Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1107 - This Week in Parenting: Roblox Hell & Parental Health Hazards

Transcript

#1107 - This Week in Parenting: Roblox Hell & Parental Health Hazards · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast. It's the podcast for the
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: time poor parent who just once answers now never before
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: on the Happy Families Podcast, have we tried to cram
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: so much news into one episode? And Kylie, I know
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: that you roll your eye every time we do this,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: but maybe we should do it more often. I don't know.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: This week in parenting, sorry, I need to do it
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: the proper way.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: This week in perishing, that was terrible.
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: Really, I wasn't expecting you to do it nominally. It's
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: all me. Well, I was joining, join me, here we go.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: This week we got to count it in one, two, three.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: This week in parenting, Oh my goodness, JR.
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: I don't know what you can do with that.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: By the time this goes to it, we'll laugh and
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: say what will we thinking?
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: Six stories?
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Six stories in twelve minutes, so two minutes each. There's
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: so much to talk about. You're going to guide me
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: through it and ask me any questions you have. But
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: there is so much going on in the world of
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: parenting and things related to parents and how we can
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: help our families to be happy. The news media has
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: been going absolutely gangbusters. Where do you want to start?
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: Well, the first story rodbox roadblocks.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Yes, I love I love how every time we talk
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: about roadblocks on the podcast, you call it roadbox, folks.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: In case you're wondering, we don't do roadblocks in our house.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: Roadblocks roadblocks with it like R O.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: B L O X. Well, the first time I caught
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: it road block. Now I'm calling it roebox.
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: Let's give it the story.
• 1:37
  Speaker 4: We're seeing examples of these cases shifting from the online
• 1:41
  Speaker 4: world into the offline world, where kids are being physically kidnapped, abducted,
• 1:47
  Speaker 4: and sexually assaulted by predators who have connected with them
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: on roadblocks.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: The article suggests that roadbox is a.
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: Pedophile healthscape for kids. Here's the deal.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: So, Hindenberg Research is a company over in the US.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: They look at stock that is overvalued. And I'm going
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: to get all stock marketing for a second, but stay
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: with me because this is important. Essentially, if you end
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: up on their list, if you short a company, what
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: that basically means is that you're making a prediction about it.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: You're buying shares with a short term expectation that that
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: company is going to tank and you're going to make
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: a whole lot of money. Or you're selling shares or
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: whatever it is. And Hindenburg Research, if they talk about
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: your company, it means that you're in trouble, so Hindenburg
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: and the reason I'm talking about this is because it
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: relates to a game that so many of our kids
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: are on, well not our kids, but everyone else's kids,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: because we don't let our kids play it. And what
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Hindenburg have basically said is Roadblocks is a twenty seven
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: billion dollar online gaming company and it has been losing
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: so much money in the last twelve months. Losses total
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: one point zero seven billion dollars. It's not profitable as
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: a company, it hasn't been since it went public. But
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: here's the critical thing, and this is why it's on
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: this weekend parenting. It's stock price and in turn people's
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: ability to make money with the stock is completely reliant
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: on the growth metrics that Roadblocks gives because it's required
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: to to Wall Street. Publicly listed company has to give
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: a whole lot of metrics to Wall Streets so that
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: they can make decisions. And what Hindenburg Research have said
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: is our research indicates that Roadblocks is lying to investors, regulators,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: and advertisers about the number of people in inverted commas
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: people on its platform, inflating the key metric by between
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: twenty five and forty two percent.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: That's insane.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: That is insane.
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: But there's more.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Since prior to going public, Roadblocks has reported the number
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: of people in inverted commas on its platform in dozens
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: of official investor communications. They say that there are over
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: fifty four point one million people coming into Roadblocks every
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: single day. But what they're basically saying is the daily
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: active users. They reckon that there's numerous counts run by
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: single people. There's also body accounts and alternative accounts and
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: that kind of thing. So they're essentially lying to keep
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: their stock price high. And the last thing that they highlight,
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: which is probably the most important thing I've buried the
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: lead I should have started with this is that for
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: the second quarter of twenty twenty four, as they push
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: towards profitability, Roadblocks reported at two percent year over year
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: decline in its trust and safety expenses. Coret of the
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: problem is that roadblocks of social media features allow pedophiles
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  Speaker 1: to efficiently target hundreds of children with no upfront screening
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  Speaker 1: to prevent them from joining the platform. As an example,
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen, prior to red Blocks going public. A
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: twenty nine year old was caught by police with one
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  Speaker 1: hundred and seventy five hours of video footage of him
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: grooming and engaging in explicit behavior with one hundred and
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: fifty minors using online platforms, namely roadblocks and at Hindenberg
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  Speaker 1: Research dot com slash roadblocks. They go through all the
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: other stuff that's there. Why am I sharing this? I'm
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: sharing it for two reasons. Number One, this is a
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: public listed company. There's making or doing its and certainly
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: there are shareholders who are making real money as they
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: buy and sell these shares, and these people are profiting
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: off the exploitation of our children. And I just want
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: to emphasize again there is so much evidence that these
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: guys are engaging in allowing a pedophile healthscape to exist.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: That's all that's my this week in parenting about roadblocks next,
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: unless you've got questions to me.
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: It just seems so disgraceful that something that literally is
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: unlawful is allowed to happen in broad daylight. Yeah, without
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: any form of justice. So there's this protection for our kids.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: There's this thing in the United States. And I'm not
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  Speaker 1: a lawyer, and I haven't read this carefully, but there's
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: a section in the United States law around technology called
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Section two thirty, and essentially what it does is it
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: absolves the carriers, It absolves the matters and the roadblockses
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  Speaker 1: and so on of any responsibility for what users do
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  Speaker 1: on the platform.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: Give it. That's disgraceful because they've created the platform for
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: users to.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: Use, and they've not put any safety measures into space
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: measures in that which I do find kind of extraordinary
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: because if I owned a restaurant and the head of
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: the Martha was hanging out at my restaurant and doing
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: business deals, I think that I would also get in
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: trouble from law enforcement.
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: It's somewhere.
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: If I had a hotel and people were engaging in
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: explicit and illicit illegal activities in my hotel, I would
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: be shut down, like that's that's what most laws in
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: most countries would do. But this section two thirty exempts
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: the tech companies. It completely absolves them of responsibility, and
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: they are writing this thing as far as they can
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: to prop up their share price and do awful things. Anyway,
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: the take home message on this week in parenting for
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: this one is Roadblocks is a pedophile healthscape for kids.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: It's really if you're going to let your kids be
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: on there, if you're going to let your kids beyond there,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: and I don't think the issue it, but if you're
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: going to you've got to be monitoring, you've got to
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: be aware, and you've got to be having conversations constantly
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: about the risks that are associated keep them on devices
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: in public places, they never go never to friend somebody
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: that they don't know, and then go to some other platform.
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: You've just got to know what's going on.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: Well, this flows in beautifully into our second article.
• 7:25
  Speaker 5: It is universally accepted that parenting is difficult, but now
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: the US Surgeon General says parenting maybe hazard as to
• 7:32
  Speaker 5: your health.
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Kylie. This one was published in the Wall Street
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: Journal a couple of weeks ago.
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: Now, in fact, I'm going back about five weeks, six
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: weeks because I'm a little bit behind on this week
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: in parenting, But the US Surgeon General has issued a
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: warning literally and I quote, parenting can be harmful to
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: your mental health.
• 7:49
  Speaker 5: Doctor Vivig Murphy wrote, and aren't bad in The New
• 7:53
  Speaker 5: York Times issued and advisory calling attention to the stress
• 7:56
  Speaker 5: and mental health concerns facing parents and caregivers.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: The report sites the American Psychological Association saying nearly half
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: the parents report overwhelming stress most days. I mean, that's
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: just such a staggering number. Half of parents report overwhelming
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: stress most days, compared with twenty six percent of other adults.
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: They're lonelier as well.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: According to cited data in a twenty twenty one survey,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: sixty five percent of parents said they were only compared
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: to fifty five percent of those without kids.
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: In some ways, parenting has changed so much over the
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: generations and what we do now. We are so much
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: more involved in our kids' lives than we've ever been before,
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: and that has definitely got some amazing benefits to our
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: children and to us, But there's also limitations around that.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: And the idea that we feel lonely and isolated is
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: real because our entire lives revolve around our children instead
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: of what would have happened in my grandparents' time, where
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: the kids went off to school, they took care of themselves,
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: They came home and Mum and dad fed them.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: Well, it's not that it wasn't that simple. It's not
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: that they took care of themselves. It's that the community,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: it's that society did so.
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, parenting being a little bit glipper.
• 9:12
  Speaker 3: I get it.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, parenting was once a team sport. It really is
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: an individual sport now and I think that's the greatest challenge.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: Too many parents feel like they're doing it alone. Mothers
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: groups aren't as cohesive or as common as they used
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: to be, and I don't know that's gendered, but that's
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: what they always were. The community and the structures in
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: community that we used to have as simply either not
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: there or not as strong as they once were. And
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: there's a whole lot less trust in the community. We
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: look at people around us and we don't trust them
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: like we once did.
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: Beyond that, we've.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: Got vigil aged dangers. Once upon a time, kids really
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: did have play based childhoods, and now that has changed
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: to screen based childhoods. That's what Jonathan Hate talked all
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: about in the Angst Generation. But I also think that
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: there's a narrative now around parenting, and that narrative I
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: had Angela Mollart, a columnist and commentator, on the podcast
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago, talking about how parenting needs
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: a new pr job because when you look at what
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: happens on TikTok and on Instagram, and the narrative around parenting.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: The narrative isugh, this is hard, this is breaking me.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: I don't know if I've got what it takes to
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: do this. And we're having fewer kids, but we're investing
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: so much more in them, which increases the pressure on
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: us and on them, increases the anxiety, makes everyone else
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: feel it. So does parenting need to stress you out?
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Do we need a mental health warning on parenting like
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: we have a health warning on a packet of cigarettes.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: I don't think so. What I think we've forgotten how
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: to do is have fun. I just think we don't
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: have nearly as much fun as we used to when
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: it comes to our families. And we've also decided that
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: we have to do it all, and it's not fair.
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: No one's supposed to be able to do it all.
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: So that's my second story for this week in Parenting.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: Over the last handful of months, we've talked about the
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: fact that there has been cries from the community for
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: age limits to be put on social media, and Meta
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: has finally made an announcement.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah social media. This was in a Daily Telegraph about
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: four weeks ago. Three weeks ago, social media giant Meta
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: wants Australia to make parents responsible for approving white apps
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: children under the age of sixteen download denying this was
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: shirking its duty to protect kids online. That was the
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: big announcement. We want to help parents and we're going
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: to help parents by putting the responsibility under parents. I
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: love this this company. They are just doing absolutely everything
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: they can to bear no responsibility for the tremendous damage
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: that's being done to children young.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: People around the world because it's not about them.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: The laws allow them to do it, and therefore if
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: people want to make an outcry, then they need to
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: step up and shoulder the responsibility.
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: And it is just not fair.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: I think if you go back to the previous story
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: that we just talked about, this idea that parents are
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: having to do it on their own, the village is
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: no longer there. There are no safeguards in place, and
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: people are happy to be remunerated for their creations and
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: inventions at the expense of our children and that sense
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: of village and community.
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that they're liable.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: I think there's really big challenges here. Meta's goal seems
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: to be that they want to look like they're doing
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: something without actually doing anything. Their support for age verification,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: that's great, they're saying, yeah, age verification is necessary, but
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: their proposal totally inadequate. Social media companies, make no mistake,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: are causing immense harm to our kids. Let me say
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: this a different way, because this is one of those
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: arguments where people say, no, the problem isn't social media,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: it's the people on social media. It's kind of like
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: in the United States with the whole gun debate, right,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: guns don't kill people.
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: People kill people.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: So I was at a school recently and presentation about
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: respect for relationships. A young man came up to me afterwards,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: in one of the senior years of high school. So
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: this isn't a little kid, this is a big kid.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: And he described the things that have been happening to
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: him online from a bunch of other kids in the school,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: where they've been catfishing him, where they've been bullying him,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: where social media platforms have been used to absolutely destroy
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: this kid, just hurt him so much to the point
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: where he has considered taking his own life. And what's
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: going on here is Metais saying, well, no, no, we can't
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: do anything about this at all.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: We can't help. But what we do want to do
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: is we want.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: To encourage parents to be aware of the apps that
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: their children are downloading, and then everything will be okay.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Number One, I think most parents do have a pretty
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: decent idea of what apps their kids have downloaded and
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: what apps their kids are using. I really believe that
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: they know they might not know what's going on on
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: the apps, but they know what the kids are using.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: But number two, just knowing that your kids have the
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: app doesn't protect them. In the US, there's what's known
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: as COSPA, the Kids Online Safety and Protection Act, And
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: the very day that that was to be debated in
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: the United States Congress or Senate or whatever it was,
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: Meta shows up on Breakfast TV and says we're introducing
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: this and this safety feature on Instagram to keep kids safe.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: The day that the politicians are going to debate it.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: I want how convenient haven't been able to come up
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: with anything to help the kids until now, and now
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, well look at that, the technology
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: is there. Anyway, We've been talking way too long. There
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: are six stories. I don't think we're going to have
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: time for them all because we've done three and our
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: time is almost up.
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: I reckon, I reckon, we need.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: To call it quits there and maybe we do another
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: this week in Parenting next week.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: You're such a cheat.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: Well, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: We can't do the other three at the time we've got.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: It's just not going to fit. Can you live with it?
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: I can live with that, okay.
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: The Happy Family's Podcast.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you for your patience, thank you for
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: allowing you. I don't know what I was thinking when
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: I said we could do six.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: Well, at least we didn't tell them what we were
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: talking about.
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, every now and again, I'm like, let's do four,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: let's do five, and you're.
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: Like, what are you doing?
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: And we've only gotten through three. It's because there's so
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: much going Oh, by the way, did I mention that
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Parental Guidance Season three is coming back next year?
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: You have not I can't.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: Believe, and I'm dropping it at the end of the
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: pod like that. More news on that coming up soon.
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: Parental Guidance Season three. It's on Channel nine with Yours
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Truly out the Popcorn and Ali.
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: Langdon I'll tell you more about that. I don't know.
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: Maybe in older bed it tomorrow Tomorrow, I reckon we.
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: Can do that.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: The Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin Rouland from
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Bridge Media.
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: Thank you Jr. For the great work that you do.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: If you'd like more information about making your family happier,
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: if you would like to join us in this incredible
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: course that we're running for autistic well I was gonna
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: say for autistic kids it is, but really it's for parents'
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: autistic kids. You get me, you get doctor Joey who
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: is a TikTok star. She's also a psychologist, runs Nerdle
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: Psychology in Brisbane and is autistic herself, and you get
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: like an eighty page workbook that gives you all the
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: information you need early birds about to finish. You can
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: find all the information at happyfamilies dot com dot you
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: or on our social media pages on those companies that
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: I have so much to say about Facebook and Instagram.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: Just check us out there, Doctor Justin Courson's Happy Families