The Average Age For a Child Getting Their First Smartphone Is Now 10.3 Years (techcrunch.com) 175
An anonymous reader writes: A TechCrunch article, citing a report on Influence Central, states that the average age for a child getting their smartphone is now 10.3 years. The report adds that 64% of kids have access to the Internet via their own laptop or tablet, compared to just 42% in 2012. Also, 39% of kids get a social media account at 11.4 years, and 11% get a social media account when they were younger than 10.
Where? Im guessing you're not talking about... (Score:3, Insightful)
This worries me (Score:5, Insightful)
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The exact same comment was made for TV, the car, the locomotive, and the music of Beethoven. I wouldn't be surprised if it was made for math and the written language as well. We somehow all survived.
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You do realise people can write porn without even having to learn to spell!
You don't actually need ChromeOS for porn. Hell, you can even draw it in the sand with a stick.
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Re:This worries me (Score:5, Insightful)
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Seriously countries should get together to create a supervised children only internet, linking together children, education facilities and licensed adults who supervise. The whole of idea of children on an adult internet exposed in an uncontrolled manner to adult content and adult advertising and in fact any manipulative advertising that could psychological harm children.
A complete separate range of encrypted protocols to which unlicensed adults are legally denied access and which is meant to promote the
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Seriously countries should get together to create a supervised children only internet, linking together children, education facilities and licensed adults ...
Eh? I was waiting for the punchline, but it never came. Are you really serious!?
My children seem to have no trouble avoiding "adult" content on the internet, just as they avoid it on TV. I don't have to password-protect Game of Thrones in the media server.
Perhaps you are one of those people who want to treat teenagers as children, instead of the young adults that biology has made them?
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Changed my mind. 20 months old, counting with Elmo (Score:3)
A year or two ago I would have said I'd never buy a little a tablet or smartphone. My one year old daughter ended up at a childcare place where they use ipads, and she got an iPad. Very soon she was counting to ten with Elmo, saying "Caillou throw ball", and other things that most kids don't do until after they are two years old. Now, at 24 months old, she's about 6-9 months ahead on most of her skills. That's "only" 6-9 months, but it's also about 30% ahead.
We put effort into teaching her, of course, taki
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My son learned to read at 3 on an iPad and my old motorola droid, my daughter is roughly in the same place. When my son walked in to the doctors office and read the sign "Laboratory Access for Technician Use Only" at the age of 4, refused to enter and the staff laughed hysterically, I decided "More good than harm". Sure, there's a million things I worry about and watch for. A lot of them I worry about in meatspace too. Parenting remains a requirement.
A lot of people on /. don't like smartphones and wish to
Re:Changed my mind. 20 months old, counting with E (Score:5, Interesting)
A year or two ago I would have said I'd never buy a little a tablet or smartphone. My one year old daughter ended up at a childcare place where they use ipads, and she got an iPad. Very soon she was counting to ten with Elmo, saying "Caillou throw ball", and other things that most kids don't do until after they are two years old. Now, at 24 months old, she's about 6-9 months ahead on most of her skills. That's "only" 6-9 months, but it's also about 30% ahead.
Our kids have an iPad too, but it is locked down. Email, web browsing, the app store, are all turned off.
To even get apps to update I have to sign in and do it myself.
Nothing wrong with such a device, so long as you know how to control it.
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While that is true, I cannot count on a 5 year old to follow the rules, they just don't work like that. :)
And as for breaking into an iPad, unless he guesses the pin, I don't think that is possible. I'm open to hearing if that is not true.
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Set it to wipe after 10 incorrect tries, then take it away for 2 weeks after the first time they try it.
That fixed that problem. :)
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Do you wipe down the screen after typing the pin so they can't figure out which numbers were pressed?
No, but it doesn't tell them the order, and having it auto-wipe after 10 wrong guesses and having each further guess take longer and longer fixes that.
That, and being 5 years old and my being lord and ruler of all things in his life, are enough for now.
I've had my 10 year old try getting past the firewall on the desktop... he lost access to the computer for a week, including homework, everything. I made it quite clear that access to the computer is a privilege and that I can remove it until he is 18 years
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Keep in mind that "average" is just that. And it isn't a wealth versus poverty issue--plenty of wealthy parents take a stand against giving kids smart phones at a young age. That said, keep in mind that I think in most cases we aren't talking about a parent deciding to go out a buy an iPhone for a 10 year old. We're talking about parents upgrading their phone and giving their old phone to their kid instead of selling it, and adding a line to the family plan for $10 per month.
My oldest will be 10 next yea
Re:This worries me (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a 10 year old son right now, he will be 11 in a few months.
He doesn't have a smart phone and isn't getting one until he is 16.
He also doesn't have unlimited access to the Internet at home and for the time being, I can control that. In a few years it will be harder to control, but it has to come off at some point.
Giving a 10 year old unlimited access to the Internet at 10 is beyond stupid, most kids can't handle it and it won't end well.
Yes, there are exceptions, but they are the exceptions that prove the rule. Just remember that you're the Dad, not society, so do what you think is right for your kids, everyone else be dammed.
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Congratulations. I don't consider it beyond stupid, my 10 year old can handle it, and you're damned.
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my 10 year old can handle it
Maybe... there are likely exceptions out there, perhaps you're one of them...
MORE likely you're not and you'll regret it in 20 years, but only time will tell. :)
There is some NASTY stuff online... goat sex, BDSM, etc. that he'll run across that a 10 year old brain isn't ready to handle. Hell, I'm 40 and I don't want to see that stuff. :)
Further, most 10 year olds don't understand how creepy and messed up some people in the world really are, they will end up talking to someone who will not have their best
Re:This worries me (Score:4, Insightful)
I have a 10 year old son right now, he will be 11 in a few months.
He doesn't have a smart phone and isn't getting one until he is 16.
He also doesn't have unlimited access to the Internet at home and for the time being, I can control that. In a few years it will be harder to control, but it has to come off at some point.
Giving a 10 year old unlimited access to the Internet at 10 is beyond stupid, most kids can't handle it and it won't end well.
Yes, there are exceptions, but they are the exceptions that prove the rule. Just remember that you're the Dad, not society, so do what you think is right for your kids, everyone else be dammed.
You can't control what your 10 year old is going to have access to when he isn't home.
I've chosen rather to discuss with my son what to expect and he is aware that there is a lot on the net that would upset him. As such he polices himself better than I ever could, regardless of where he is.
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You can't control what your 10 year old is going to have access to when he isn't home.
Sure I can... He is home, then he is at school, or he is at a friends house of someone I trust...
He is 10, not 15... For now, I do have more or less total control over his world...
That won't last long however, he has one more year in elementary school, then it starts to go.
I've chosen rather to discuss with my son what to expect
You talk to your 10 year old about goat sex? Pedophiles? Worse?
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You can't control what your 10 year old is going to have access to when he isn't home.
Sure I can... He is home, then he is at school, or he is at a friends house of someone I trust...
He is 10, not 15... For now, I do have more or less total control over his world...
That won't last long however, he has one more year in elementary school, then it starts to go.
Emphasis mine.
I know that at 10 my son had at least one friend who was looking at more than he should have been - and it was my son that told me about it (as I said policing himself better than I could). So maybe your son will tell you - maybe not.
I've chosen rather to discuss with my son what to expect
You talk to your 10 year old about goat sex? Pedophiles? Worse?
Of course not in detail but yes, absolutely. He understands that people 'do things' together and that it's called sex and that usually this is nice and some is abnormal and can be very upsetting for him to see and so forth. And yes I give vague examples.
So far the worst thing I've seen in the search history is "naked women" which I find to be healthy enough curiousity for a pre-teen, not something to be worried about at all.
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My son is not allowed into other people's homes. Too many people do not secure their guns or their internet. At least one neighbor on the street that I know of keeps a loaded shotgun under their bed unsecured. And of course other parents do give unrestricted access to the Internet to their kids. That is why my kids don't go into other people's homes.
Electronic devices are not allowed at school either. No phones, no tablets, and the schools devices are locked down.
He really doesn't have any place to be
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My son is not allowed into other people's homes. Too many people do not secure their guns or their internet. At least one neighbor on the street that I know of keeps a loaded shotgun under their bed unsecured. And of course other parents do give unrestricted access to the Internet to their kids. That is why my kids don't go into other people's homes.
Electronic devices are not allowed at school either. No phones, no tablets, and the schools devices are locked down.
He really doesn't have any place to be exposed to any of it.
One more year of elementary school, then that starts to go, since kids are allowed to have phones in junior high. I will spend the summer before junior high discussing this stuff. He isn't ready for it now.
Well I hope he has siblings then, as otherwise it must be a pretty lonely time.
My experience growing up in the US was that everything that was bad, forbidden, out of reach, blocked...was thus waaaay more interesting than it should have been. This is why I prefer to expose my son to everything that he might encounter, in moderation and with discussion, instead of it just happening to him all at once when he gets free of a closed ecosystem of control.
You'll raise your kid the way you think best, of course.
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My parents restricted Internet access, computer access, and put the computer in a public viewable space. That never stopped me from downloading a ton of porn.
Then they didn't do a very good job... Or you were 15 and just went to someone else's house. :)
Our computers are password protected and Internet access is on a white-list... My kids are 10 and under and while they are smart, there are limits to what they can do without me knowing about it, at least in my house...
I had to actively work against my parents every moment I was on the computer
Ahh, in other words you didn't give a crap about your parents, their rules, or their efforts to raise you. What a punk ass worthless fuck...
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Ha at 10 I was using renegade on the c64 to copy farm house cartoon porn from friends.
When the C64 was current, it is likely that your parents were not tech savvy... Sadly, many parents still aren't...
I am, have done this for a long time, and keep the house fairly well locked down.
From time to time, they'll surprise me, but I have monitoring in place to catch it.
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They won't be social outcasts. I don't allow my teenagers to have a smart phone/tablet/etc. unless they want to buy and pay for it themselves (shocker - they don't) and they are far from social outcasts.
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I'm a tech nerd, but I had similar reservations. Up until my first son was 2, we let him watch children's television and generally were the normal American household. A friend of mine told me about Waldorf education and so we went to some seminars at a local school. I'm not really onboard with the spiritual philosophy, but I've been totally won over by their educational philosophy. They stress the importance of social development for young children, introducing scholastic skills later than public school
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My sons will have, in their pocket, full access to the breadth of the internet by the age of 10
I have 3 grandkids and another 2 on the way, the only thing resembling a mobile phone in my childhood was Captain Kirk's communicator. I think the fact a 10yo can have a communicator in his pocket is fucking awesome, the fact that it can also access mankind's knowledge base is doubly awesome
Disclaimer - I haven't had a mobile phone for over a decade now.
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"The kids no longer do what kids in that place used to do" - die from malnourishment and/or easily-treated disease?
LOL... old people (I am one of them) (Score:2)
First let me say I am likely older than you. I just say that because I was born in the late 60s. I grew up on farm, obviously didn't have internet, or even cable. I spent a lot of time outside, but as soon as I could get technology, I did. My kids will never know the feeling of riding your bike in the rain for miles with a pocket full of quarters to play arcade games. And that is OK. I am not nostalgic for "the good old days", nor am I angry at "this generation of kids" the way so many other people my
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I completely agree. I have a 9 year old girl, a 5 year old boy and a 3 year old girl. Although I was working in fast food at 16, I didn't get a cellular phone until I was 24. Payphones or the house phone were the only way to communicate. It's very different than when we were growing up. I think that creates the fear: that a social norm in our generation can be fundamentally different in our children's generation. Our grandparents would say "wow, back in my day we had a party-line if we had a phone at all" a
Re: This worries me (Score:2)
The original article mentions that the survey asked parents how old the kid was when they gave them the phone, but didn't ask if the phone had service or not.
It's really common for parents to hand-me-down their old, no longer activated phones to their kids. It's also really cheap and easy to buy pre-paid Android phones and not even activate them.
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Re: This worries me (Score:2)
*Facepalm* (Score:5, Insightful)
Want photos? Excellent. Here's a camera, film, and some batteries. Remember, these will have to be developed down the street.
Want to use the computer. Fine. It's my computer. My lock down. And it's in the dining room.
Want to use a phone to call someone? Cool. Here's the land line.
*Need* a cell phone? Alright, here's one with three buttons: Mom, Dad, and Police.
Oh, you bought one yourself? Neat! It's mine now.
You hate me? I'm so very sad. No child has ever hated a parent before.
Re:*Facepalm* (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not that strict with the phones or anything else -- but I'm not far behind.
My kids have RDP terminals in their rooms with just enough bandwidth to run word/excel. The main computer is in the dining room (on wheels when we need the full space for guests). All homework is done at the dining room table.
Only my son (16) has a smart phone and he pays for service himself. The phone, however, is mine. He's not allowed to "own" a phone until he pays rent. Phones aren't allowed in the house during the week except early evening (after homework/dinner and before 10pm). Weekends are a bit more generous.
The cool thing is I wrote a chore tracker which they need to fill out every day or they automagically lose internet access on all their devices (except access to the tracker). They just need to fill out if they did a task and if not provide a reason. It wont cut them off if they dont do their choirs -- just if they dont report it. I can cut them off or return access from my phone anywhere with an internet connection. They're pretty honest about filling it out and know if they lie and get caught it's a week without internet.
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And they should be cheap, too. They're always losing them or forgetting and putting them in the washer. (unclear who I'm talking about here...)
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My son's service is limited by his resources. About $8 per month on Freedompop -- He's got about 500MB of data per month. Phone service sucks (it's VOIP) but outgoing calls uses sprint's cell network which are very good. There's other things for which he'd like to use is money.
And the phone is off ebay -- basically $100.
My daughter (13), on the other hand, was a $19 nokia t-mobile prepay. I paid $100 for minutes on t-mobile way-back-when and have dropped $10/year (yes year) to keep the phone active. S
Murphy's law (Score:2)
chore tracker
You sound like a pretty cool dad, empowering them to learn haxxoring and shit.
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The cool thing is I wrote a chore tracker which they need to fill out every day or they automagically lose internet access on all their devices (except access to the tracker).
I'm reminded of that Jira for kids parody video.
"We have to finish the dishes scrum"
"There, I've commited the last of the dishes to the drying rack"
"We should do some quality control to see if we got them clean enough"
"No time!"
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We are the same. We actually switched from wireless phones in the house to one hardwired phone in the kitchen when the kids got old enough that it became a problem. The only computer they can use in the kitchen where we can monitor what they are doing (and we have to unlock it before they can use it). We have a TV, but all it is hooked up to is a DVD player. No internet access to the TV. You want to go to a friends house and do I don't know what? Let's invite them over here instead. Etc. I'm absolutely flab
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C'mon. A camera with film? At least make it digital. It's a lot cheaper and easier to use in the long run. Do they even make such a restricted cell phone? We thought it would be useful for my son to be able to call us if necessary, and discussed not getting it out at school.
The problem with being too restrictive a parent is that you may push your kid(s) to do things outside the home that may be worse from your point of view and may not be supervised at all. You have to let them screw up sometimes,
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I will not trust my child with a private computer, digital camera, or cell phone until high school. (...) You hate me? I'm so very sad. No child has ever hated a parent before.
All kids do at some point, that doesn't change the fact that some parents really are being unreasonable. It's not proof you're doing it right. And kids have a pretty good idea what normal is, if nine out of ten in their class gets to have something or do something they will know you are being very uptight, it's not like they're asking for ice cream for dinner or bedtime to be after midnight. That's when your kids will start lying to you, when they were at a friend's house they weren't playing Civilization i
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I will not trust my child with a private computer, digital camera, or cell phone until high school. And even then, it will be for very low values of "trust". I was young. I know what we would have done with those tools had we had them. I'm not letting my child's life get screwed up by such indiscretions.
Want photos? Excellent. Here's a camera, film, and some batteries. Remember, these will have to be developed down the street.
Want to use the computer. Fine. It's my computer. My lock down. And it's in the dining room.
Want to use a phone to call someone? Cool. Here's the land line.
*Need* a cell phone? Alright, here's one with three buttons: Mom, Dad, and Police.
Oh, you bought one yourself? Neat! It's mine now.
You hate me? I'm so very sad. No child has ever hated a parent before.
Yep, that doesn't sound like a recipe for maximum rebellious action as soon as your child is out of your immediate presence.
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"Shelter your kids..."
Excellent advice!
"...they're in REAL trouble"
I know what you mean!
See what I did there? Maybe next time you can address a full sentence instead of just a snip.
cancer/no cancer (Score:2)
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A group of top cancer researchers out of the University of Sydney pored over 29-years of data to come to that conclusion. They pulled their data from the Australian National Cancer Registry because all cancer diagnoses in Australia have to be legally registered. The team compared “age and gender-specific incidence rates of 19,858 male and 14,222 females diagnosed with brain cancer between 1982 and 2012, and mobile phone usage data from 1987 to 2012,” writes l
Re: cancer/no cancer (Score:3)
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Dang! (Score:3)
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Well you didn't go to school in the 21st century either.
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Well I didn't go to school in the 21st century either but I do have a smart phone and I do see how the world has changed.
I'm on the fence, I still I haven't decided if I think cell phones and constant internet and social networking is going to kill society or make it better. I'm sure it will be worse before it's better though.
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It will be self driving cars turned into killbots that will kill society. We will of course record the whole thing on Instagram and Vine, and complain about our new robotic overlords on twitter.
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A sunspot will throw off GPS navigation briefly and every car will crash simultaneously.
The decay of society right there (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, 39% of kids get a social media account at 11.4 years, and 11% get a social media account when they were younger than 10.
We are letting the personal information of children be sold for profit. This is a more certain sign of the decay of society than most that I can think of. It doesn't matter how harmless some people may think this is, the bigger problem is that most people don't think of that problem at all. They sign little Johnnie up for a facebook account so that he can see Grandma's wall, and pretty soon Johnnie's personal events are being sold to every company you can think of.
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We are letting the personal information of children be sold for profit.
Hey, they should pass a law against collecting data on people under the age of 13! What... they already did that, and all the social media companies' business models are based on encouraging kids to LIE about their age in order to set up an account? Welcome to corporate-owned America!
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Average age for first glasses now 11.3 years (Score:2)
Pretty much wrecking the eyes of an entire generation.
kids (Score:2)
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If this trend continues... (Score:2)
Children will have smart phones before conception!
Need more data (Score:2)
When I was 10 (Score:2)
The little snotnoses were in their 20s when the smartphone came out, and I don't know what the policy is on the grand-snots.
In MY day... (Score:2)
...the average age for a child to get a smartphone was 40-something. Because that's how old we all were by the time they came on the market.
My daughter got one at 2 (Score:4, Insightful)
Now before I'm told how horrible a parent I am, let me explain. Like anything in life or parenting, I think it's about moderation and structure. We gave our daughter one of our older Android phones when she was about 2.5 years. We were embarking on a 5 hour flight with a toddler and a baby so yes, I was looking for distractions. I gave her a locked down phone (no dialing or data connection possible) with two educational apps and one simple drawing app. We play the apps with her and monitor her play. She can also take photos. That's it. It held her interest for a while, as did a number of other activities we brought with us on the plane, but with a limited amount of distraction available she eventually grew bored. She still has access to her phone at home now and she rarely uses it. We've taken it as a backup to many outings but find we only pull it out rarely (specifically dinner at a restaurant, close to or past bedtime, aka the witching hour).
If you give a kid a phone with the entirety of the internet and app store available with no structure, sure they'll become overwhelmed or addicted. Same thing goes for most stuff we give kids as they get older (insert car analogy). But I also think it's important to have access to the tools, connectedness, and creativity that computers and smartphones can unlock. So as my kids get older and they demonstrate they are ready, I'll unlock more functionality. But if and when I do, they can expect a lesson in how to use that new functionality safely and responsibly. If they abuse it, they lose it. I think that's about the best you can do. Maybe I'll be singing a different song in 7 years.
Trickle down effect (Score:2)
Should I feel bad? (Score:2)
We have two kids, 11 and 8.
We set up a old smartphone as a "house phone". It's shared on my Ting account. We let the kids use it when they go on walks in the neighborhood. Yesterday we had to leave the 11 year old in the house for the morning so we told her to text us every hour that she was OK. She's been left alone for shorter periods so we were thought she could handle it, but she is right on the cusp of the responsibility to be home alone for a few hours. She's not old enough to be home with her sister,
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What 7 year old needs a $400+ phone? "Smart phones" in particular are huge distractions. My 16 year old has an iphone 5 and when home it's not in use (my rules) until after homework and dinner. Then it's back on the table for charging at 10pm. My 13 year old uses a little nokia candy-bar phone with a flip keyboard.
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Ignore the stupid ACs, who are probably trolling anyway...
You're doing the right thing...
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Or you are and the OP are the assholes. I guess it's 50/50...
Re:Hmm..... (Score:5, Funny)
Moderators, please delete this comment. My seven-year old made this comment from his iPhone and has been severely reprimanded. No access until after homework and dinner tonight.
Re:Hmm..... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Well that's insightful.
Perhaps you'd care to explain what, exactly, is BS. Do you not believe the statistics? If not, why not?
Re: It's a real problem for some parents. (Score:3)
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