I see the issue, I trust my kids, I just need to be sure that the crazy world we live in gives me a chance to be a participant in my families own rescue if necessary.
My kids don't object, from an early age I told them that safety trumps almost everything.
I told them that when they have their own families, I am quite sure they will do a better job than I have done, but know I did my best and all decisions and actions were the best ones I could muster.
What I think you are all missing is, my kids know what I am doing. I am not secretly budding the phone. I have had my younger son call me to say, phone is dying, I am turning off location services to save battery. My ringer is now on. call or text me if you need me-OK?
I know your kids know, that is the point I am trying to make clear. Your kids know, and they
are keeping secrets from you. All kids do. Your use of Find my iPhone (which cant easily be disabled, so most people will chose to leave the phone behind or turn off location services if they wish to conceal their activities) means that if your loved ones are taking risks - whatever they may be - it might not actually be possible for you, or anyone, to participate in their rescue, because they are unable to call for help or be located.
You are taking the right to any privacy from your children, teaching them that your concern drums their right to learn from mistakes. I cannot agree with that and I want you to see that in doing so you have created a situation whereby they will put themselves at a deeper risk to avoid your surveillance.
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Why couldn't we just answer the question instead of turning this into a parenting lesson? Whether you agree or not is irrelevant when it comes to child safety, no matter how you approach it.
Well no
it is possible to ensure your child is safe with approaches which are more or less controlling. I am presenting the case that children will naturally rebel, and that any measure of safety has to account for that.
At one end of the sliding scale of child safety we have Rapunzels mother; who locked her daughter in a tower and forbid her ever leaving. On the other end you have total freedom with no consequence (this probably wont work). At the mid point is asking your child to check in or to share location information when they are comfortable.
As a teenager I was allowed the freedom of my home town on weekends, with the provisos that I let my parents know if I was going to be home later than 2100, or where I was staying. I never got into anything that I couldnt then bail myself out of, or call for help if needed. I also never had to think about my mother breathing down my neck, knowing that 17 year olds do not sit under the pier late at night to watch the moon, they do so to ingest illicit substances and to experiment with one another. Had I been under the assumption that my own private Big Brother was constantly watching me, I likely wouldnt have had an adolescence fuelled by my own desire to understand myself, which seems unhealthy to allow deny that of anyone.
