Understanding and assuming the risks when you give your child a phone & social media.

Do you know all the risks that your child is exposed to? Are you willing to be responsible for them?

I have been spending a lot of time thinking and writing about teens and social media, based on a cautionary tales I have seen as a teacher, administrator, and dad.

There are people who spent their careers studying this, so you can search for some “how-two” stuff from them. I’m spending a few posts on the “don’t-do-this” side of things.

In short, my position is that social media has some real and serious dangers, as well as some benefits. However, the risks and potential for harm are very real. That is borne out by the recent Surgeon General’s advisory report on the topic

That said, I do think that good parenting can do a lot to mitigate and ameliorate and protect against that harm—however, that parenting has to be intentional, consistent, and ongoing and it has to be provided in some dose, range, and frequency proportional to the child’s social media use.

As people consider their social media parenting strategy and approach, I have been discussing some mistakes I’ve seen (and made) over the years, specifically focusing on common pitfalls parents make.

These are fundamental problems and incorrect baseline assumptions that can have long-tail effects down the road.

The first two, which I shared last week are:

1. Don’t ever say, or even think, “My child would never do that.”

2. Don’t romanticize or overestimate your child and their maturity

Today, I want to tackle a big one:

3. You have to understand the risks, and you have to understand that you are assuming those risks.

If you get your child a phone, you simply must be clear-eyed about the risks and be prepared to assume them. If you still decide to get your child a phone then that is a thoughtful, engaged, conscious choice.

But please, please, don’t be swept along by the “everyone else has one” argument.

Or, worse, don’t be the parent who is so concerned about their child being cool and advanced that they drive this by being the first one in the grade to get their child a phone.

Once you understand the risks (and you can read them in the Surgeon General’s sobering report on adolescents and social media use or you can read my deep dive into the report here, here, and here), then you need to realize that you are assuming this responsibility.

You can’t farm this out—or put the blame on—the school, the other kids, the other parents, or even your child.

There are big, scary, dramatic things, and I’ll get to those later.

For now, here’s a big, but subtle, risk most parents don’t think about: the impact a phone and social media will have on social considerations, feeling left out, and a sense of FOMO.

A story, if I may:

My children attended the school where I taught. It’s a private school, so the people who attend are generally pretty affluent, although many families work very hard and sacrifice to make it work. People were truly lovely and inclusive and our children were treated with enormous generosity. It was a blessing in every way.

There was one blip.

One day a parent in my child’s grade was complaining about some petty theatre issue. This was standard and routine. But at one point, trying to draw more authority, the parent said “Well the other night at the Bradford’s (not their real name) party, everyone was talking.

Skeptically, I asked who “everyone” was. I was confident that everyone was not talking about this minor, niche issues. But as we talked, I realized that everyone at the party was “everyone” in the grade. The whole grade had apparently been invited—except us.

I was in my 40s at the time. Happy, enjoying doing meaningful, challenging work. I had a doctorate. Friends. A great family. I was secure in myself. And yet that really, really stung!

On another occasion, my wife would go to our child’s athletic games. I am a hermit at such events, but she likes to chat and engage with people. So she’d go stand by other moms on the team. They would greet her and were sincerely nice, but then, with her in the middle, they would literally talk around her, planning lunches or talking about parties they’d gone to, etc.

My wife, also a grounded adult always felt strange. She said, “I don’t even want to go, but it’s really weird to be talked around like you don’t even exist.”

I bring this up to point out that even grounded, happy adults can feel left out in situations.

Small wonder then that teens who live and breathe based on social standing and connection with friends respond with true angst when they are left out.

This is not dramatic or big. It’s not a horror story, but the possible sense of exclusion or hurt feelings that can arise from seeing others enjoying events or experiences to which your child was not invited. That’s a really big deal to an adolescent.

If your child can’t handle this—and a lot of people, kids and adults can’t—there is no shame. But if they are constantly in pain because of this they are not ready for social media.

And, if they have it and it is causing pain, it might be necessary for them to step back (incidentally, there’s nothing that prevents you from walking back access if needed).

That is critical. They have to be ready for this because you will never be able to manage other parents and other children and what they post.

Imagine if someone marketed a device starting tomorrow with the promise that this device had some questionable benefits, but almost certainly it would regularly zap your child’s brain and activate the places that felt loneliness, left out, friendless, and shame. It regularly stoked their natural FOMO.

Sounds great, huh?

I do understand that phones and other digital media are how kids socialize. That is why I finally gave in to one of my kids. He was just at a big social disadvantage since everything from math homework to big pool parties were being discussed in group texts.

So this is tough. Personally, I feel that if parents would rise up and revolt, push back against companies who profit by exposing children to all sorts of possible damage and bad outcomes, and, most of all, band together in social groups and make a pact not to let their children have phones (or other devices) until much later, this could be addressed. But I digress…

The point here is that, as parents, we must understand that this is a fundamental, ongoing challenge of social media. We can’t try to force the landscape to fit our child’s preferences. Our child must be made ready for the road; we can’t expect to fit the road to the child.

