Please Advice on My Kids Playing Fortnite

[Carl-Richard]

26 minutes ago, Arcangelo said:

Lazy parents give their kids video games IMO.

What an incredibly simplistic way of looking at it. Yeah let's just ignore the fact that all his friends are also playing that game. Young people can't just pick and choose which culture they grow up in. Do you know the type of social isolation that happens when you don't participate in the same activities as your peers?

[Arcangelo]

Scarcity mindset all over this thread.

By that logic if the peers start smoking dope the kid has to smoke too. Gotta avoid that social isolation at all costs right? Hehe Come on man

 

 

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, Arcangelo said:

Scarcity mindset all over this thread.

By that logic if the peers start smoking dope the kid has to smoke too. Gotta avoid that social isolation at all costs right? Hehe Come on man

That's a strawman- I mean a weedman. Apples and oranges. All kids play video games. Get with the times.

[Origins]

@Hsinav The only advice I can give you is to work on becoming a better parent. You should have simulated these kinds of scenarios before they happened, because after you "get advice regarding Fortnite" then another problem will emerge and then another and so on and so fourth, how are you going to be a good role model if you're not the kind of parent that's teaching your own child to plan in advance by setting the example of doing so for your child (while giving them free will in as much as they're capable of responsibly expressing it)? 

To be truly a good parent, you should have resolved this at least a year in advance, you have to admit to yourself that you've made some mistakes here. My brothers and sisters are parents, they know I think they're bad parents and I think that way because they are. In truth they're just average, but if you truly love your child you don't want to be just average, and to be honest most parents do not truly love their children even though they say they do, in fact they're very myopic, biased and selfish people. Most of them are parents out of ego. Parenting is done in advance, not on the run like most do.

I'm blunt because you're a parent so you have to make decisions right now not later and you're here to get solid advice, not stuff that is just looking to people please.

My best advice in saying that is forget Fornite for a moment, take a few days off to really contemplate your child's future by brainstorming as many future problems and decision intersections (i.e. whether to play Fortnite or not) and then working bit by bit to develop intelligent narratives that are going to help you solve those problems before they happen. Meaning as an example, you should have posed this question 12 months ago to the forum, your friends and many other places before the possibility came up. You should already know kids are highly brainwashed towards wanting to play video games so you should have anticipated at the very least the genre of potential game they may want to play and then think through how you will negotiate that, not only games but also films, places they may go, people they may hang out with, music they may listen to and so on and so fourth. 

What active roles are you playing in your child's life where say in 20 years time your child can look back and say "Shucks wow, I really learned so much from my dad he taught me so much! I was a bit of a rat bag sometimes but he really handled me well, he studied up on the best parenting techniques of the time, he really got to know me as a person and he really did his empathic darndest to guide me in the best way he could"?

I'm only potentially planning on being a parent in the future for example and I'm already prepping years before I even might have a child. This should be the norm but it's like talking about living on Mars for most people and even for those that are serious about having children. 

Get cracking and all the best!

Edited November 8, 2020 by Origins

[Ethos]

Fortnite it's not as hardcore as the games in my time. Counter Strike, Doom 64. Ah, the pleasure of mayhem. But the game on itself is not really about that actually. It's about tribe companionship, it's not about fear, which is the core of REAL violence. Try it yourself and see how you feel. If you play with people you don't know you will be slighly bored and asking yourself why I am even playing this? But if you play with friends it will feel like sharing a good time. When in doubt, always go to your REAL feelings. 

When is a game adictive? When is a game a source of REAL violence? When you feel identified with the, generally, hateful, dark personality of the characters who mostly are twisted by a horrible past. If you have given your child a horrible past please, restrain him from all games. This is because, in the game, dark creatures usually are feeling pleasure out of their horrible represed feelings. So if your child is feeling the same things, he might be tempted to try the same solutions since very little is said about how to deal with the dark.

Edited November 8, 2020 by Ethos

[Michal__]

If he wants to play it and you tell him he can't he will just want to play it even more.

It might just end up teaching him not to trust you, since he will still probably find some way to play it. (For example at his friends house)

Just tell him he has to do his chores before playing and it should be okay.

[Hsinav]

5 hours ago, Origins said:

@Hsinav The only advice I can give you is to work on becoming a better parent. You should have simulated these kinds of scenarios before they happened, because after you "get advice regarding Fortnite" then another problem will emerge and then another and so on and so fourth, how are you going to be a good role model if you're not the kind of parent that's teaching your own child to plan in advance by setting the example of doing so for your child (while giving them free will in as much as they're capable of responsibly expressing it)? 

To be truly a good parent, you should have resolved this at least a year in advance, you have to admit to yourself that you've made some mistakes here. My brothers and sisters are parents, they know I think they're bad parents and I think that way because they are. In truth they're just average, but if you truly love your child you don't want to be just average, and to be honest most parents do not truly love their children even though they say they do, in fact they're very myopic, biased and selfish people. Most of them are parents out of ego. Parenting is done in advance, not on the run like most do.

I'm blunt because you're a parent so you have to make decisions right now not later and you're here to get solid advice, not stuff that is just looking to people please.

My best advice in saying that is forget Fornite for a moment, take a few days off to really contemplate your child's future by brainstorming as many future problems and decision intersections (i.e. whether to play Fortnite or not) and then working bit by bit to develop intelligent narratives that are going to help you solve those problems before they happen. Meaning as an example, you should have posed this question 12 months ago to the forum, your friends and many other places before the possibility came up. You should already know kids are highly brainwashed towards wanting to play video games so you should have anticipated at the very least the genre of potential game they may want to play and then think through how you will negotiate that, not only games but also films, places they may go, people they may hang out with, music they may listen to and so on and so fourth. 

What active roles are you playing in your child's life where say in 20 years time your child can look back and say "Shucks wow, I really learned so much from my dad he taught me so much! I was a bit of a rat bag sometimes but he really handled me well, he studied up on the best parenting techniques of the time, he really got to know me as a person and he really did his empathic darndest to guide me in the best way he could"?

I'm only potentially planning on being a parent in the future for example and I'm already prepping years before I even might have a child. This should be the norm but it's like talking about living on Mars for most people and even for those that are serious about having children. 

Get cracking and all the best!

LoL This looks good in theory, with all respect, it just doesnt work this way!!. Kids will challenge you in ways you never dreamt of. Of course you have to plan in advance! 

Btw, my question was just if fortnite is ok for young kids.

 

 

[Hsinav]

@Michal__ Agree, thanks!

[Hsinav]

@Ethos Thanks, I remember CS but never that 6-8 years kids were playing it!? Or did they?

[DaveB]

Recommend him this channels, they are focus on quit video games addiction.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTbbu5C5sq9VStQD2gvIN_g

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClHVl2N3jPEbkNJVx-ItQIQ

PS: One important tip: Do not at any cost try to disconnect his computer or take it away!!!

Especially not at the moment when he's playing!!!

It makes him super angry.

[dafels]

On 2020.11.6. at 1:18 PM, Hsinav said:

Of course, the problem is that he will get excluded in a lot of his social life, I don't want that to happen because I like most of his friends and the parents and they effect him good, most of the time. His friends gather and play a couple of times a week and Fortnite is all they want to play now

I can only share my experience in the hopes that it helps somehow.

I have been a heavy "gamer" since childhood. I was spending most of my free time on computer playing games, started with shooters and my favourite game was literally where I could split bodies of humans to pieces (Half life - to all gamers out there). Maybe games back then were more brutal and iFortnite is nothing compared to the games I grew up with. 

I also had a side hobby, I was doing martial arts and I loved it and helped me with socializing and I didn't feel socially excluded at all even when I was spending bigger chunk of my free time after school on PC.

Does your kid engage in other REGULAR social activities outside of the family and school in parallel with spending his free time playing video games? I think this is critical, atleast, it was in my life when I was growing up.

I also got interest in a game that was a turning point in my life. This video game basically steered my life into what I am now. I loved this game so much that I started programming modifications for this game and I was even earning hundreds of dollars when I was only 15 for programming modifications for this game and I really enjoyed it. And I was working in teams with other kids to create projects.

Video games sparked interest in programming for me. And fast forward 10 years, I am a software engineer with a computer science degree working in a international corporation earning salary that is in the top percentile. It was not as flawless though, I spent 4-5 years on the wrong path until I came back to the PC world again.

It is weird how it all worked out for me. Video games was the best thing that happened to me when I look at it from my perspective.

 

But, yeah, agree to many here, "Don't worry, it is just a game" unless your kid is spending 80-90% of free time in that game, then it should be very worrying. You should also observe how he is actually playing it, if he is communicating and talking/chatting to other people and doing teamwork in the game instead of mindlessly consuming the video game

Edited November 13, 2020 by dafels

[Jacob Morres]

I'm confused. I play gun games all the time growing up but I don't equate this with violence in real life. Does this happen for some people?