I'd rather not have the Iphone.

[bara]

Why the hell does a parent need to have their kid sign a contract in the first place?

I have to lean to the control freak camp on this one just because of the way the contract is written. Especially the password part, a 13 year old should have privacy. Im not saying he should be able to do whatever he wants, but she is either going to give him this bit of freedom/responsibility or she isnt. If she isnt then she never should have gotten the phone.

[bex1218]

I highly doubt that's a hard and fast rule. It's obviously meant as more of a suggestion.

Still shouldn't be on the "contract". Thats something they could talk about outside of having a phone.

[Rageaholic]

Still shouldn't be on the "contract". Thats something they could talk about outside of having a phone.

Exactly, the fact that she felt the need to put that on the contract makes me think she's a control freak.

It's hard to judge since I don't know how she enforces the rules, but she comes across as the type to demand he follow the rules to the letter. People like that are just so infurriating.

[violiav]

Why the hell does a parent need to have their kid sign a contract in the first place?
.

That may be just how that family does things. I've read self-held books that suggest that type of thing to encourage good behavior. Schools use contracts with certain students. It also depends on the kid.
-rant-
I would not trust 13 year old boy thing with an iPhone, because he simply does not have a good track record. His dad got him a decent tablet for his b-day last year, a few months later the thing was lost. So naturally his bio-mom turned around and got him an his siblings kindle fires for Christmas. I guess we'll see how long that lasts.
Of course, she is the queen of "everything is disposable."
-end rant-

[AmbrosiaWriter]

I think I'll just reiterate a point, since someone mentioned "privacy."

Every time something terrible happens with minors involved - sexting, bullying/abuse through text messaging, naughty pictures being spread and getting a whole school on the sex offender's list - we have a huge mob of people (not necessarily on here, but in the world) screaming "WHY DIDN'T THE PARENTS KNOW!"

Now we have the opposite, a parent trying to know and we get people coming out saying "CONTROL FREAK, HE SHOULD HAVE PRIVACY."

What are the parents supposed to do?

Also, the assumption of someone "coming across as <blank>" is just that, an assumption. No one should be making judgements on a person from assuming that they are a certain way based on one, tiny sliver of their life.

She may have discovered that "a contract" is what her son responds to best to understand "These really are the rules" and also helps him remember them. It's always easier, and better, to go stricter and move to more lenience than to start easy and go strict.

The first way has the kid saying, "Hey, I'm being rewarded for following the rules, this is awesome."
The second one has the kid saying, "My parents SUCK! The only thing I did was that I didn't follow their STUPID RULES, now I can't do X, Y, and Zed."

It still doesn't read to me as control freak.

[TheHuckster]

I think this is one of those things that comes down to what I've believed for the longest time: There is no one way to raise a child. There seems to be this notion in some parents that there's this one magical method of parenting that can work for every kid... and worst of all, their "proof" of such a method is it worked for their kids.

Some kids need more reigns than others. I think the best general parenting advice to give is it's important to try to gauge your kid's innate personality, and use that to determine just what kind of parenting is necessary to raise them into an upstanding person. And that is why only this mother's closest friends who know the son best can make a judgement call over whether the mother is too overbearing or not.

[SongsOfDragons]

I've stayed off Fratching for several days because this story incensed me and I wanted to come back to comment when I have a cooler head, else I'd have pissed people off again with ad hominem comments that'll set the green-on-black into orange-on-black...

I hate control freak parents. I've seen some cases where it falls just into my local council's 'abuse orange flags'. But now I'm calm and I've read the rest of the comments on this thread, I'm agreeing more with those that say that some are contradictory, and that all kid-raising is different. So, it's not really too bad, aside from those two points. That makes more sense than anything I could bitch - er, say about this example. I would only wonder aloud how much resentment this is going to build in him and whether he's going to leg it away from her for good the second he is old enough to legally leg it.

This kind of thing didn't work for me, and I absolutely hated it. It was a Gameboy Advance, not a smartphone, but my mother tried to stop me from becoming like those Korean computer game addicts she had read about and made me pay for time to play it with chores - 1 hour spent doing them = 1 hour playing, and then only on weekends. It didn't help that a. she was a clean freak so all my assigned chores could be done within an hour and there was little chance of helping anywhere else, and b. she kept losing the game cartriges and not bothering to look for them when I asked for them. Eventually I just stopped asking for it. I was an only child and knew how to entertain myself without it, and besides, I had access to a PC and CD-ROMs/floppies and Dad's Atari 2600...and I wasn't getting addicted. I got it free and fair about a year later, and still didn't get addicted. Didn't ask for another console until I could buy them myself, and my mum still reads those stupid non-cited articles about how everything's unhealthy and shit. At least she didn't blog about how wonderful it was.

Oh, and also, genuine question. Let's say this poor kid breaks the phone. Let's say he is thrifty enough to save up enough money to buy a replacement on his own back. Is he able to do so or is there an age limit? If he is old enough, is his beloved smother going to nick it off him again, a phone which is now officially his and in his own name? Is that not some kind of theft/extortion?

Let's hope I was calm enough and I'm not going to get set alight...

[s_stabeler]

Actually, she probably can; it's probably a contract phone, so it would still be in mum's name if it needs to be replaced.

If the kid gets his own contract phone in his own name, however, then she's lost that bit of leverage.

[TheHuckster]

This kind of thing didn't work for me, and I absolutely hated it. It was a Gameboy Advance, not a smartphone, but my mother tried to stop me from becoming like those Korean computer game addicts she had read about and made me pay for time to play it with chores - 1 hour spent doing them = 1 hour playing, and then only on weekends. It didn't help that a. she was a clean freak so all my assigned chores could be done within an hour and there was little chance of helping anywhere else, and b. she kept losing the game cartriges and not bothering to look for them when I asked for them. Eventually I just stopped asking for it. I was an only child and knew how to entertain myself without it, and besides, I had access to a PC and CD-ROMs/floppies and Dad's Atari 2600...and I wasn't getting addicted. I got it free and fair about a year later, and still didn't get addicted. Didn't ask for another console until I could buy them myself, and my mum still reads those stupid non-cited articles about how everything's unhealthy and shit. At least she didn't blog about how wonderful it was.

My parents only started giving me limits on computer games when they noticed it becoming a "problem." That is, I was getting semi-addicted to the point where I was not doing my schoolwork, not playing outside on beautiful days, and sometimes even snubbing my friends just so I could play more video games.

I think a lot of parents forget that much of their limits should be more reactive than preemptive.

Oh, and also, genuine question. Let's say this poor kid breaks the phone. Let's say he is thrifty enough to save up enough money to buy a replacement on his own back. Is he able to do so or is there an age limit? If he is old enough, is his beloved smother going to nick it off him again, a phone which is now officially his and in his own name? Is that not some kind of theft/extortion?

First of all, it's not theft, even if you've bought it yourself at 13. I once bought a bunch of candy when I was a kid using my allowance and my parents took it from me and didn't give it back until I ate my dinner. Had I called the police over it, they'd laugh and give my parents high fives.

Second of all, even if that were the case, he is on his parents' mobile plan. Because these are contractual agreements, a minor cannot legally sign such a contract to get on his own plan. If he's still on his parents' mobile plan, they still can impose rules.

So, if his parents took his bought phone away from him because he wasn't doing his homework or was otherwise being a brat, I doubt any judge would prosecute.

[Andara Bledin]

I think a lot of parents forget that much of their limits should be more reactive than preemptive.

Except that not all kids are like you, and not all kids will respond the same way.

As mentioned earlier, some kids will resent their parents for going stricter and work better with a gradual loosening as trust is earned.

^-.-^

[TheHuckster]

Except that not all kids are like you, and not all kids will respond the same way.

That's pretty much my point. A parent doesn't know how their kids are going to respond, so preemptively going for the strictest approach without knowing the result isn't the best course of action, until there are signs that someone needs a stricter or looser approach. Hence, reactive instead of preemptive.

[evilfarmer]

I have to agree with people saying that the parent knows their child better then us on how to handle an important device like the Iphone. To me things that a lot have mentioned as control things read as a smart idea to me. It is a CYA situation in case the kid does break one of the rules so that he parents can pull it back out and show how he broke them and what the consequence would be.

To be honest I wish my parents had been this smart to get me sign something like this when I got a treat like a game boy but their way was to just never replace it. To me the rules will need to be reevaluated once the kid proves themselves.

[Andara Bledin]

That's pretty much my point. A parent doesn't know how their kids are going to respond...

The kid is 13. I'm pretty sure his mom has some idea how he's going to respond vis-a-vis her parenting.

^-.-^

[TheHuckster]

The kid is 13. I'm pretty sure his mom has some idea how he's going to respond vis-a-vis her parenting.

My statements made were not in response to the OP... if you read my preemptive vs. reactive post, it was in response to SongsOfDragons, who was ranting about his own experience. I thought I made it pretty clear in this thread that I'm supporting the mother in the OP.

[bainsidhe]

I liked this list and didn't find it controlling. I didn't read it as mummy-dearest following and tracking her child every second of the day. Rather, she wanted to remind her child of simple manners and open a line of communication with him.

What's wrong with reminding your kid to be respectful and not say hurtful things? To think about what you say (or in this case, text) before you put it out there for the world to see? To realize there is a time and place for certain things and a time when you are expected to give your undivided attention to others? Similar rules applied long before cell phones were common, it's good parenting.