Hartselle attorney warns of social media misuse among youths
For the Enquirer
Parents and educators need to learn about dangers their child may be facing when using a growing number of social networking apps, according to a Hartselle attorney who practices juvenile law.
Patrick Caver spoke at an Alabama Education Association District 5 meeting at Cook Museum of Natural Science recently. He has practiced in juvenile court for about 20 years and has made presentations on social media issues for almost a decade.
“I always tell kids, ‘Don’t do anything online that you wouldn’t do offline,'” Caver said.
He said parents should know the passwords on all their child’s apps or the child should not have a smartphone.
Caver said one of the most popular social media apps children use is Snapchat, which allows users to send photos, videos and messages that are only available for a short period before they become unavailable to recipients.
Decatur City Schools Deputy Superintendent Dwight Satterfield said out of all current social media apps, Snapchat has distracted students the most.
“The number one drama related to social media apps is Snapchat,” Satterfield said. “We try to combat it, but the bottom line is that on most of these apps, (children) are declaring they are older than they are and parents are buying the phones and allowing them to download them.” Satterfield said apps like Snapchat can create a disruptive environment among students and it has been used to threaten or bully others.
Retired Winston County teacher Michelle Cummings was at the Alabama Education Association meeting and said one of her biggest concerns with social media is students using Snapchat. She said she forbids her 16-yearold daughter from using the app.
“Because the (content) goes away after a while and they can fix it where we can’t see it,” Cummings said. “With her emails, we can look at them and have them sent to our phone, but with Snapchat you can’t do any of that. We did find Snapchat on her phone once, but we removed it.” Caver said Snapchat has a feature where only the user can access certain content with a password, leaving it hidden to everyone else.
“Kids are smart because they know if you put the password in there three different times, it will erase the pictures,” Caver said.
“The worst thing you can do as a parent is ask, ‘What is your password?’ If you don’t know their password, they shouldn’t have a phone.” Double Springs parent Crystal Satcher said she allows her 11-year-old son to play video games online, but he does not have any social media accounts. She said she became apprehensive of social media after she witnessed an adolescent relative using Snapchat.
“She has hundreds of boys on her Snapchat and doesn’t even know who they are,” Satcher said. “She will Snapchat them all day long to keep up with some kind of streak. The pictures will delete right after you open them, so you don’t even know what they are seeing or learning and that’s what is scary.” Satcher said she does not plan on allowing her son to access social media until he is at least 16 years old.
“I feel like with driving age, you get a whole lot of responsibility across the board so I feel like he would be more mature in handling things online,” Satcher said.
Caver said a new app, Lemon8, is on the rise after recent discussions on the federal level about banning the popular app TikTok. Created in 2016 by ByteDance, users on TikTok can post or share short-form video content with videos ranging from 15 seconds to three minutes. Lemon8 is also produced by ByteDance.
“Lemon8 is the new Tik-Tok,” Caver said. “When the government shuts down TikTok, Lemon8 is going to come online. Most teenagers are already downloading it.” Satterfield said there were a few incidents last school year where students were vlogging (video blogging) or producing TikTok videos on school grounds.
“During times when they were allowed to have a phone, but those were creating issues at school,” Satterfield said. “A lot of them had offensive language; some of them were making fun and picking at others.” Satterfield said when students bring phones or other devices to school, they use their own data plans and are not hooked up to the school system’s network. So, when students access apps like Snapchat or TikTok, the school system cannot detect the activity.
“The biggest issue is, they are not on our devices; they are on the children’s phones,” Satterfield said. “They are not using (apps) over our network, they are using them on the child’s phone and the child’s data. We can’t block it.” Despite this, Satterfield said the district sends out notifications to parents and guardians every year about the potential misuse of Snapchat and other apps to keep them aware of their child’s online activity.
