Texasmeat said:
not overprotective enough? Isnt he talking about bugging his daughter to find out what she's doing? That's not overprotective? I should have worded that better. More and more parents dont give a **** and the ones that do care are almost always overprotective with their kids.
If a parent wants to find out what their children are doing, it is not being overprotective. It is called being a parent. It is their
job to care and know about what their kids are doing. While I will agree that employing spyware on a computer is a bit extreme, versus just confronting the kid in conversation first, it is not being overprotective to wonder what your child is doing online. It is just being responsible.
That being said, I am leaning towards the majority of the group here in that I am having difficulty believing that this particular issue is 100 percent legit. It does sound more like a friend/boyfriend/weirdo wanting to spy on a person, rather than a concerned parent.
A true parent, in my opinion, would probably not have chosen a handle like "deathdealer". I am not saying that a concerned father should have to put "dad" or "parent" in the name, but "deathdealer" is obivously a poor choice if one is going to post a question such as this one, and want to be taken seriously.
A truly concerned parent would also not be as worried about the cost of such spying software. If you really wanted to know what was going on that badly, I would think that the $20 or so would be well worth it, especially if it could help save your kid from dangerous situations like drugs, stalkers and other questionable things.
All in all, I stll think the best and most effective approach would be to just talk to the teen. If it is that bad of a situation, he could take the laptop away, or at the very least restrict use of the internet to the point where he can at least be in the same room to supervise or monitor it. At the end of the day, the dad is still the parent. And whatever the parents say, no matter how much the teen may disagree, is the way it goes.