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Tell HN: My son is being bullied for owning an Android phone

• expertentipp 4y ago
  [flagged]
  • rejectfinite 4y ago
    True and based.
    • shrimp_emoji 4y ago
      It's not just that. Apple is evil. Apple users are willing slaves, shackling themselves to gilded cages. Death to the evil Apple empire. They never said winning was easy. Freedom is painful and unsexy. But it's right. It's the sea of sheep around us who is wrong. :triumph: Ironyposting https://youtu.be/R706isyDrqI https://youtu.be/R706isyDrqI
• Octokiddie 4y ago
  You might start by talking with him about the peer pressure to own and carry one of these gadgets in the first place, and the kinds of expectations he automatically buys into by doing so.
• originalcadaver 4y ago
  We never push brands in my family, quality over branding. Focus on his self confidence. My son thinks iphone is lame for the same reasons you mentioned above, given a choice of any phone he picked a pixel 4 because it's different and the perfect size.
  • smohare 4y ago
    [dead]
• nicoburns 4y ago
  > How do I convince him that this peer pressure is unacceptable and that iPhones are not automatically 'better' just because they're marketed as a premium brand are are nothing more than expensive jewelry? Whether the phone is any good or not is besides the point. The point is that he's being bullied for it. Perhaps you could try raising the issue with the kids' parents? I'd also suggest that there's an extent to which taking a principled stance on these issues isn't worthwhile. Such bullying can be really damaging to kids (as I know from my personal experience as a child), and hepling them to fit in can be the best way of protecting them from this stuff. That doesn't mean you accept the line of reasoning they are hearing. You should still provide a strong rebuttal to that. But it might mean that you support them to do things that wouldn't otherwise be rational simply because they want to fit in. EDIT: I also agree with another commenter who says "Focus on his self confidence". If he's confident in himself then he'll be able to navigate the social situation much better.
  • CleanCoder 4y ago
    I would hire a private investigator to get some dirt on the bullies' families and then have my kid ready with a response the next time he gets called out for NOT having the latest iPhone - "Well, I might NOT have an iPhone but at least my father doesn't have a second family in Tampa" or "You might think my Android is worse than your iPhone but at least my parents didn't need to remortgage the house two times to afford it" or "Maybe your sister can get me one then with all that OnlyFans money she's making?" I am certain this would get the right kind of attention from the bully's parents the second little Johny makes dinner talk the most uncomfortable day in HIS family's life.
    • kylehotchkiss 4y ago
      Making an issue between children into a war between families doesn’t seem wise. Especially when they decide to pay you back with the same or call your boss and make things even messier
      • ungamedplayer 4y ago
        Haha. They call your boss... This actually happens? My Australian boss would impolitely tell them to go away.
• Panino 4y ago
  It sounds like you're thinking 10x as much about the technology involved as you are in your own son's feelings. Can you involve another adult who can help?
  • red-iron-pine 4y ago
    but but sideloading! f-droid! FOSS! I wonder what that kid's therapist will say about those features viz-a-viz bullying in 20+ years.
  • zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
    When I was 12, my Cybiko and Dreamcast were the coolest things because I could download homebrew games for them and even try writing programs of my own. I'd have definitely been an Android kid
• petee 4y ago
  You probably can't convince him, peer pressure is going to win out at that age. Best I think you can do is emphasize working (at 12, allowance or chores) to earn the fancy things you want, and not caving yourself to the demands of his friends. He might be disappointed, but its not his money.
• kjkjadksj 4y ago
  Kids will always self select like this unfortunately. When I was a kid they would do the same about what brand of t shirt you had on.
• diebeforei485 4y ago
  So, instead of a less expensive iPhone SE, you got your kid a more expensive Galaxy S20, with features he doesn't care about? It's mostly an iMessage thing as I understand, and all iPhones work with iMessage.
• paulcole 4y ago
  > they're marketed as a premium brand are are nothing more than expensive jewelry There’s nothing wrong with expensive jewelry. Your son isn’t being bullied because the iPhone has more features than the S20. Bullying’s bad but focusing on explaining the technical benefits of the S20 show a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation on your part. If you’re not equipped to help him deal with the bullying, you should consider getting him an iPhone. It’s probably the easiest way out of the situation and there are worse things in the world than being accepted socially. He’s going to have plenty of time in life to be miserable and build character. If buying an iPhone today can make things better, why not?
  • red-iron-pine 4y ago
    The S20 is a more expensive phone and has more features. He's being bullied because he's the odd-man-out, and every single text message from a non-iPhone user looks a different color. His parent's concern about sideloading and F-droid also makes it clear that this family isn't great with the awareness or social skills; awkward parents == awkward kids.
    • hd95489 4y ago
      It’s not just the color of the bubbles. Rich Media texting compatibility between the two platforms is garbage. Pictures and videos off android come in at low resolution and often fail altogether
• rejectfinite 4y ago
  >He just wants to play a few games, do instant messaging, and do casual surfing And an S20 cant do this somehow? Is this the american green bubble shit?
• brarsanmol 4y ago
  Undergraduate Sophomore here, hopefully I can help shine some light on what your son might be experiencing. I also had an Android phone from 7th grade to 12th grade, and definitely faced the same attitude/behaviour your son experienced. First, you should address the bullying. That is the most important part, kids are vicious and the phone might just be an easy excuse to pick on your son. You should raise this issue with other kids' parents as nicoburns said. Second, it can definitely be a bit isolating being the only one or the few kids with an Android phone (especially in the States) a lot of social activity revolves around the Apple Ecosystem (iMessage, iMessage Games, FaceTime, etc...). I found that when I got an iPhone I felt a lot more "connected" to my peers simply because we shared the same platform, its unfortunate but it is the reality. Third, and this may be controversial, I would get your son an iPhone, I assume the dependence for cell phones has only gotten increasingly higher post-covid and feeling left out at that age can hurt pretty bad. You could perhaps make him "earn" it by doing chores, getting good grades, etc...
  • roundandround 4y ago
    I'd recommend against the earn it approach to gain an object that is at the center bullying. People don't like to think of their own kids as possible bullies, but suffering and earning is basic justification to make one a bully towards those who "still don't have one."
    • brarsanmol 4y ago
      Thinking about this a bit more, I agree. Definitely not a parent haha but I would struggle between just capitulating and buying an iPhone or just holding firm and saying no, so I was thinking of somewhere in the middle but looking back I can definitely see how that could also cause some unintended issues.
  • meetingthrower 4y ago
    Yes. We have a no apple house but I bought my kids iphones because of the iMessage monopoly. It's not that they are looked down on for blue bubbles but that literally they CANNOT participate in group texts! Apple should burn in hell for that.... I wish US kids would move to Whatsapp like the rest of the world but that's what we have here.
• cmdrk 4y ago
  it has nothing to do with technology. it has everything to do with tribalism and just plain growing up.
• Raed667 4y ago
  If it wasn't Android it would have been sandals or turtlenecks or whatever random thing. Kids can be cruel.
• numtel 4y ago
  Everytime someone with an iPhone shows me a video on YouTube and has to wait for an ad or two, I use that time to make fun of their expensive preference and inability to install an ad blocker.
  • hd95489 4y ago
    Yeah they just suck at tech because you can ad block on iPhones too
• teg4n_ 4y ago
  If you are not willing to get him an iPhone you can always allow him to throw you under the bus and tell his friends that it’s your fault he has the uncool phone. It doesn’t have anything to do with the technology and trying to convince your son Android is better really does your son no good and might make him feel that you care more about technological arguments than how it is directly affecting him.
• mywittyname 4y ago
  Buy him an iPhone. Kids are assholes and $300 will keep him from being a target here. Adults do this too, btw.
  • rejectfinite 4y ago
    [flagged]
    • mywittyname 4y ago
      I've gotten it from friends and family too. It's just one of those things that has become culturally appropriate to tease people about. And kids are assholes, so if they can get away with teasing somebody about anything, they are going to turn the dial up to 11 on it.
  • red-iron-pine 4y ago
    There are way, way better ways to flex than an iPhone tho. Those aren't available to a 12 year old. i.e. they can talk shit all day about my Pixel phone, whatever. I'll ponder why it matters to them as I drove home in my 7-series.
  • ashwagary 4y ago
    I completely disagree. He should learn to embrace the android and whatever attributes it has that makes it a great device to own. Also wouldnt hurt to buy him a Ferrari and get some hot supermodels to hang out with him from time to time.
  • hd95489 4y ago
    Let’s be honest Apple made it super annoying to deal with android users so I can understand what kids would gravitate to being assholes
    • atonse 4y ago
      How so? How much of this is just SMS? Is it Apple’s fault that SMS doesn’t have group chat, etc? People forget that the iPhone only had SMS the first 3-4 years of its existence. It was a green bubble from day one. So it’s not like they’ve planned this from day one. They needed to differentiate between SMS and iMessage so they started switching colors. I do wonder if anyone has checked the shade of green though. I bet you they’ve made it subtly more visually annoying. Also, yes RCS exists but the feature set is spotty across carriers and it’s not end to end encrypted.
• 28278 4y ago
  Is the issue that his phone isn’t the latest and shiniest or is it that he’s being shunned for the the “green text bubbles”? If it’s the latter, consider getting him an older iPhone so he can participate. At 12, kids are just starting to execute their us vs them muscles. Anything that causes you to stand out against the group can compound this social isolation. There’s plenty of time for your son to develop his individuality later but it takes quite a lot to undo the damage from bullying at this age.
• quink 4y ago
  It sounds like he’s caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand he has his friends with iOS and importantly iMessage, on the other he’s got a parent who thinks these things are beneath him and wants him to get a better and more flexible device. It seems like I’m that kind of situation we should probably just go with whatever the person being squeezed feels like and they’ve explicitly stated that they don’t care about sideloading or understand what it is - and there’s no conceivable way that participation in your circle of friends should depend on it or even does depend on it. And that he just wants to do things that iPhones are perfectly well suited for. You can get slight older iPhones that’ll continue getting updates for a while yet for remarkably little these days and iPhones offer, dollar for dollar, better CPU performance than Android devices by some margin. It is no expensive jewellery it is just a tool. The people around him have settled on one kind of tool that works for them so just get him the same tool. You’re the one trying to burden him with expensive jewellery, a device with worse CPU performance per dollar, with features he doesn’t care about but missing features that he needs just to be able to more effectively interact with the people around him. That’s jewellery.
  • quink 4y ago
    Also, I’m getting the suspicion that OP has posted this to HN in order to get an answer or story on how twenty kids have been convinced to switch from dumb iPhones to amazing Android. If OP is looking for an explicit answer to that read between the lines question the simple one is: You don’t and you can’t, the end. As a wise person once said: "Gretchen, stop trying to make fetch happen! It's not going to happen!"
• throwawaysalome 4y ago
  tried to explain how you can side-load apps from F-Froid Wow, talk about missing the point. My parents were well-to-do but frugal immigrants. I got railed on constantly in the faddish 80s for my home haircuts, my second-hand gear, and my sneakers from the clearance bin. Nothing my parents told me about function over form helped alleviate the ignominy. I honestly don't know the best approach, to gut it out, or to succumb to consumerism.
  • gabrielsroka 4y ago
    > F-Froid A bit of a Froid-ian slip there. I know HN doesn't appreciate comedy, but I couldn't resist and will gladly take the down votes.
    • throwawaysalome 4y ago
      Nice. The applicability of this heretofore unnoticed pun would seem endless!
    • sdfhbdf 4y ago
      I think HN appreciates comedy, just a specific type, but I am not able to fully nicely describe it at the moment. I believe the comedy has to be universal because we come from so many different cultures here. HN dislikes comedy that is based on some biases or bigotry.
    • projektfu 4y ago
      I like to kid around and only a few times have been heavily down voted for not taking things seriously. Be brave!
• rejectfinite 4y ago
  [flagged]
• rejectfinite 4y ago
  >explain how you can side-load apps from F-Droid, bypassing Google Play, but he's too young (12) to understand such concepts. I use an android, but none of this. Nobody normal cares. Unironically. I install apps from google play, use firefox for the adblock and messenger, telegram, whatsapp, discord, snap for messaging. When did smartphone start to mean apple? I feel like just a few years ago EVERYONE used snap as a teen/young adult. Is it really imessage/facetime only now?
• manv1 4y ago
  They don't care about the facts, they care that he's using a different OS on his phone. And they really don't care that much. If he really wants to he can say that it's because of his big dick.
• runjake 4y ago
  Have you considered he might be lying or grossly-exaggerating the problem to you and just wants an iPhone? It's something kids commonly do around this age (n=3).
• aynyc 4y ago
  It's not about better, it's about tribalism, the US and THEM will come in full force soon. Wait til high school. Get your son an iPhone if you can handle it financially. It's not capitulation, there are other bigger shits your son will need you to deal with that money can't address. Focus on those.
• noodlesUK 4y ago
  I would try to understand that this has nothing to do with the relative technological capabilities of the phones in question, and you should try to stop yourself from seeing it that way. As you're an HNer that might be hard, but it's important to understand that this is a social issue -- not a technical one --, and kids can be ruthless. There are a couple ways you can approach this particular issue. 1. You can capitulate to the demands that your child has, and get him an iPhone of some appropriate variety. You can attach some strings to this, maybe he needs to work or do something else and this can be his reward, or you could just give it to him. Sometimes it's best to pick your battles, and you could have a conversation with him about that. 2. You can continue as you have been doing to try and teach your son that the kids are wrong, and that he can be resilient against this kind of bullying. (I don't think I recommend this strategy) 3. You can tell some other authority figures about what's going on. The outcome of this will largely depend on who they are, and how likely they are to recognise/care about the bullying. EDIT: The most important thing is to talk to your son about this, and listen to what he has to say. You might think you're an expert on phones, and you probably are. That doesn't matter. Let your son explain how he feels, and work through a plan to make the situation better. Bullies prey on insecurity. Help your son understand what's happening and let him know that you are a person who can help.
  • itchyouch 4y ago
    Totally agree. "To listen" but people need so much more on what it actually means to provide non-judgmental emotional space. Based on the OP already trying to have made a technical argument, there is already likely a decent amount of emotional damage that OP's son has already experienced and may not be willing to have that conversation or listen. IMO, option 3 can also be highly ostracizing depending on the circumstances. Maybe the bullying based on the phone will stop, but it's also possible the kids decide that "OP's son is a snitch. So full of shade. We don't want him around." There's a whole slew of conversational skills that would be useful to develop in OP's son for dealing with adverse situations like this. Especially in deescalation and conversational redirection techniques.
  • dabbledash 4y ago
    Do you just think 12 is too young to teach a better response?
• jollyllama 4y ago
  Buying him an iphone is probably the worst thing you could do, you'd be teaching him the answer to bullying is to change and conform yourself. What will happen if others later bully him for "not drinking enough" or not engaging in other foolish behavior?
  • jgwil2 4y ago
    This is my instinct as well. I'm really surprised how many people here seem to think that just buying the status symbol a) will solve the problem and b) imparts the right lesson.
    • km3r 4y ago
      Seems like the kid never wanted an android phone. Why buy him one when there are plenty of iPhones at S20 prices? Don't force your kid to go to church, and don't make them choose your ideological side on Android vs iPhone. And I say this as someone who really doesn't like Apple and has only had Android phones.
    • luckylion 4y ago
      Because it often solves the problem. When someone is seen as "the other" because of some criteria, and you change those criteria, they are no longer "the other". You can also buy them a pump gun and teach them how to deal with bullies, but that's being frowned upon.
  • thiht 4y ago
    > the answer to bullying is to change and conform yourself Well, it is an answer. An easy and effective one in this precise situation. We’re not talking about changing the whole kid’s personality here. He probably didn’t make the choice of an Android phone himself.
    • jsnk 4y ago
      This is just the start. It'll make a lasting impact on the impressionable mind that the right thing is to fit it, conform, and subjugate oneself to bullies rather than stand up for oneself.
• CodeWriter23 4y ago
  When it comes to this kind of stuff (and no, she doesn’t have a phone just yet) with my 13yo I work in the space of not being concerned about others passing judgement for superficial BS like this. We have a saying in our family, “Rejection is Protection”. She actually has the opposite problem, cut off from texting with her Android-toting peers because iMessage on her iPad only clicques up with other Apple users. They work around it in some cases by others relaying appointments for gathering f2f, or by not having contact with certain kids except when they serendipitously cross paths irl. And it’s ok. She doesn’t suffer FOMO because she experiences missing out on things and recognizes she’s still ok.
• otoburb 4y ago
  Separation of concerns and prioritization may help here: 1. The bullying is unacceptable. As other comments have noted, address this first and foremost regardless of the (perceived) reason. A good first step is to have your child identify the offenders and reach out to the parents with your child's agreement on the plan of action. You may also want to consider a longer-range set of possibilities, up to and including potentially changing schools if you have the means and if the situation is extreme enough (ideally, not). 2. Older/refurbished iPhones look they can be found for similar prices as the Galaxy S20. If you buy one for your child, or have your child earn it via chores/jobs, then you'll both find out soon enough whether the bullying stems from not having the right phone or if it's a vicious social group that will find a different reason to keep harassing your child. Hence, dealing with #1 is the most important. 3. You explained to your child (probably numerous times) about iPhones not being automatically better; now it's time to move on and take actions that (might) improve his situation. Parenting can be tough to navigate. Best of luck.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
• spacKingChamath 4y ago
  I get bullied about having a Pixel as a 30 year old by all my close friends. No one wants the green bubble. At 12, fitting in is a big thing. Sometimes some things are worth adjusting for.
  • itchyouch 4y ago
    I do lightly bully my best friend of 20 years for going with an android because our picture quality is abysmal though...
    • ungamedplayer 4y ago
      I bully iPhone users with their inferior photo quality, inferior hackability, battery life. Just to balance things out.
      • Jcowell 4y ago
        > battery life The iPhones battery life has been amazing since the 11
        • ungamedplayer 4y ago
          Bullying isn't logical.
  • hd95489 4y ago
    Media messaging from Apple to android is a disaster. Experience is terrible I don’t see how a 12 year old would overcome that
    • Nextgrid 4y ago
      To be fair, this isn't an Android problem as much as it is a carrier problem. There's technically no reason they can't pass through the raw media sent by MMS, but as a result of lack of engineering talent, cutting corners and technical debt, it is mangled and recompressed to potato quality before being delivered. This problem would also affect iPhones that don't use iMessage.
• itchyouch 4y ago
  This isn't an issue of technical merit. This is an issue of the lack of emotional safety brought on by the bullying. The phone is only one area that kids can be cruel in. The pressure to conform will be very high as the kids will ostracize him from iMessage group chats for "turning their bubbles green" and essentially being the individual that brings a neutered media experience to the group. There is an active negative selection pressure that the kids are exercising. "Lame" is really just the tip of the iceberg. So you reply, "it's not lame! look at all these cool things you can do." This is very invalidating for your son. Others have mentioned things like self-confidence, but I'd beg to differ. One can't just pull confidence out of a magic hat. These kinds of character traits are developed over time and circumstance in small amounts so that the mental activation energy of getting over a give "hump" is significantly reduced. And also confidence is a similar solution to the way, "getting an iphone" is a similar situation to getting bullied. Sure, the peer pressure is unacceptable and people shouldn't be judged on their merit, but what your son needs isn't logic that proves the principled stance. He needs you & (other parent if they are available) that can listen to his personal struggle of what it feels like to deal with the situation (without offering solutions like "side-loading is awesome!"). Once he has an authentic, non-judgmental, supportive, not-providing-solutions outlet for the struggles he's facing, then you as a parent can help him process what is going on. And in that process, you can model what a healthy response looks like. Without that modeling, and a framework for being able to articulate rebuttals and defend himself, "just having a capable phone" is a very dismissive approach. He legitimately has an Everest of a social mountain to climb not being an iPhone user. As adults, getting judged by some unimportant people in our lives is not important to us, but as kids, his school, his "friends" are likely a HUGE part of his life. And being able to participate in those social circles is a huge part of the quality of life and satisfaction he likely receives from his peers. So it's important to be able to understand what about his inner world is important. And it's important to validate that his inner-world is seen & heard, and based on what's been seen & heard, that he feels accepted. If this wasn't an issue for a while, it could be that he wants to join a particular social circle because maybe he's interested in a girl from that social circle. It could be that he looks up to someone in a particular circle and wants to be accepted by them. It could be that he feels that he needs to obtain a certain amount of status by associating with certain kids (he won't actually word it this way). So it's important to be able to delve into what's really happening, how it's making him feel, that his feelings are actually legitimate & OKAY, and what coping mechanisms are necessary to prioritize the right things. I don't have any helpful direct youtube links, but I would highly recommend looking through the Youtube videos of HealthyGamerGG, who is a Harvard trained psychiatrist, but makes a tremendous amount of the challenges that kids go through, very accessible to understand with both kids & adults alike.
• alexashka 4y ago
  [flagged]
  • throwawaysalome 4y ago
    "Son, don't blame the phone. You're just a loser." That kind of tough love might just put the whole matter to rest!
  • t-3 4y ago
    Sad, but probably true. Bullies pick on kids to get a response, if he didn't let them bother him he wouldn't get bullied.
    • krapp 4y ago
      >Bullies pick on kids to get a response, if he didn't let them bother him he wouldn't get bullied. Plenty of bullies will escalate until they get what they want.
      • ungamedplayer 4y ago
        I have found a bit of counter bullying solves a lot of these issues.
      • rasz 4y ago
        Mine escalated until I broke his nose, clear sailing from there to the end of elementary school. Wasnt thrown out only because there was long documented history of me sheepishly reporting bullying to adults for years, and them ignoring it/punishing both parties(you asked for it, stop provoking him into beating you etc).
  • dang 4y ago
    When you respond this personally and aggressively to a story about bullying, you bring a quality of bullying into the thread. That's the opposite of what we want here, regardless of how right you are or feel you are. If we assume that you're 100% right, that actually makes your comment considerably worse. We've had to ask you many times not to break the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26391704 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26391704 (March 2021) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24313927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24313927 (Aug 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23375138 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23375138 (June 2020) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21330811 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21330811 (Oct 2019) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889807 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19889807 (May 2019) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17812921 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17812921 (Aug 2018) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11170081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11170081 (Feb 2016) A lot of those requests were specifically asking you not to do personal attacks.
• MikeTheRocker 4y ago
  It's not about the features of the phone. Not having the right tech is the modern equivalent to not wearing the latest trendy sneakers (or whatever). Kids can be incredibly unrelenting and mean, so it might be best to just get him the phone he needs to fit in. Part of me wonders if that sets a really poor example for how to handle social pressure though. On the other hand, if you think the bullying is light enough that your son won't be traumatized by standing up to it, teaching him that it's okay to not follow trends would be a big win and probably serve him well in life. I have no idea how best to solve this, but I wish you the best of luck!
• coldblues 4y ago
  Is this primarily a US thing? I have never heard of such a thing where I live. The only other country I can think of is Japan.
  • itchyouch 4y ago
    https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-apples-imessage-is-winning-teens-dread-the-green-text-bubble-11641618009 https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-apples-imessage-is-winning-...
• nobodyandproud 4y ago
  Ask your son on when the bullying really started.
  • whatyesaid 4y ago
    Yeah, probably his way of easing you into a bigger problem. Unless it's light hearted teasing/discussion (by actual "friends") but taken as peer pressure. To be honest S20 at 12 being an issue over Apple in 2023 is first world problems as fuck.
• mikst 4y ago
  First, you should find out exactly what is happening. Coroborate what he is saying. Assuming things are as you say, fist thing is to teach fear management. Do light fear training. Nothing extreme, ideally something tailored to his psyche. Without this nothing is gonna work. Then, teach him crowd control. I'm not joking. There is science on how to deal with a crowd. You don't need to explain advantages of Android, but how to use them to stand up to those kids. Both of these skills are universally useful, and will help him in life almost guaranteed.
• 908B64B197 4y ago
  > I tried to explain it's a modern enough and capable phone that can do everything the latest iPhone can do, sometimes even better. Didn't know the Galaxy S20 supported iMessage or FaceTime. That's probably what all his friends are using. And the girls he would like to talk to. I mean, I guess he can show them how he can "side-load" apps on his phone...
• schwartzworld 4y ago
  It's not just kids. I know adult apple users who claim to feel uncomfortable with the green bubble that iPhones use to show non-apple SMS messages. We ended up moving band planning over to email because it continued to be an issue.
  • em-bee 4y ago
    how can the color of a text bubble be that much of an issue? or is there more to it? it seems like apple needs to be forced to stop this. maybe this new law in the EU will help: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34993823 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34993823
    • crysin 4y ago
      Color of the text bubble matters because humans are judgmental. Conformity matters to children. You can’t stop bullying. Even if iMessage is made available to all platforms, there’ll be something else that’ll become the focus of the bullying.
      • em-bee 4y ago
        i can see that for children, but not for adults. not to the extent that they would prefer email just to avoid seeing green message bubbles.
    • Nextgrid 4y ago
      At least for me there's more to it. A green bubble means I have no way to know whether the message was delivered or was swallowed/mangled in transit. There's no guarantee on delivery time - I trust iMessage to be near-instant because it goes over IP - I don't trust the duct tape and garbage that handles SMS delivery especially across carriers. Agreed that iMessage needs to be open, but let's not pretend like SMS is a fine replacement for it - it's not.
      • em-bee 4y ago
        thank you, that's actually helpful. good point. i agree with the issues of SMS. it's the same issue with the signal SMS integration i think. in fact having to use SMS on android to be able to talk to iphone users would also bother me and i'd seriously want to pressure them to use a cross platform messenger instead.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
  Your son needs to mature. He needs to start ignoring what others do think about him and start to actively resisting peer pressure of others. You can either force him the Android and drive his mental development towards a person who is not afraid to to have different opinion than the opinion of the group OR you can let him have iPhone and validate that being just another ant in the anthill is best approach to life.
  • daseiner1 4y ago
    he’s 12.
• Indomit 4y ago
  Teach him to be grateful.
• bitlax 4y ago
  The advantage Android phones have is hackability, access to underlying apis, Linux app compatibility, etc. Apple phones might have the slight edge in photography and messaging, but Android absolutely wipes the floor with Apple when it comes to the amount of value it delivers through customizability. That might be hard for your son to demonstrate in the short term, but an Android phone is basically a Linux computer you can use for infinite integrations, whereas an iPhone is just a smartphone.
  • hd95489 4y ago
    Doesn’t matter if Video and photo texts don’t show up correctly to your peers. Apple and Android are barely compatible
    • bitlax 4y ago
      Never been an issue for me. His friends must use junk messaging.
  • scarface74 4y ago
    And you think a 12 year old cares about any of that?
    • bitlax 4y ago
      I don't care what 12-year-olds care about.
      • scarface74 4y ago
        I mean that kind of is the subject of the post…
        • bitlax 4y ago
          Which means the poster is asking the wrong questions.
• ashwagary 4y ago
  Continue helping the kid understand the major technical limitations of the device and ecosystem his ignorant friends have subcribed to. There is a silver lining that could pay off for the rest of his life.
• Jcowell 4y ago
  > I tried to explain it's a modern enough and capable phone that can do everything the latest iPhone can do, sometimes even better. H Couple of points here that as far as I’ve seen has yet to be addressed by the comments. It doesn’t matter what the Android phone can do, in the end, no android device beat the social experience of the iPhone. The texting experience is inferior. The inability to send gifs videos, and photos (It doesn’t matter how good of a photo an android photos can take if the recipient will never seen the quality over text) in a reliable manner, voice messages, and iMessage games is a turn off. The fact that these are degraded/ even more undoable for a group chat enhances the inferiority. The inability to FaceTime, have group face time, and now share play is also a Downside socially. The fact is, no android can do what the latest online can do socially
  • delta_p_delta_x 4y ago
    > no android device beat the social experience of the iPhone. ??? Android phones (and iPhones too, for that matter) can have third-party apps like WhatsApp, Telegram, Zoom, Skype, WeChat, Viber, etc installed. iMessage absolutely pales in comparison to Telegram.
    • hd95489 4y ago
      Doesn’t matter if your friends don’t use it
      • delta_p_delta_x 4y ago
        Literally everywhere else in the world, people don't use iMessage and FaceTime, but third-party apps. This is solely an American problem manufactured by Americans for Americans, and catalysed by the excessive vapidity and superficiality of social media. You lot appear to like shooting yourselves in the foot a lot (sometimes, not even figuratively). Ergo the bullying that OP's son is experiencing. Android phones have rivalled iPhones in price for a long time now.
        • shen 4y ago
• Clubber 4y ago
  >How do I convince him that this peer pressure is unacceptable and that iPhones are not automatically 'better' just because they're marketed as a premium brand are are nothing more than expensive jewelry? I would just buy him an iPhone, or sign him up for Jiu Jitsu class.
• cozzyd 4y ago
  I wonder how much bullying Apple's closed silos leads to. Add it to the list of reasons never to buy Apple products...
• jasfi 4y ago
  Read up on narcissism, it helps to explain most bullying.
• kylehotchkiss 4y ago
  20 years ago, it was the same thing with shoes. I remember the talk about “Walmart walkers”, “k-mart kicks”, etc. Half these bullies are probably on iPhone SEs, refurbs, or hand-me-downs anyways. If you’re thinking of getting your child or teenager a high end iPhone… why not just go spend that same money on yourself
• mildredbonk 4y ago
  Do your kid a favor and get him an iPhone sometime. If you think Androids can do everything iPhones can do, you're kind of underestimating the network effect of iMessage. Or I guess he can stick with the Samsung and sideload 90s emulators to twiddle his thumbs on on while the rest of his friends digitally socialize in their blue-bubbled group chat. You said it yourself. He doesn't care at all about pushing his S20's operating system to the limit. Even though this is a forum for nerds, you don't have to peer pressure him into owning a nerd phone.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• fwlr 4y ago
  Telling your son how good Android phones are isn’t going to work. You need to tell the bullies that Androids are good phones.
• MathMonkeyMan 4y ago
  Kids can be shitty to each other. If it's not the phone, then it's something else. You don't have to convince him.
• scarface74 4y ago
  Did he ask for an Android phone?
• silisili 4y ago
  My opinion: they're gonna bully him regardless. I remember going to school with a kid who was bullied for his shoes, though I don't remember the brand. One day he got new Nike to fit in, and they teased him for doing it, among other things. Then it was onto his clothes, hair, backpack, etc. Kids are jerks, I honestly don't think buying him an Iphone will change a thing.
  • adr1an 4y ago
    True, but I disagree. Currently, the object is in dispute with the father. So, from the kid perspective, the father is responsible up to some degree. Here's their relationship at stake. Also, it might so happens the bullying does fade away. We lack a whole lot of details on the situation of this kid.
• ianzakalwe 4y ago
  Asking for a parenting advice on HN seems more like asking for more tools to win "Android vs iPhone" battle. Just let your kid have less painful upbringing. Let him learn about peer-pressure and other things on his own. Stop making yourself right at his expense.
• deafpolygon 4y ago
  Sounds like an American thing. It's the other way around in the Netherlands. An iPhone is seen as a wasteful cost, especially for teens.
  • shrimp_emoji 4y ago
    That's because your people are more educated and cultured.
  • Nextgrid 4y ago
    > An iPhone is seen as a wasteful cost, especially for teens. A second-hand SE is cheap and is still likely to outlast the support period of even a brand new flagship Android phone.
    • deafpolygon 4y ago
      Not when you can get a decently performing android handheld, brand new (i.e. Samsung A33), from the carrier for 50 with an added monthly payment cost of 9eu/month for 2 years bundled into a family plan of 200gb shared/month. Only 8 euros a month for the number itself (unlimited calling+text) For the same cost as a refurbished iPhone SE 2020 from the same carrier.
• user3939382 4y ago
  Nothing matters more than fitting in at that age. Get him an iPhone.
• IIAOPSW 4y ago
  Well first of all, 12 isn't that young. He could understand it if he had to. Second, its kind of a great teaching opportunity. Why does he care what other kids think? Get him to try putting into words exactly what he thinks the iphone can do better. There's no time better than now to not get sucked into the consumerist bullshit signaling game of owning things for others to care about. It may hurt now, but not being a slave to marketing is a valuable lesson to impart.
• rd 4y ago
  Another sophomore in college here. Get your kid an iPhone. Growing up without iMessage, FaceTime, GamePigeon, when every other kid has it, sucks, plain and simple. You’re disconnected and more than the bullying, your kid will never truly fit in. It is sad that’s the way it is, but it’s the world we live in.
  • wizofaus 4y ago
    I really don't buy that at all sorry. My son's only ever had an Android device and it's never been an issue (he seems to mostly use Discord for group chat). Giving in to bullying like that and literally helping make the Apple-monopolisation situation worse seems the worst possible response. Plenty of kids come from families that surely can't even afford to buy all their kids any sort of phone at all let alone the latest iPhone. Kids getting teased/bullied at school is par for the course and part of growing up - if it's not having the latest iPhone it'll be something else anyway. Unless it's obviously getting dangerously physical the most important job you have as a parent is to ensure your kids are equipped with the mental and emotional wherewithal to deal with it.
  • habitue 4y ago
    There's more to life than fitting in. Letting kids from spmenother family dictate what you spend your money on is lame. As others have said, the issue is the kid's feelings and self confidence not actually technology. That applies to sideloading not being the point, but it also applies to switching to iphone not being the point.
• weird-eye-issue 4y ago
  I can't believe you approached your 12 year old son getting bullied by talking about side loading apps
  • udev4096 4y ago
    That was the my first reaction too. I mean, why would you even bring that up? I can understand that it's important to make your child realize the importance of FOSS but it wasn't necessary in this case.
  • filoleg 4y ago
    That left me baffled too. OP just couldn't resist playing a pure caricature of a stereotypical emotionally deaf technical worker at a few points in the post. One of those posts where I am not even entirely sure whether it is satire or not (most likely not).
• e-clinton 4y ago
  Buy him an iPhone. It’s cheaper than therapy.
• n8henrie 4y ago
  A lot of responses from people that clearly do not have young children. Not that this means they are right or wrong, just interesting its own right. You wouldn't try teaching calculus to your toddler. You'd have a hard time teaching many 30 year olds why you're right on technical and/or ethical merit in this situation. Regardless of what lessons you may help your child learn from this, what they will remember most prominently will be how you made them feel. Be supportive. Help them figure out a plan to earn an iPhone, if they want. Bullies will continue to bully, but don't make it your fault -- they will learn these lessons on their own.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• pivateschool 4y ago
  [flagged]
• Projectiboga 4y ago
  My kid felt iOS was a better choice for certain multiplayer games. He's PC for gaming we are a mixed tech family. I use Windows, Linux and Android. My wife iPhone and a used macbook. Kid wanted mom's old iPhone when mom upgraded. Sorry your kid is getting bullied.
• zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
  Tell him kids are dumb and he'll forget about it in a few years. I don't have kids, so not sure how good that advice is.
  • kilgnad 4y ago
    A few years is eons for a kid. The father here is wrong. Logic isn't an argument here. The iphone is an icon, a fashion symbol, his son wants it for cultural reasons. Logic DOESN'T apply to fashion. Whenever I hear an argument like this it makes me wonder how in touch with reality some people are. On hot days why don't men just don't wear pants and walk around with their dicks hanging out all day? There's no difference here, and overall you'll be cooler temperature wise then having to drape an extra piece of clothe called "shorts" over your crotch area. It's the rational thing to do. How do I convince society that I'm logically right? You don't. Just like you don't convince your kids to change the culture of his friend group. They like iphones... that's the culture you can't change. Let him wear some shorts for godsakes because currently the kid feels like he's walking around with his dick hanging out. .
  • izacus 4y ago
    No they won't, even here on Hacker News so called smart adults come out to claim their superiority for buying the right apply phone brand. Every single mobile thread is full of marketing on how Apple is the superior brand and how others are wrong for not buying it. If the adults are parroting the corporate marketing propaganda, how could children not?
  • valar_m 4y ago
    Yep, terrible advice, my friend. I know that because it's what my dad said to me at that age. It's been 20 years and I'm still processing the trauma of horrific bullying.
• rootsudo 4y ago
  You can explain it, but his community will never accept him and will always judge him and you as someone that can't afford an iPhone or change into what it is. Having an android in some circles, that skew young, is pariah. It is what it is. It's about peer acceptance, and what's happening on blue imessages is the kids classmates talking about how he's weird because he isn't fitting in.
• brudgers 4y ago
  I own an S20 too and tried to explain how you can side-load apps from F-Droid, bypassing Google Play, but he's too young (12) to understand such concepts. He’s not too young to understand. It is your thing. It isn’t his thing. 12 is about when kids see that. When their friends become important and their relationship with their parents changes. It is when your role as a parent changes. My parenting advice is get two iPhones. Let your kid teach you how to use yours. If you really want to win, first ask them if you should get an iPhone. —- On a Friday afternoon, I picked my boy up from middle school to get to an out of town travel soccer event. “I need an iPhone because I have a girlfriend.” Thus ended the Tracphone is good enough phase of our relationship. A five years later I asked what phone I should get. These days we FaceTime when he’s not working. It’s a long game. Rapport, trust and goodwill are the only winning strategy. Good luck.
  • em-bee 4y ago
    as a parent, part of my job is to protect my children from harm. thus regardless of the kids wishes, they will not be getting an iphone (or a regular android phone). “I need an iPhone because I have a girlfriend.” "if that is what your girlfriend expects from you, then she is not a true friend. i know this may be painful, but true friends do not focus on things like that. try to be persistent. this is a good test for your friendship. if she insists, then let her go. you will not be happy with her in the future, because she will continue to pressure you to buy fancy things, and that is not the kind of relationship you want."
    • fkgmeqnb 4y ago
      Great way of ruining your child's relationships.
      • em-bee 4y ago
        it will ruin the toxic relationships and make room for better ones.
        • TastyJhinga 4y ago
• lenkite 4y ago
  Ask him to earn the iPhone. Better grades and chores are repaid with down-payments towards the iPhone. Otherwise he can stick to Android. Everyone needs to learn to deal with a bit of bullying. If it gets to the level of constant harassment, then it has nothing to do with the iPhone and you need to talk to the school and start making some calls to the families involved.
  • eps 4y ago
    This may be perceived by this kid as massively unfair, because everyone else have their iPhones with no strings attached. If the OP is to get his kid an iPhone, it should be conditional only on taking good care about it.
    • lenkite 4y ago
      Well..I grew up in the third world in a lower-middle class family, so I have little sympathy for the kid.
• aaron695 4y ago
  [dead]
• RalfWausE 4y ago
  As someone who was bullied more or less his entire time in school my only advice would be: You don`t discuss with bullies... You ignore the lesser ones, the bigger ones you punch in the face.
  • em-bee 4y ago
    > You can continue as you have been doing to try and teach your son that the kids are wrong, and that he can be resilient against this kind of bullying. (I don't think I recommend this strategy) i disagree with not recommending this strategy. today it's the iphone, tomorrow it's something else. bullying needs to be stopped, and giving in to demands is not the way to do it. apart from involving authorities (parents/teachers, etc), children need to learn how to deal with bullies. but don't argue about the qualities of the phone, instead talk about bullying in general and how any children that exhibit such behavior are not friends, and help your child find friends elsewhere.
    • Ekaros 4y ago
      As society we should step up and set zero tolerance on bullying. First time punish them. Third time ship them to some facility. Remove them from society like other criminals.
      • em-bee 4y ago
        children who are bullying are often suffering from problems at home, so punishing is not the right solution. they need coaching and support just as much.
        • Ekaros 4y ago
          Why wouldn't removing them from homes and having them be in appropriate facilities be a solution then? Removes the problems from home, so they could do better in other places. And no, nothing should excuse bullying.
          • 4y ago
• azmodeus 4y ago
  Your son's insecurity is being preyed upon Getting the iPhone isn't a solution. Building up your son's confidence and capability will arm him against bullies and internal insecurities. To build these up I did martial arts as a teen and it helped me a lot. Caving to peer pressure is not a position of strength. On the other hand it can also be the case your son wants an iPhone. In this case good to chat with him.
  • PartiallyTyped 4y ago
    The child must want to do martial arts or whatever other solution to appreciate it. The parent ought to build up their child, and __telling__ and reasoning to the child why they are wrong is not the way to solve a social or emotional problem.
  • wreath 4y ago
    This. Especially if you are in the US, Gracie Academy runs a special training for kids to teach them how to handle bullying (and no, not by choking another kid)
• valar_m 4y ago
  God I feel so bad for this kid it makes me want to cry. Motherfucking side load apps? Bro, your son is suffering and it ain't got shit to do with side loading apps. I was cruelly bullied at that age and my parents did nothing either. It nearly did me in, for good. I was 13. If you won't buy him the iPhone lmk and I will.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
• devwastaken 4y ago
  Kids social status has gone full consumerism. If they don't have the right shoes they're "lame". If their 'friends' care that much that they have an Android phone, they're not friends, they're losers. If they want an iphone that much then they can get a job and work for it. You can't educate perspective, they have to learn it themselves.
• throwaway16639 4y ago
  Get your son something else (perhaps relating to your son’s interests?), like a powerful microscope, or a huge trampoline, or rent a VPS for him and emphasize on what it does… That way he can have the self-esteem that he also has something valuable. The goal here is changing the subject entirely and not being forced by their game of “who has the best phone”…
• qalmakka 4y ago
  I was on a packed bus yesterday at 7.30 AM. I live in Italy, which has been historically a strong Android bastion with no iMessage usage whatsoever. I was surrounded by high schoolers from lots of backgrounds, and yet the vast, vast majority of them were using iPhones. It's not like the iPhone is a status symbol, that was back in the late '00s. Gen Z has simply rejected Android for whatever reason and very few young people in the west willingly pick an Android. This is not only a big issue for Google but for society at large - because we're basically giving to Apple complete and utter control about the future of computing.
  • luckylion 4y ago
    Young people are hyper-focused on status, so I expect it to be a status function. You can show that your parents have a certain amount of disposable income by owning an iphone, just like you can by owning brand clothes and shoes, a brand schoolbag, brand softdrinks and candy bars etc etc.
  • Nextgrid 4y ago
    > Gen Z has simply rejected Android for whatever reason and very few young people in the west willingly pick an Android. It's just a more pleasant and robust experience, especially if you're non-technical and don't know the pitfalls to avoid or how to make the most of your Android device (removing pre-loaded crapware, alternative & better ROMs, which devices/brands to buy, etc).
  • yucky 4y ago
    This segment of Gen Z should be reminded that their status symbol is a symbol of slave labor and that if they consider themselves so progressive they should keep in mind that they are directly contributing to the oppressors they love to make snarky comments about on social media. But they won't. Because ultimately they are unable to accept accountability for any of their own decisions.
• poulpy123 4y ago
  [flagged]
• frankreyes 4y ago
  My sister, back in school, had a ridiculous attachment to backpacks and hair straightener of a specific brand. She managed to get my parents to buy a hair straightener but the color was not the same as her friends and she started to cry. Because of the color of the hair straightener. It's an emotional decision that had nothing to do with technical capabilities. It's being virtue signaling and a tribal human in its finest form. Kids bully each other to establish a hierarchy. It happens to both boys and girls. I once dated a very tall girl who told me she was being bullied for her height, but in return she bullied back her friends for being short. It was so funny to listen girls bullying each other over physical appearance... Lol
• hypertele-Xii 4y ago
  Bullies bully. It's never about the specific quality being bullied about, it's the weak personality of the victim being exploited by the bullies to feel better about their own worthless selves. Take your son to kickboxing for a year, and see if he ever gets bullied again, ever.
• LangIsAllWeNeed 4y ago
  I really think the specifics matter a lot here. Is this just friend group being a little mean+him inconvenienced by apple ecosystem lockout or is he being targeted as bullying prey? I was bullied relentlessly as a kid. I was an easy and fun target, incredibly maladjusted, social skills of a rock and had no friends. I got beat up in bathrooms, manipulated and was told in a sincere way to kill myself almost weekly. If he is a target of general serious bullying, you should try to coach to build a layer of social skills and emotional defense, they will find something else, telling authority figures or buying phone will not fix this, it will make worse. The sad truth is people aren’t bullied in serious/ chronic ways for no reason. The reason may only be that they different. But with difference comes a necessity to defend oneself, socially, physically, emotionally. I hope this is just a somewhat regular friend group and they are giving him a hard time for group chat incapability or cheapshot dogging on android, then perhaps get him a used iPhone and make him sit through some more of your side loading type technical talks as repayment. Try to encourage him to not react emotionally to friend group teasing and to tease back in a smooth way.
• tsol 4y ago
  Is this really a common issue now for kids?
• MichaelRo 4y ago
  You must be American because in Europe the iPhone is the odd lot and in Eastern Europe it's even odd-er. And having a Samsung is actually considered high-status, let alone one of the S-series :) Xiaomi is very popular since it used to offer about the same hardware power as a Samsung at half the price if not lower, so owning a Xiaomi flagship, albeit costing half the price of a Samsung S-series is still viewed with admiration. Meaning it's a good phone with decent performance, although it has it's shares of bug like all Chinese made stuff. But you tell to yourself "well at least I paid half price". And then there's the Xiaomi mid range which also has decent performance although ,guaranteed, with a lot more annoying bugs like: switching the camera from photo to video takes 10-20 seconds so if you wanna film evidence of Bigfoot, make sure you anticipate it's brief appearance by at least half a minute in advance. And updating the software is only guaranteed to break even more stuff while almost surely doing nothing for the existing bugs if not making them worse. But then Xiaomi mid range is still flagship level of performance and reliability compared to the phones owned by the a lot of people, often adults with not so great jobs and / or their children, who are happy to at least have a phone, compared to a vast number of kids (usually smaller age) who have none of their own and look in admiration and envy at the ones showing a Chinese clone with the strangest names ("FreeYond", "Bobbary" etc). I actually had a period when I tried to see what's the lowest cost one can pay for a phone or tablet and still be able to use it. Noticed there's an abrupt exponential degradation from the price of a Xiaomi mid-range although the prices enter saturation region quickly. Just cannot manufacture them cheaper, so all you pay is the hardware essentially, but then God-help us with whatever software runs on them and the compatibility with the hardware. One tablet I bought for less than $100 had some 12 nasty bugs right of the bat and eventually at some point the battery exploded (for real!). So Samsung S20? That's so high-status around here that people mostly assume you're showing off when you buy that :)
  • jacobgorm 4y ago
    I’m in Denmark and all the kids in my child’s school class have iPhones, FWIW.
