Over the past few years, social media challenges like the Tide Pod, Cinnamon, Ice and Bird Box Challenge have surfaced.
While wildly popular with teens, these risky, often life threatening, challenges have been a frustration to parents. Newsweek published an article about the appeal of challenges to teens stating, “Attempting to grasp the motives behind the reckless stupidity of teenagers has been a frustrating endeavor for parents since the beginning of time, and many experts believe the internet has made it even worse. In the good old days, parents typically felt they could maintain control over their misbehaving teen simply by limiting the time spent with peers who were a “bad influence.” But thanks to social media, persuasive people with dumb ideas are now omnipresent and a mere click, tap or swipe away. Add in the appeal of 30 seconds of fame, and some teens are willing to try just about anything. In many cases, the more dangerous it is, the better.”
48-Hour Missing Challenge – What Parents Need To Know
Dangerous challenges of the past continue to recirculate among teens bringing with them new social media challenges. Just last week, from Kansas City, Missouri, it was reported that in there is a new social media challenge parents need to be aware of.
Called the 48-Hour Missing Challenge, teenagers encourage one another to go missing for 48 hours to see if a missing post for them shows up on social media. Missing teens earn points for likes and shares.
Police, Parents And School Personnel Are Concerned because it is dangerous, causes panic and wastes valuable time and resources.
What Parents Can Do
Parents can urge other parents to monitor their child’s social media accounts, look at their phones to see who they are talking to and texting, and remind their child that this dangerous 48 Hour Missing Challenge is not a joke and that teens can be criminally charged for participating and filing false reports.
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