Ben (00:02)
The statistics indicate...
That in 2023 roughly 150 000 reports of sexual exploitation from adults to children, adults exploiting children sexually online, in 2024 the number was 546 000 of which 100 000 were AI deepfakes
Kristi McVee (00:11)
Rock.
Holy crap.
Wow.
Ben (00:27)
which means that the kid didn't send a naked photo and then get blackmailed and get extorted and get taken advantage of. These people took a regular photo of a kid, turned it into a naked photo, and then exploited the kid using that photo. And in 2025, we're gonna finish the year at about 1 million.
Kristi McVee (00:41)
Wow.
my gosh, it's just so bad.
Ben (00:47)
So this is
the rate of growth. Like I say, like it's, think it's worth paying attention to the rate of change. The rate of change is significant.
Kristi McVee - Intro (00:58)
Welcome to Conversations with Kristi I'm Kristi McVee a former WA police officer, specialist child interviewer and child abuse detective. For years I worked on the front lines investigating child sexual abuse, where I saw the risks, the patterns and most importantly, the ways that we can protect our kids. Now I'm here to share that knowledge with you. This podcast is all about real conversations, giving parents, carers and educators the tools to keep their kids safe, both in person and online.
Through survivor stories, expert insights and practical advice, we'll navigate these tough topics together so you feel informed, confident and empowered. Because when we know better, we can do better and our kids deserve nothing less. CONTENT WARNING Some topics and conversations can be triggering for some listeners. Listener discretion is advised as your mental health is important. Please refer to my website and the show notes for available support services.
Kristi McVee (01:56)
Hello and welcome back to the Conversations with Kristi podcast. I'm so excited today because I am with Ben Gillenwater all the way over in the US. And I hope I said that right, Ben, because I tell you what, sometimes our Australian accent is really interesting and we say things very different to how they're meant to be pronounced. But I'm with Ben and I reached out to Ben via TikTok because I love everything that Ben's putting out there in the socials about.
Ben (02:08)
Yes.
Kristi McVee (02:24)
protecting kids, he's the family IT guy. And I can't wait to hear how you have become the family IT guy really. So let's get straight into, you know, talking about really your background and how you became the family IT guy.
Ben (02:41)
Yeah, thanks for having me on, Kristi. I'm excited to talk with you. Yeah, I've been a tech guy for 30 years. I'm an IT expert, a cybersecurity expert, and I have spent most of my career protecting corporate systems, protecting government systems, and now I protect families and family systems, and I help parents understand how to keep their kids safe online.
And the reason I started doing the family IT guy and focusing, which is now my full-time job, focusing on this topic is because I became a dad and I made a bunch of mistakes that in hindsight, you know, should have been obvious and were not. And so if I'm an expert at computer systems and then I gave my kid an iPad, I gave my kid YouTube, I did all the things that, you know, were not
Smart in hindsight, but I had all the parental controls turned on but they turned out to be Not smart decisions exposed my kid to sexually inappropriate content Exposed my kid to things that gave him nightmares for years Exposed him to addictive mechanisms that you know, the iPad itself was was Like outwardly addicting him and he was behaving in ways that you would see an addict behave towards something
And so I learned from those things and made adjustments, took the iPad away, long story short, took away YouTube and eventually took away the whole iPad. And some of my consulting clients and friends and colleagues would come to me and ask me for advice. What should they do with their kids? And it really got me thinking, like, at first I thought, well, let me help you implement technology. Let's use tech to manage tech, which...
You can in some ways do that, but that's not actually the correct and complete answer. And so the more I thought about it, the more complicated I noticed that, or I found that it became. And so if it's hard for me as a tech expert, I'm like, well, then it must be really hard for people that are not tech experts. And so I took on the challenge of sharing my knowledge and my experiences and my research with parents on the internet.
And I've been doing it since the beginning of 2024. wow, almost coming up on two years now. And it's really wonderful. I'm really grateful I get to do this. I make videos and share things with people and get a lot of positive feedback that people are able to make positive changes as a result. And it's pretty wonderful.
