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I just called my brother, the father of my 16-year-old nephew, Mike. I asked my brother which hospital I needed to take Mike to after I shove his cellphone up his a$$.
It's insane...the kid is texting his friends -- and his girlfriend -- CONSTANTLY. CON.STANT.LY. He mows the yard with one hand -- and texts with the other. I can't even have a conversation with Mike without prefacing it by saying, "Put the phone away...NOW." I'm half tempted to take the phone from him and bash it to pieces with a hammer.
I don't remember EVER EVER EVER being in constant contact with my friends and boyfriends when I was his age. "Well, I need to keep in touch with Mike when he's out and about," my brother says.
Meanwhile, Mike's grades are a joke. I wish he would spend as much time studying as he does texting his insipid friends.
He's not my kid, there's nothing I can do about it, but I definitely needed to get it off my chest.
First of all, it really isn't any of your business. This is your nephew, not your son. Your brother has every right to raise his son the way he chooses. I was on the phone quite a bit as a teenager and my mom nagged me about it also. It is a right of passage. I have two daughters that have cell phones and sometimes the texting drives me crazy. However, they both know that if their grades suffer they lose the phones. It is a different world than when we were children and my children are involved in a lot of activities that requires me to leave them places and I need to be able to contact them and have them contact me. There are far worse things that kids can be doing instead of texting....believe me, I'll take the texting!!!
My advice is to stay out of it. Every generation of kids has their "thing" and texting is the "thing" right now. I really find it hard to believe that you would actually tell your brother that you would shove a cellphone up his sons' @@@. That is really rude and crude, imho. Most kids turn out ok. If you really want to be involved in your nephews life consider some positive activities. Positive encouragement and sincere love and compassion go a long way with teenagers. If they are engaged enough they may even put down their cell phone, for a few minutes
Love2Travel, I feel your pain!
My daughter was the same way and it drove me insane. I cut off the phone last month as she drove the bills up way past the extreme one time too many! Now she has to pay for it, and I hardly know she has a phone. I think she got one where she has to buy minutes. I don't have her phone number.
I show property and had a customer with 2 cell phones. He called them phone A and phone B. He was constantly on both while I was trying to show him property. I wanted to shove those phones up his you know what too.
It's probably against the law to shove a phone up someones kadodoo's, and nope, you can't do anything about it but ask your nephew to have a little more respect when he's around you and turn the phone off when you're talking to him.
My family used the same lame excuse that I need to be able to contact my daughter and let her keep the phone. I found it interesting she didn't answer the phone when I called! To heck with that! Her grades were a joke too, and come to find out, the phone was the drug link. I supplied the car and the phone. 2 things a drug runner needs to complete the task. Now the car is in my yard and she has a job trying to save up money for a car and phone. Was the smartest thing I've done all year by taking them both away.
My son does have a phone, but there are strict parameters placed on its use. He has only 50 text messages included per month and must stay within his limit or the phone is taken away.
We monitor his use on the AT&T website, makes it very easy to supervise and see which calls are going in and out. Prior to getting a full-fledged cell phone, we had our son prove his responsibility by using a pre-paid inexpensive Tracfone for a year before he earned the right to be added to our plan.
My son is a serious cyclist and does long training rides, or we probably would've never gotten him started with a cell phone at such a young age. But I do agree with the other posters, it is up to each child's parents to make the call on this issue.
My kids want phones. All their friend have them. NO WAY. They did get the pre-paid phones once with their allowance. The minutes lasted about a week. I don't know why parents would pay for the kids to use the phone that much - especially for a kid under 13!! I was in sports and stuff, too. My parents were there with me, or another parent was watching me. No need for a cell phone. Parents like to know where their kids are. I understand that. But at 9 - 13 years old I don't think them having a phone with them is good enough. They need an adult there actually watching them. Just my opinion. They'll still make bad choices, then call to "check in". You may know where they are, but you don't know what they are doing!!!
My son is 11 and his friend when he was 9 got one then of course he wanted one too.
He's never w/o an adult, neither of them, so what's the point?
I was 40 before I ever got one and survived!
I use it for work or my kids can reach me anytime.
Did you guys know they can talk to each other with their hand held games now? It's freaky! My son was sitting really close to the computer next to me with his game once. I asked him why he was right on me. He said he could access internet with his game sitting close to the computer! It's all a mystery to me!
cell phones can be useful things, but parents have to set limits on the texting thing.
you can't keep track of what they're texting, only how much, and to me it seems that what's being said is more important than the number of messages.
parents know they need to watch what's happening with their kids and the internet. it's the same for texting.
SO TRUE!!! My friend recently found out that her daughter was using IM or her e-mail through her phone, and the language she was using during a fight with her friend (they're 12) was very inappropriate. She also recieved messages from a man she didn't know! He was trying to start a converstation with her. I don't know if that was simply text or e-mail.
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