Luckily my son doesn’t yet have the ability to get onto Netflix, Disney+, Hulu or YouTube in order to find something to watch on his own. 🙌
Not saying it won’t happen soon. I’m just saying that most first time parents don’t think of this when they first allow their child to watch content on a tablet or some other device by themselves. Children need constant direction from their parents (not rules or orders guys 👮 but guidance).
They need to be educated on how to choose what they want to watch first, so that the child understands what to look for and what to look out for. They need to understand what the ratings stand for so they can stay in their age group too.
Parents hear DaysoftheDad out on this matter and let me tell you why.
Just before becoming a parent myself I was fortunate enough get some great parenting experience through my friends. 😊
At the time they had a little boy about the age of 3 and a little girl about the age of 4. Well let me tell you that little boy loved watching stuff on his tablet. He watched all kinds of stuff on YouTube, videos we believed safe for kids since there was children in them. Honestly, it just didn’t dawn on any of them that they needed to have the child use YouTube Kids, which is an app built for that’s right KIDS. 😐
I mean you really have no idea the kinds of things that are on YouTube with kids taking part in the video. I know we’re not the perfect parents so I don’t want to preach, just warn! The YouTube algorithm saves your video history and uses it to recommend videos in the related video section next to watch the child is watching. If the child would have been on YouTube Kids there would have been no issue, but because he didn’t completely understand what he was clicking to watch next the selection slowly became more mature.
It went from kids playing pretend, to kids shooting each other with Nerf guns finally ending in kids using dolls to do well grown up stuff. 🤐 They didn’t realize how bad the videos had gotten since he would start on the ones they selected. This all led up to one of the craziest parenting stories I’ve heard personally and was there when the act happened. (Luckily in the other room)
We were all hanging out talking, playing games and watching television as the children played like any normal day. Now I know my other parents get flashbacks when I say, “The kids are being too quiet guys.” 🤨 I mean they were just in the bedroom one room over so we figured they were watching something. Listen to me when I tell you that mothers have a sixth sense for their kids! 🦸♀️ His mom said she better go check just to be sure his mischievous little self hadn’t snuck some snacks into the room for the kids to share and make a mess. When she got to the doorway to look she shouted,
“You better stop that right now! Pull your pants up!” 🤬
I later learned that he had decided to pull down his pants and started urinating on his sister. 😥 This sweet, innocent little boy was only imitating what he saw on the videos he had viewed so it was in no way his fault. We had to sit him down and slowly explain to him why that wasn’t okay to do.
If this isn’t bad enough I recently read an article that had to warn parents to the effects of pornography on children. The article was by Motherhood: The Real Deal called “Everything you need to know about the effects of pornography on children.” The blogger gave some great insight to the statistics of children and teenagers exposure, what potential problems it can cause the child mentally and most importantly how to handle that kind of talk with your child.
Dads of today I’m manly speaking to you as I am a father myself. We have to watch out for the gift(s) we’ve been given since one day it’ll all be behind us. Keep an eye on their content intake and don’t freak out on them if they do watch something a little too mature for them. Just sit down with them and talk (not lecture) with them about what they saw. Explain why they don’t need to watch it if needed, and don’t just use the old, “because I said so.” It won’t help anything, it’s not their fault for being curious and I promise following this will make you closer to them in the long run. 👊 Leave me a like below if this gave you some value and follow DaysoftheDad on social media! #garyveechallenge
Days of the Dad 
Omg didn’t think about that happening 😲 great post though. Parents watch out!
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Hi Tyler,
Great advice for parents! I had no idea about a YouTube Kids app, so thank you for the warning. My wife and I opted to buy vintage cartoon collections and other, guaranteed, safe-for-kids fare for our little ones way back when. There are collections of older cartoons on YouTube (such as the Fleisher Studios version of Superman), and peaceful content from around the globe, but we’ve found that the international entries are sometimes laden with the cultural biases of the originating (or dubbing) country.
We avoid the cartoons on Cartoon Network for a host of reasons, not the least of which is the “Adult Swim” content. We’ve found the Disney Channel to be safe-ish, but the modern Mickey Mouse cartoons–though funnier than any Mickey Mouse cartoons ever produced before–are nevertheless extremely violent, though not graphically so.
Like you, we found that you can’t trust ratings or the word of online video content creators (YouTube, Vimeo, whatever). They post friendly images, but based on your history and the whims of the creator, the actual content could be…concerning.
Finally, we resorted to watching content in advance of the children to ensure it was safe for them, always recording as we did so. Bottom line: I advise showing what you know and pre-screening what you don’t. That was our solution. It took lots of time, but we managed to keep all the vile stuff away from the kids.
All the best,
Keith V.
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Wow that’s an awesome plan of attack you guys have there I’m impressed 🙌 we try to buy a lot of the movies and cartoons we’re familiar with too. I love rewatching most of them with him and others I wish had stayed forgotten due to how boring they seem now.
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