• MYEUHD 4y ago
  meanwhile, I bully my friends who use iphones because their expensive high end phone can't send a file using bluetooth.
• Ekaros 4y ago
  Contact the authorities. Try to get these bullies removed from the school. Tough actions is the only long term solution we have as society.
  • hn_throwaway_69 4y ago
    This often doesn't work and backfires. The school will just warn them, the target will be characterised as a snitch and it will just strengthen the bullies' mutual loathing of the target. Generally the only way to stop bullying is to build resilience and fight back. There are extreme cases where I agree it should be reported, including infliction of physical violence.
    • Ekaros 4y ago
      Then sue them for not doing anything. Or start a rightful social media and media campaign so it cannot be ignored. Get them fired. This is clearly a situation where adults failing to do their job should get their careers ended permanently.
  • eps 4y ago
    This will only make things worse. No one will seriously consider removing kids from school for making fun of other kid's phone, but this attempt will percolate down to the kids and antagonize everyone against this kid as a tattle-tale.
• gls2ro 4y ago
  I am a parent of a younger child and yet I struggle with picking the right battles to fight and when it is time to talk about values, when it is time to let him learn resilience, and when it is time for immediate action. First, let me tell you that you did well trying to explain to your son the reasoning behind your decision _so far_ to not buy an iPhone. It is always good to explain why you took a decision than simply saying "No". Second, I think you should approach this tactically. There are three causes/problems here, each needing a different reaction: 1. (Immediate) Your son is bullied and that should stop. This is serious and requires immediate action on two sides: 1.a. Work to stop the bullying behaviour (as many people pointed out here bullying is a behaviour that has many triggers, it happened now to be the phone) 1.b. Help your son vent and talk about how he is feeling while trying to minimize the psychological harm caused by bullying. I don't know exact how to do this, but I am sure there are resources for this. 2. (also immediate) Recognise that your son is probably feeling left out of his social circle. Action -> Buy an iPhone today. There is no good way around this if your kid's social circle is already using iPhones. Your values are not the fight on this level. Your kid belonging is. No amount of discussion will fix this. The feeling of not belonging is powerful and deep, it is a survival or protection mechanism. So even beings with a mature "neocortex" are not able to think their way out of this feeling with ease. 3. (long term) Here we talk about your values and what you want to transmit to your kid. Android vs iOS is not a value. What are you really trying to teach him here? I don't know what value you are trying to teach, but be sure that buying an iPhone now will not break nor make that value. 4. (long term for you) I say this with an open heart as something that I am still learning. There is a balance between trying to teach my son a value and recognizing when he is a different person than _should_ and _will_ most probably pick up his own set of values. He might not like what I like and our world-views might get challenged between us. Here the most important thing to do (allegedly as I only have a small kid) is to try to create a space for you both to share your feelings and feedback. While having a hard conversation the important thing, in this case, is to focus on making sure you both understand each other side, respect each other side, and then maybe reach a common conclusion. If this appears like a prescription please ignore the tone. I am writing this more to me than to you trying to put in writing some things that I try to wrap my head around when taking decisions related to my kid wellbeing.
• bigpeopleareold 4y ago
  I had a popular brand of backpack in junior high school in the 90s. It was high-quality, but there is a bit of an allure to the branding beyond quality that is best to realize is not a value in itself to pursue. It's not like I thought this when I was younger though, just something about it made me nervous when all these other kids were also sporting the same brand. I was almost robbed once of my bag (I ran away from them and got into my house before they can see me) because of this obsessive fad. While I still used it, it certainly can shape an outlook on branding and faddishness. I think the takeaway (if I were a parent conveying something) is that bullies are finding reasons to bully, because they are shallow. One should use things to support one's own values in the end - I'd say technical and social freedoms are more important than brand allegiances. Now though, I was also aggressively bullied as well, but I saw that bullies will just find anything to feel superior over someone else. I wouldn't know how to describe it - but there is greater things in life than access to particular program. I can understand though - how do you explain this a 12-year-old who is most likely living in our modern culture and must function in the light of others who are steeped in modern life's constant frivolities and distractions?
• t312227 4y ago
  i have to agree to some of my fellow posters here and repeat more or less the message: imho. this is clearly a social and not a technical problem - it should be approached accordingly ... just my 0.02€
• thecleaner 4y ago
  I have only heard of this sort of thing in the US. How can bullying of this sort be allowed ? Are the school authorities sleeping ?
• thecleaner 4y ago
  If you can afford an S20 you can probably afford an iPhone. Spend the money and buy your way out. Do have that conversation with your kid though and let him talk you into buying the phone. Don't make it seem like giving in to bullying or it will never stop. Next thing it will be "oh you got this fancy phone. Think you are rich, hahahha". Bullies are bullies and you need to teach your kid to talk back and stand up for yourself. You need to be militant about your kids welfare and blast the school authorities if these kids ever get physical.
• tpoacher 4y ago
  Buy him an iPhone, but tell him to prefer using the Android in front of his friends "because the iPhone is lame and very limiting, but, ugh, ok, if your iPhones arent compatible enough I'll use mine too just for this one thing". Now he's the one with the cool phone, but he's also got the lame one. Reversal! /s
  • adr1an 4y ago
    I wish this would be possible in our societies.
• eps 4y ago
  Get him an iPhone. You let your opinion known, he knows that you are against, so by yielding to his request you will show that his needs - as foolish as they may seem to you - are actually important to you. Also, the fact that Apple and Google stores have different content is a very big issue for kids. Someone picks up a new game, comes to school, shows it off, everyone gets it, plays it for a day or a week, and then moves on to the next one. If your kid is on another store than doesn't have this game, he is excluded. Repeat this few times and this will leave a mark on him even without someone making fun of him because of that. And the Apple store does get better games first.
• myshpa 4y ago
  Is he bullied or do they just make fun of him/his phone? If he's really bullied, I would teach him to fight back, only easy targets get bullied. They hit you? Hit them 3 times. It's the same as with wild animals. They will attack only if you're running away from them, but turn around, establish eye contact and make threatening noices and every predator thinks twice because it doesn't want to risk an injury. We're all just animals, anyway. If they make fun of him/his phone, talk with him about things android does better (I think it's the same spyware tech, but you probably think otherwise), what marketing and markets do to influence children, teach him to tease those children back or to find new "friends" if the current ones are toxic for him. Inform/prepare him and then let him choose how to handle it, but purchasing whatever just because your "friends" find it acceptable and you're not enough without it is not the right way.
• smusamashah 4y ago
  It's not about phone it's about bullying. They can pick anything to bully with. It's a phone today, tomorrow it can be clothes, shoes, watch, face or body even. What are you going to do then? I have been bullied by older kids in school for anything just because I was too young. If I was in the same situation now, my answer to them would be that this is how I like my things and this is how I am. Downside is that you won't fit in those circles, but should you with that kind of people? One answer could be to go even worse, give him a basic phone (e.g. Nokia 3310)or a basic watch no one in the school would have it and that could be his own unique selling point (or may be not, it doesn't matter). What matters is what your kid likes. I am a parent now and I know I will be facing similar situation one day and I will be teaching my kid to do what he likes instead of giving in to social "demands". Edit: All I needed at my time in school was some confidence, which I wasn't given from parents, you just need to give your kid the confidence. The means could be to let him know that he can have an iPhone just don't give in to demands of bullys. We shape our wants/needs/desires based on what our social circle expects but that's not what we really want.
• tete 4y ago
  I am somewhat shocked about how many people here think that getting an iPhone will change anything. That's all leading up to start smoking, etc. "to be one of the cool kids". Worse, it's actually re-inforcing bullying, and make the kid a target, because it obviously works. You don't stop a behavior by making it work out. I however agree with people that it's not a technical problem, so trying to solve it like one is doomed to fail. The "solution" really depends on the context though. The assumption that owning an iPhone will turn a bullied outsider into being part of a peer group is bizarre and only works in commercials and bad TV shows.
  • HDThoreaun 4y ago
    Not having an iPhone as a kid when all your friends do is actually super isolating. You won’t be invited to group chats since they’ll be broken by having a non iPhone. No FaceTime which my kids spend no less than an hour a day on socializing. Even normal texting between iPhone and android is completely kneecapped by apple.
• deleted 4y ago
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• imtringued 4y ago
  Instead of telling him about the technical capabilities of the phone you should just try to boost his confidence and tell him that bullying in no way means you are a bad person or deserve the bullying. He might get or feel bullied over other things. The iPhone might just be the thing that you as a parent can help him with, just by throwing money at the problem. Not all bullying can be solved with money, it just happens to be the case here.
• williamcotton 4y ago
  Is he being bullied by kids who are not his friends or is he being razzed by his friends? Does he actually personally want an iPhone over an Android phone? Might there be some subtle emotional manipulation going on in order to get what he prefers over what you might prefer?
• ilaksh 4y ago
  I think the whole thing is based on miscommunication. iPhones are a status symbol and also they deliberately make them incompatible so it is a logistical issue for someone in a group to have an Android phone. They probably are not exactly bullying him, it's just that they are treating him as lower status and not fitting in because he has the wrong phone. He used the word "bully" to try to help you understand that this was a significant social issue for him. Having the non-Apple phone signals less wealth, lower social status, makes him unavailable for significant communication channels. I personally have never owned an Apple product. Mostly because they seem like a waste of money and aren't developer friendly. Luckily I have no friends anyway and am not a kid in school so it doesn't matter.
• dezb 4y ago
  I have a Samsung Galaxy S20 and it's a great phone.. time to find your son a better school or group of friends.. better yet, teach him to leave the phone at home when he's out and about and "see the world" without having to "see it through a phone screen".. let your son know this phone at most will be a device of convenience for a couple of years.. it does not define him..
• flappyeagle 4y ago
  It is lame in the same way that wearing champion sweaters was lame when I was a kid. But now they are cool in 2023. They function about the same. Fashion is weird.
• saaaaaam 4y ago
  When you say “bullied” what do you actually mean? Is it active bullying or passive bullying? By which I mean has he been regularly and systematically picked on and ostracised/humiliated/physically hurt or is it just a few passing comments? I’d start out first by talking to him about what is actually happening. Is it his friends bullying him? Where and when is it happening? Is he being left out of things? How did you find out about it? Has he mentioned it in the context of “my friends think I’m a loser because I don’t have an iPhone” or is it “I’m getting left out of things because I don’t have an iPhone and people are calling me names”. When you’re 12 being told that one thing is as good as the other thing is meaningless if everyone else has the other thing and the other thing is perceived as cool. In reality and android phone is not as good as an iPhone if everyone you know has an iPhone - and particularly when you’re a kid as it means you can’t do things other kids are doing and participate in those things. This can be iMessage group chats or FaceTime group video calls - or it can just be simple stuff like being able to join in a fad like where everyone uses the same images for their wallpaper or something like that. Sure you can set the wallpaper on an android phone but you’re still being othered. I’m an adult. I use an iPhone. Most people I know use iPhones. I do t like whatsapp but I have a whatsapp account but it’s hidden away and I don’t have notifications turned on because I’ve got really bad ADHD and have all non essential things hidden and notifications off. If people don’t iMessage me I tend not to reply because I just don’t see it. There is no easy answer to this. But saying “an android phone is as good or even better” might actually make things worse because you’re not hearing what he’s trying to say. To be clear - this is probably not actually about the “wrong phone” making him stand out, and it’s not about consumerism gone mad - but more likely about the fact that he doesn’t have a key tool that lets him participate. Will changing the phone fix things? Maybe not. But telling him the thing he has is great when he knows that it’s not will make him less likely to come to you in the future. When I was a kid I was bullied - horribly, physically, psychologically, every day. After one particularly horrible incident when I was about 9 where two “friends” who were bullying me relentlessly told me that they’d created a skeleton key for all the locks in our house and given them to a “burglar” who was going to get in at night and “murder my parents and murder my dog and then burn the house down” I finally - after literally not sleeping for an entire weekend through fear - plucked up my courage to tell my parents. The problem was that I felt like I had done something wrong - that’s what bullies do - and I felt ashamed and horrified that I’d brought this danger on my family. My parents laughed and said that I was being silly and of course they weren’t going to do anything like that and anyway the two boys were good friends and they were just teasing me. That increased my shame, and I never told my parents about bullying again. It continued for another ten years, and ruined my childhood. I would fake illness to avoid going to school, and would spend lunchtimes and breaks hiding wherever I could to avoid encountering bullies. That made me more alone and more susceptible to being bullied. And it fractured my relationship with my parents, and I never really trusted them again because when I was at my lowest they laughed off my concerns. As an adult I can see that it actually made me incredibly resilient, self sufficient and almost immune to caring about what anyone thinks of me - which has allowed me to achieve a lot. But as a child it nearly killed me. Talk to your son. But more importantly listen to him, and try and understand what he’s actually telling you. The best suggestion I’ve seen here is that you buy two iPhones and make it a thing for the two of you. Do weird things together with your two iPhones. Play games together. Don’t even switch to an iPhone for your main phone. Make it the hat phone that only he can reach you on. A direct line to dad. There was an interesting radio programme I heard the other day, talking about online safety for kids; the woman talking said that too many parents treat online games differently to other hobbies. If your kid is into sport of music or drama or whatever you get up early to take them to practice, you’re there on the sidelines cheering them on, celebrating the highs and the lows. You are participating in their participation. Do that. Make the iPhone a hobby that you do together.
• giardini 4y ago
  "bullying"? I see your boy manipulating you and you afraid to let the boy grow up. Tell him to get a job and buy any phone (and whatever else, within reason) he wants. I did; so can your son.
• antibasilisk 4y ago
  [flagged]
  • shrimp_emoji 4y ago
    >when i was 12 i was writing code Counter anecdata: I was too dumb to code when I was 12. Only over a decade later did my brain, and gumption, grow big enough to do it, and I've loved it ever since.
• lamontcg 4y ago
  This reads like marketing copy from Google. > How do I convince him that this peer pressure is unacceptable and that iPhones are not automatically 'better' just because they're marketed as a premium brand are are nothing more than expensive jewelry? The flip side is that Android phones are cheap because everything you do is tracked and sold. Android phones are at least as expensive as Apple, but someone else is subsidizing the cost because they enjoy spying on you.
• throwaway22032 4y ago
  The US seems to be particularly weird on this. In the UK I know people with iPhones and people with Android phones. The cost of them are usually not that different, people have stuff like the galaxy flip phones that are 1K+. But everyone uses SMS/WhatsApp/Telegram/etc so this manufactured problem just doesn't exist.
• Hoyadonis 4y ago
  I'm sorry that this is happening to your son, OP. I think your solutions are: (1) buy him an iPhone or (2) stand up to the bullying in some capacity. Not to grandstand, but this is one of the many reasons why I strongly believe children - certainly preteens - should not have phones. They obviously cannot comprehend the function of these devices, and certainly cannot comprehend the danger of these devices. Tragically, at this point, it would take a law to change the status quo, and it seems the the gerontocracy of American government cannot comprehend or is apathetic to the underrated crisis of mental health that mobile phones, social media, etc. is obviously causing amongst children. I'm sorry that your kid is a victim of this unprecedented modern phenomenon. After this debacle is hopefully resolved, encourage you to share his experience and your thoughts with a lawmaker if you see fit.