So many times, well-meaning, loving parents of very sensitive children get their child a phone and then spend years trying to manage other children and their parents and the way they use phones, or trying to get the school or others to manage it.

It is just not realistic and the more energy that is spent, the more efforts start to backfire socially for the child, and sometimes, for the parents as well.

The sad irony is a child may be feeling left out, so the parents get a phone and then the child feels more left out so the parents start trying nudge or guide or direct the way other people’s children and what they do and what they post online. This then causes some tension and the other kids may pull back even further—which then creates a really sad spiral.

This is why I say that the parents of the minor getting the phone have to assume that risk. It’s human nature to try to address the perceived flaws and weaknesses of others, but it is rarely effective.

I knew a sweet, sweet child once who really wanted to be friends with two other students.

The students were nice to her, kind, and even generous. They ate lunch with her and even included her in some after-school activities. But they were best friends of many years standing and the reality was that they didn’t want to have a new best friend.

But anytime they did anything together, the other child would see it online and be sad. The parent saw this as bullying and exclusion and started pushing, complaining, saying mean things about the other girls, etc.

But it wasn’t mean. It was painful, but the fact that something is painful doesn’t make it mean. Not everyone is going to click with everyone to the same degree. That’s so hard, even as an adult, but that’s a pretty fundamental reality. Better to teach a child how to cope with that than trying to stage manage such a situation.

I would submit that this child wasn’t ready for social media quite yet. It was too distressing for her. She was a great kid, by the way. Bright, clever, energetic, brave, and super fun. But that doesn’t mean she was ready for social media.

Parenting a child on social media means preparing them for this and helping them process it in a mature way.

Parenting a child on social media also means thinking deeply about what should and shouldn’t be posted—as well as when and how often. That is also a responsibility. I would argue that if a child can’t be a little discreet about things then they are not ready for social media either.

I knew some students once who had a slumber party. During the party, they took a picture and sent it via Snapchat to someone they hadn’t invited.

Okay—that seems pretty clearly wrong and egregious. I suspect most people would agree. I don’t think those kids were ready for social media, and I think the parents should have been far more engaged.

But how about a more public post the next day? Something that says something like, “So grateful for my crew. They have my back always,” followed by a hashtag with inside jokes and also soppy affection.

Is that wrong?

It gets muddy and murky fast.

If a child cannot handle such situations, and if you are not willing to engage with them and help them on both sides of the coin, it may be better to reconsider their access to these platforms.

Remember: rather than trying to control the social media landscape, it is more effective to empower our children to manage their online experiences. That happens with time, engagement, coaching, mistakes, apologies, and, of course, parental modeling.

On that note, here’s a sign of parental readiness: are you able to contact other parents and manage difficult situations? Sometimes, in rare cases, a school or even law enforcement will need to step in, but those are really extreme cases. They just can’t get involved in mediating problems or trying to help with hurt feelings. That just exceeds their mission and resources.

Over the years I’ve been approached often by parents who are concerned about various situations. I almost always encourage them to talk to the other parents. In almost every case, that is really uncomfortable and awkward but it almost always goes far better than expected. And when it doesn’t, that is sad, but honestly, there’s not really anything else that can be done (barring some really egregious or illegal stuff).

So if you can’t do this, it is probably best for your child not to have access.

Of course, there are other risks as well. I’ve talked about them before. The Surgeon General talked about them. These risks are both things that are inherently risky—e.g. being exposed to sexual content—or are inherently neutral or good but become problematic because of the amount of time spent—e.g. chatting with friends to the exclusion of other important things, not getting enough sleep, and so.

It’s important to realize that your child might be bullied. What do you do in that case?

Likewise, your child might be really mean (it may seem unlikely but happens all the time).

Your child might be asked to share nude photos. They might offer to share them. This happens to and is done by boys and girls alike and is not always just a boy pressuring a girl, incidentally. Remember how curious kids are about their bodies and those of other people—especially the unfamiliar kind. They might do nothing and still receive nudes. Regardless of intent or what they did or didn’t do, this is illegal! (Read this article—it may really shake up what you think you know about sexting—h/t the wonderful Jennifer L.W. Fink and her valuable newsletter).

According to Snapchat’s parent company, 2 out of 3 teens have been targeted by sextortion scams (story here again, from the wonderful Jennifer L.W. Fink and her valuable newsletter). Is your child ready for that? Are they going to be equally ready and able to make a good decision late at night, alone in their room on a day when simmering crockpots of hormones have them really curious sexually?

Your child might hear really inappropriate things—racial slurs, hardcore pornography, hate speech, and other things that are less blatant but are still inappropriate or troubling.

Worse, there’s a high chance that your child might say unfiltered, inappropriate things that could bring anything from embarrassment to more serious consequences, such as social ostracism or discipline from other institutions. In all likelihood they will do this without malice, just repeating something they heard that they don’t fully understand. But consequences for such things can be swift and severe, regardless of the offending child’s level of understanding.

If you doubt that your child would do anything bad, here are a few quick questions to ask yourself and consider carefully: