t as sensible as you and didn’t guess who it was.

I mean it would be a bit hard to shame them over their disgusting parenting when the ‘partner in crime’ was your own son. The call was made from her own son’s phone. He was obviously involved to some extent as he was there and making panicked apologies afterwards. So I don’t think op should really be ‘shaming’ anyone - especially when she isn’t even 100% sure her own son didn’t make a similar call.

"Even" I would be ashamed, yes.
However, if you approached me in an attempt to deliberately shame me, it might make me wonder more about your own son's involvement in the incident. As PP said, it was from his phone.

And how could one approach you to ‘deliberately shame’ you? The facts speak for themselves. How you react to them is on you. Next you will be blaming OP for using her ear to hear the phone call.

I would speak to the boy's parents in person as they need to know and it would also show your son how seious this sort of language is. I also think you should meet the parents of any child that your son stays with in the future.

I would speak to the boy's school, and if there is a chance it was the 9 year old, his school too.

I would also wonder if you were the first person to get a "prank call" that day, can you check the call history? I wonder if every female contact got a rape threat from the "little brother".

The trouble is that the call came from your DSs phone.

i’m all for pranks & read your title thinking this is going to be someone with no SOH…..

How wrong I was, I would be totally & utterly livid at this, absolutely speechless that anyone that isn’t a complete psycho could even dream of saying this.

I think your plan sounds spot on…apart from I would also speak to the parents of the boy.

I honestly can't believe people are suggesting calling the Police. Ffs what on earth do you think.Polive should do.

Speak to the boys parents

No way the 9 year old brother did this. How stupid are they to use his phone to do something like that when it would be obvious to you that the call was made from your ds's phone. Definitely talk to the other kids parents and see if they can check is call log. Also check your ds's in case any other similar calls were made.

What are "the facts"?
I would just want to be clear that I knew who made the calls before going in all guns blazing.

Have you checked his calls log? That way you can see whether other calls were made