Reply to "Catfishing" my kid?

Forum Index » Tweens and Teens

Reply to ""Catfishing" my kid? "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You should tell your child to relax. Whatever this person is saying is rather pointless. I encourage my child to ignore or tell an obnoxious kid to f-off. I recommend you do the same. If it becomes threatening, notify the school.

Apathy is the best attitude your child can have towards this kind of behavior. If he/she doesn't give a damn, the game is no longer fun for the other kid. [/quote]

OP here.

I brought my kid to a counselor who said this, in a nutshell.  The counselor (who is not related to the school) told my kid that the best tool is apathy. The counselor encouraged my kid to sit down with this child in real life and listen to the feelings.  Counselor thinks that looking my kid in the eyes will make some of this stop.

She said lots of people are very bold in text messages or facebook posts or online forums and will attack you because they feel witty and powerful at a keyboard, but they wouldn't say that if they could see your eyes.

FWIW, these kids are pre-teens.

I have also contacted an admin at the school so they have knowledge of this incident.  Not trying to fry the kid, but when I spoke to the other parents, they see were angry that their kids have unwittingly been pulled into an "online mob".

You know the scene in Mean Girls where the queen bee tries to trick Cady into criticizes her other friend on the phone, without telling her that the third friend is on the line?  That is what is happening on a loop, but instead of "Do you like Becky" it is "Tell me that story again about the time you cried in front of the whole school," or "Does it bother you that ___ is more popular than you? but coming from a variety of fake accounts. Then, hilarity ensures for this kid, while my kid feels awful and like it isn't possible to trust anyone.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics