Peer pressure to buy kids phones
Discussion
My eldest has a 5se which she pays for. She was recently offered an upgrade with a better data package before she went to uni but was happy with the se and I managed to upgrade her data.
My youngest has a 6 on a contract but is always going on about getting one of the latest models which isn't going to happen, the 6 is more than adequate for a 13 year old. I don't care much for apple products, it's all about fashion as far as I can see and the equivalent android phones are as good if not better than iPhones.
Her school has now banned phones as others have mentioned in this thread which isn't a bad thing as they can and do cause problems.
My youngest has a 6 on a contract but is always going on about getting one of the latest models which isn't going to happen, the 6 is more than adequate for a 13 year old. I don't care much for apple products, it's all about fashion as far as I can see and the equivalent android phones are as good if not better than iPhones.
Her school has now banned phones as others have mentioned in this thread which isn't a bad thing as they can and do cause problems.
Zetec-S said:
Another one here. Slightly OT, but I vaguely remember an IT lesson where we were put into groups and had to go out and do a survey on what trainers all the kids in our year wore, then make a database from the results. The 2 things I remember is one of the guys on my team was insistent that we didn't put Reebok down as a separate category (as he said they were crap), and I was insistent we had Gola as a category (because that's what I had). Results were in, there was only 1 person with Gola (yep, that would be me) and we had about 50 people in "other" asking why we didn't have Reebok as a choice
tinytim123 said:
Would be nice if the schools could just ban the phones but what happens if they get confiscated then there is an emergency and the kid can't call their parents, emergency services.
How did i ever manage to survive growing up without instant contact with the emergency services !Nanook said:
Gary C said:
tinytim123 said:
Would be nice if the schools could just ban the phones but what happens if they get confiscated then there is an emergency and the kid can't call their parents, emergency services.
How did i ever manage to survive growing up without instant contact with the emergency services !I don't think it's a very good one to be honest.
I mean, mankind used to survive without cars, without vaccinations, without medicine. And yeah, some of us survived.
These days if someone confiscated your car, would you be as blasé as to say "Well, we used to manage without them so no harm done"?
I don't have kids, so on these sorts of discussions I'm frequently told that I can't possibly understand, but consider this:
You buy a phone for your kid, for emergency purposes. The dumbass gets caught with it out of their bag in school, and a teacher confiscates it. At the end of the day, your darling child goes to ask for it back, to be told the teacher is keeping it til the end of the week, and a parent or guardian will have to pick it up.
On the way home, something happens to your kid. They do not have their emergency phone to contact you, because they did something silly.
Now, I'm sure that for the purposes of this discussion, you'll say "Tough, that's what they get, they shouldn't have been using it in class"
But i suspect that if this actually happened, you might have a slightly different view on the teacher holding onto your property after hours.
But hey, I don't have kids, so I can never possibly understand
Phones are a disease, they spread like measles and can cause harm and misery. Makes the kid more likely to be a target for mugging etc, no end of them walk about without looking, almost ran one over last year when they dropped their phone, it bounced into the road and they jumped in front of me to get it.
Most of the time i dont know where mine is, or care.
The phone, I mean, not the kids.
Nanook said:
Gary C said:
tinytim123 said:
Would be nice if the schools could just ban the phones but what happens if they get confiscated then there is an emergency and the kid can't call their parents, emergency services.
How did i ever manage to survive growing up without instant contact with the emergency services !I don't think it's a very good one to be honest.
I mean, mankind used to survive without cars, without vaccinations, without medicine. And yeah, some of us survived.
These days if someone confiscated your car, would you be as blasé as to say "Well, we used to manage without them so no harm done"?
I don't have kids, so on these sorts of discussions I'm frequently told that I can't possibly understand, but consider this:
You buy a phone for your kid, for emergency purposes. The dumbass gets caught with it out of their bag in school, and a teacher confiscates it. At the end of the day, your darling child goes to ask for it back, to be told the teacher is keeping it til the end of the week, and a parent or guardian will have to pick it up.
On the way home, something happens to your kid. They do not have their emergency phone to contact you, because they did something silly.
Now, I'm sure that for the purposes of this discussion, you'll say "Tough, that's what they get, they shouldn't have been using it in class"
But i suspect that if this actually happened, you might have a slightly different view on the teacher holding onto your property after hours.
But hey, I don't have kids, so I can never possibly understand
Nanook said:
Gary C said:
You dont ?, well ours only had phones when they could afford to pay for the calls. they are tough enough to ignore peer pressure and well adjusted for that, and not reliant on people generally to pull their arses out of a fire. Millennial's they maybe, but no snowflakes.
Phones are a disease, they spread like measles and can cause harm and misery. Makes the kid more likely to be a target for mugging etc, no end of them walk about without looking, almost ran one over last year when they dropped their phone, it bounced into the road and they jumped in front of me to get it.
Most of the time i dont know where mine is, or care.
The phone, I mean, not the kids.
Fair enough. I don't view my phone as a disease, i view as the most useful tool I own. The problems you describe are with the user, but that's a different debate, Phones are a disease, they spread like measles and can cause harm and misery. Makes the kid more likely to be a target for mugging etc, no end of them walk about without looking, almost ran one over last year when they dropped their phone, it bounced into the road and they jumped in front of me to get it.
Most of the time i dont know where mine is, or care.
The phone, I mean, not the kids.
I stand by my point that holding on to something like that until it suits them isn't right. They might have it written in their school rules but I suspect that if anyone ever took them to task on it, it might not hold up.
vsonix said:
It wouldn't surprise me if manufacturers pay 'cool' kids to evangelise certain brands, I remember when I was in school the arbitrary rules over what trainers were 'cool' and what weren't - how did anyone know to begin with, was it just a matter of copying older siblings (I had none)?
For example: Nike were cool but only if they were 'Air' ones and not regular. Reebok 'Pump' Hi-Tops - epitome of cool, then went to epitome of 'Naff' in the space of about a week. Just after I got some, sods law. 'Naf Naf' was cool, despite the name. Fila - if you had a pair of Fila basketball boots you were like God. Adidas was cool, I guess thanks to the Hip-Hop effect and Run DMC rapping about them. Reebok were cool with a certain demographic - the 14 year olds who already smoked 30 a day and were always in detention. But woe betide you if you were adventurous/stupid enough to show up with Hi-Tec trainers (but you were cool if you managed to bend the rules and wear black Hi-tec trainers instead of Clarks school clodhoppers), or Puma or *gasp* Gola.
Any of those brands was like social suicide and marked you out as having fleas and/or herpes.
This is it. It's just the 2018 equivalent of the peer pressure that we had as kids in the 80s and before. Instead of the parents caving in and buying 12 year old little Jakob (with a 'k', obviously) £700 phones they should tell him "no" and to save up for it himself if he wants it, same as most of us had to do 'back in the day'. This crap being trotted out about having to buy them to stop them being bullied is just mollycoddling and will do them more harm than good in the longer term. Being bullied to some extent is part and parcel of growing up and teaches you to stand up for yourself.For example: Nike were cool but only if they were 'Air' ones and not regular. Reebok 'Pump' Hi-Tops - epitome of cool, then went to epitome of 'Naff' in the space of about a week. Just after I got some, sods law. 'Naf Naf' was cool, despite the name. Fila - if you had a pair of Fila basketball boots you were like God. Adidas was cool, I guess thanks to the Hip-Hop effect and Run DMC rapping about them. Reebok were cool with a certain demographic - the 14 year olds who already smoked 30 a day and were always in detention. But woe betide you if you were adventurous/stupid enough to show up with Hi-Tec trainers (but you were cool if you managed to bend the rules and wear black Hi-tec trainers instead of Clarks school clodhoppers), or Puma or *gasp* Gola.
Any of those brands was like social suicide and marked you out as having fleas and/or herpes.
Thanks to my late Old Dear's frugalities I had the Gola, the Hi-Tec and the Puma trainers at different times and no amount of tantrums demanding that she buy me the latest Nike Air or Reebok Pump changed that. I either wore my Gola's or I went out barefoot
. Naturally that put me on the receiving end of being bullied and a few pastings to boot but you only put up with it for so long and then you fight back, which completely takes the wind out of their sails as they are not expecting it and then suddenly you find that they give you a wide berth and find a new target 
.As for those brands being "social suicide", I'll have you know that I bagged the hottest girl in my year that all the guys wanted and went out with her for over a year often wearing my Puma trainers, unbranded C&A shirts/T-shirts and Wrangler jeans
and received no complaints whatsoever! (although truth be known she did say she fancied me because I was mature for my age and took no s
t off the bullies when they started being gobby but let's not let that get in the way of my cheap-trainers-bird-pulling story 
).In summary, going without teaches you the value of things/money and being on the receiving end of some bullying isn't a bad thing either in the longer term. Giving kids everything they want when they demand it just turns them into entitled spoilt brats and usually results in them being given a label for their wholly predictable behavior issues before they're out of school.
wjwren said:
My 2 daughters had a meltdown the other week. They both want new iphone 7's for Christmas. I informed them santa wont be buying £900 of phones. They are 12&14. Some of the kids in their class have contract iphones, these same parents rent houses and lease the latest cars. They dont own jack st. I suggested id buy a brand new Moto G or similar, that went down well! It HAS to have the apple badge on apparently. They have had 2nd hand iphone 5's in the past but they break and are usually bought off ebay and are already knackered or they get old iphones off family members, which are equally broken. Or they drop them and break them. They refuse to have a case as it isnt cool.
How the ft. I suggested id buy a brand new Moto G or similar, that went down well! It HAS to have the apple badge on apparently. They have had 2nd hand iphone 5's in the past but they break and are usually bought off ebay and are already knackered or they get old iphones off family members, which are equally broken. Or they drop them and break them. They refuse to have a case as it isnt cool.k do you know what other parents financial affairs are? Having a dig at people renting their home? How PH "tw@t" of you 
Camelot1971 said:
wjwren said:
My 2 daughters had a meltdown the other week. They both want new iphone 7's for Christmas. I informed them santa wont be buying £900 of phones. They are 12&14. Some of the kids in their class have contract iphones, these same parents rent houses and lease the latest cars. They dont own jack st. I suggested id buy a brand new Moto G or similar, that went down well! It HAS to have the apple badge on apparently. They have had 2nd hand iphone 5's in the past but they break and are usually bought off ebay and are already knackered or they get old iphones off family members, which are equally broken. Or they drop them and break them. They refuse to have a case as it isnt cool.
How the ft. I suggested id buy a brand new Moto G or similar, that went down well! It HAS to have the apple badge on apparently. They have had 2nd hand iphone 5's in the past but they break and are usually bought off ebay and are already knackered or they get old iphones off family members, which are equally broken. Or they drop them and break them. They refuse to have a case as it isnt cool.k do you know what other parents financial affairs are? Having a dig at people renting their home? How PH "tw@t" of you Nanook said:
Gary C said:
the disease was slightly tongue in cheek, but phones are causing some problems, maybe not in proportion to their benefits but still a problem. I think schools have every right to ban them on school property. Phones are banned on site where I work and only recently have been allowed for businnes purposes in the admin building for a select few who have to display a pass on a lanyard at all times (otherwise they might get shot)
I agree they're not required in school, they should be left in pockets or bags, but the school removing it on a Monday and not giving it back to the parent til Friday doesn't seem right to me. You're not allowed to use a phone in your workplace, but if you have to nip out to take a call for some reason, they'll still let you take it home at the end of the day.
actually, im not even allowed to nip out, not allowed out of the control room area and two out of the three of us must be in the control room at all times, no exception. Security are very sensitive about mobile phones.
Gary C said:
Nanook said:
Gary C said:
the disease was slightly tongue in cheek, but phones are causing some problems, maybe not in proportion to their benefits but still a problem. I think schools have every right to ban them on school property. Phones are banned on site where I work and only recently have been allowed for businnes purposes in the admin building for a select few who have to display a pass on a lanyard at all times (otherwise they might get shot)
I agree they're not required in school, they should be left in pockets or bags, but the school removing it on a Monday and not giving it back to the parent til Friday doesn't seem right to me. You're not allowed to use a phone in your workplace, but if you have to nip out to take a call for some reason, they'll still let you take it home at the end of the day.
I can't speak for anyone else's school, but at my son's school, that's the second level penalty.
The first time in a term that they're caught using a phone when they shouldn't be - which is any time other than in specifically mandated classroom sessions - they lose the phone for the rest of the day.
The second time, they lose the phone for the rest of the week, and a parent has to collect it.
The third time, they lose the phone for the rest of the term.
I don't know a single parent who isn't fully supportive of the policy, and the policy is very clearly communicated to all parents and boys.
In my son's case, he has had one term where he managed to get his phone confiscated for the rest of the week on a Wednesday. The fact that neither my wife nor I could get in to collect it until the following Tuesday was enough to ensure he'll never reach stage three.
It's really, really easy for the boys to avoid having their phones confiscated for a prolonged period of time. All they have to do is not use them when they're not specifically told they can. How difficult is that?
I don't have kids but I used to be one - amazingly - and I find some of the responses on this thread are shocking.
I'm not sure what to say about the guy who gave his 2-year old their own iPad or the parents who appear not to be able to just say 'no' to their children. I'm sure this will be met by a wall of; "You're not a parent, so you wouldn't understand." but I have distinct memories of my parents saying 'no' to me as a child. They would at least take the time to explain why I couldn't have that pair of Air Max because I'd grow out of them in three months or couldn't have a 386SX because it was simply too expensive. Yes, I got mocked for having to wear Hi-Tec trainers but now I'm an almost fully-functional adult and can buy all the trainers I want (apart from Air Mags and Foamposite Paranormans, obviously).
Being told 'no' made me do other things; reading everything in the library, learning everything about BBC Basic, learning to play various intstruments and generally doing cheap nerdy things. Had my parents fulfilled every whim, I'd be a thousand times the ahole I am now as well as being thick. Probably.
I'm not sure what to say about the guy who gave his 2-year old their own iPad or the parents who appear not to be able to just say 'no' to their children. I'm sure this will be met by a wall of; "You're not a parent, so you wouldn't understand." but I have distinct memories of my parents saying 'no' to me as a child. They would at least take the time to explain why I couldn't have that pair of Air Max because I'd grow out of them in three months or couldn't have a 386SX because it was simply too expensive. Yes, I got mocked for having to wear Hi-Tec trainers but now I'm an almost fully-functional adult and can buy all the trainers I want (apart from Air Mags and Foamposite Paranormans, obviously).
Being told 'no' made me do other things; reading everything in the library, learning everything about BBC Basic, learning to play various intstruments and generally doing cheap nerdy things. Had my parents fulfilled every whim, I'd be a thousand times the a
hole I am now as well as being thick. Probably.
The point of renting was that 2 of her friends have parents who prioritise material items over anything else. The kids and them have all the latest gadgets, clothes, these Yeezy trainers at £300 a pop yet always complain that they cant afford to buy a house and how expensive renting is. If you stopped buying all this st and saved your money then you might be able to afford somewhere and stop throwing your money away.
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