I was chatting with a childhood friend of mine last night, whom I grew up with and have known for almost 30 years. I asked whether her 12-year-old son had a phone (since most kids on our island do not), and the conversation took a different turn than I was expecting.
B: Every 12-year-old has a phone?
J: Pretty much. He had friends in elementary school who had phones. We got him one in middle school last Christmas. Leftover phone we had.
B: When I think about coming back from our simple island life, I can’t imagine it. We will most likely move back here to be close to my parents.
J: It’s even more complicated than that. If you think about school shootings, you want your kid to be able to contact you.
B: I knooooow that freaks me out
J: Damn the anxiety I get sometimes dropping off my kid in the morning
B: There was a school shooting not far from you last week
J: Yep. Like this could be the day. It’s crazy. But it’s almost like the nicer schools are more dangerous. I was thinking about how back in the day we had school shootings, but it was gang related mostly and definitely not mass shootings. It wasn’t some overbearing threat like it is now.
As an American living abroad, people ask me about the guns and mass shootings regularly. I really don’t know what to tell them, and it is something I think about often when thinking about moving back. How much do you worry about this if you live in the US?
cantaloupe / 6086 posts
It’s hard to think about, and honestly to some degree I put it out of my mind because there’s little I can do to control it. Our elementary school has some security measures but at best it might keep out a random deranged person … but not someone who premeditated things or was a parent or something. I live in a gun friendly state (tx) and worry more about play dates where a gun could accidentally get in kid hands (especially a worry for my son who doesn’t have good impulse control and common sense yet). Right now the kids are mostly young enough to have more parent supervision but soon that won’t be true.
As for the phone there’s a movement near us to “wait until 8th” (grade) and I hope we can do that. I mean I have trouble managing my phone time as an adult and I don’t post on social media because I get too into the reactions … can’t imagine expecting a 12yo to do a good job managing it all. Then again I can also buy the arguments I’ve read that starting younger you can help guide their usage so I don’t know. My oldest is about to turn 8 and I’m not ready to think about all this tween stuff yet!
blogger / apricot / 275 posts
yeah i do live in the US now – was forced to return and stay put a year a half ago and it’s challenging sometimes. i think we will stay because visas are exhausting but i do wonder if it’s worth it. the constant uprooting to see family would be too exhausting with two kids even if my health gets approved for long term travel in a few years but it’s hard to imagine continuing on like normal with the risk of school shootings as my kids get older. not sure.
apricot / 364 posts
I think it is very hard to think about. Our local high school had a threat recently and I’m just comforted by the fact that other students heard chatter and reported it immediately. This allowed for investigation and extra security measures.
As for phones, I barely let my kids use tablets (5 and 7). We’re not doing sleepovers yet and play dates are only with parents we know so I’m not worried about them being able to contact me. I’m nervous about knowing how to lock everything down and helping them learn how to make wise online choices. Eventually we’ll have to give them more access to technology, but I’m delaying as long as possible.
guest
Can we unpack the last thing your friend said for a moment? For students who attended schools that always had metal detectors because their schools were located in poor, crime ridden neighborhoods school violence has always been an overbearing threat.
While I think about mass shootings and bombings that may have slipped through the FBI or CIA there’s only so much precaution one can take in such an unpredictable situation even though it feels so normal now.