Dear Mary-anne: My son is blackmailing young girls
QUESTION:
We had a visit tonight from the Youth Police Officers.
I was quite shocked to find out my 16yo had been demanding photos from (several) girls and saying he would use photos they had already sent to other people, if they didn’t - he had previously told them he’d deleted them.
He had been spoken to last year in regards to similar behaviour and we thought he had learnt it was more so about him sending inappropriate photos. But now to my dismay we find out he hadn’t. We are very concerned about this behaviour and now after the police visiting he has said he should just kill himself. This too concerns me. He said he hasn’t passed photos on. We had been given a suggested from the officers that he get some counselling, which I will look into tomorrow.
Do you have some suggestions moving forward and how we can help him?
ANSWER:
The visit from the Youth Police Officers has obviously been a shock as the inappropriate behaviour you thought you’d dealt with last year, never finished at all. The officers suggested counselling to discuss your son’s blackmail but after they left, he said he should just kill himself? This could be your son playing into the media hype about our high suicide rate but the counsellor needs to know about his threat too.
You ask how you can help your son and where to now. When you’re 16, it’s easy to feel as though you’ve ruined your life over a mistake. Public humiliation seems permanent and the situation irredeemable. You can talk to your son and help him understand that everything is fixable and that he can come back from this completely. However there are consequences to his actions that he can’t escape. Instead of threatening to kill himself, he needs to learn make amends and accept responsibility. Do you know any of these girls or their parents? Is there any way your son could meet with them and their parents in an organised way, to hear their stories and for your son to apologise.
Your son will be feeling cornered, humiliated and exposed. These are the exact same feelings the girls will have had, when they realised your son was blackmailing them and threatening to use their photos.
I have added a link to a talk by cyber-safety expert Susan McLean that aired on RNZ recently. She advocates for parents to be as involved in their children’s online life as they are with their offline lives. One suggestion of hers that may work for your son is a signed agreement between parents and children that online activities are to be accessible at all times. Susan McLean explains that in the real world parents are aware of who their children are talking to, who they’re buying, selling or negotiating with and when they’re talking to complete strangers. In the cyber world though, parents are easily kept at bay.