Kristi McVee (05:13)
I think that's amazing, but I can totally relate. I can totally relate to your story. I, the detective, the police officer giving an iPad, letting my daughter have YouTube, the whole thing, battling the whole, you know, addiction, the issues, the, you know, and then having to wind it back and go, actually I stuffed up here and I shouldn't have given this to you. And we don't know what we don't know, right? β
Ben (05:37)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (05:38)
And I was that person as well. kind of fell into my role in what I'm doing because everyone was always coming to me going, Kristi, what do I do? What do do? So it's kind of like similar pathways in a way that happened. you're so right. You can't take your way out of this. We really do need hands-on parenting to help with this situation. And I always think about my own parenting and stuff like that.
Ben (05:49)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (06:06)
if you know if we had someone like yourself to say that like to give it calmly and that's what I love about your your social media is that it is very calm it is not like you're not hyping people up you're not giving them you know for one of a better word bullshit advice you're just giving them calm direction and that's all parents really want
Ben (06:22)
Yeah.
Yeah, my personal philosophy is, you know, I don't like when people sort of tell me what to do. I just, want to know what's going on. I want the information. And I really enjoy that about, I think one of the most special things about being human is that we're all different and we all have our own values and our own desires and goals and things that we enjoy or don't enjoy.
Kristi McVee (06:42)
Yeah.
Ben (06:47)
And so, I just put things out as very straightforward as I can and really from a place of love and a place of benefit of the doubt and from a place of understanding that as a dad, I now that I'm, you know, I became a dad later in life. I get it finally, you know, if I did this as a younger man, I would I would probably come at it from the wrong approach, you know, and find it easier to accidentally pass judgment.
Kristi McVee (07:04)
Yeah.
Ben (07:15)
But being a parent is like the hardest thing that there is probably. And so I respect that. so I just take that approach. I share what I can from a place of caring and love and really hoping the best for everybody.
Kristi McVee (07:19)
very much so, β gosh.
Yeah, with age comes wisdom, right? So, you know, I was quite a young parent, but at the same time, I wasn't the youngest parent. And, and still I look back if I started now with like a child now, I'd be a completely different parent, right? So yeah, I can totally relate to that. And, you know, working in the police and seeing different parenting styles and what has what what actually I used to have this saying, and we do swear on this podcast, just, you know,
Ben (07:47)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (07:58)
β because it's an adult parent podcast, so no kids are listening, hopefully. β but I used to just say, my job as a parent is to just make sure my kid isn't an asshole when they become an adult. Like, and you know, like what is, and it's really important that we, give them the tools to be a good adult. And so sometimes if we're not, β you know, some of these things that we give them thinking that it's the right thing to do, or we don't know better, or it just helps us in the moment.
Ben (07:58)
good.
Right. Right.
Kristi McVee (08:25)
It actually doesn't help us in the long run. everything we do, I learned very early on if we should can start how we want to continue. so, but we make mistakes along the way. yeah. So with your own child and, and winding back that, you know, the iPad, the YouTube and stuff like that, how did you go about that? Like was that, was there tantrums where you're struggling as a parent, like thinking you'd done all of this stuff wrong, you know, as parents, we judge ourselves harshly.
Ben (08:34)
β Yes.
You know, it's a good question. First of all, I'm very lucky that my son is very smart and reasonable and very self-reflecting. And when we gave it to him, it was with some basic expectations. Please don't, and it's hilarious saying this now, but this is the way we did it. Please don't watch.
Kristi McVee (09:11)
Yeah.
Ben (09:15)
the types of content that we know you're going to watch. There's the search button. Please don't tap it and type in the things that you're going to type in as a young boy. And then so he did. And so he said, okay, that's fine. No big deal. Like our approach is here's the expectation. If it doesn't match reality, we'll make a change. And so that's what happened. You okay, well, you're watching things that you shouldn't watch and here's why you shouldn't watch them and here's why they're not good for you. So what we actually did at first was we
Kristi McVee (09:18)
Yeah, right. β
no.
Ben (09:42)
We took off YouTube and we put on YouTube Kids. And I think it's kind of funny to think that my rationale at the time was very simple. It was, first of all, it's called Kids. So it must be made for kids. And secondly, Susan, and I don't know how to pronounce her last name, so I won't mess it up, but the gal that was the CEO of YouTube at the time was a grandma. So I, a kid's product made by a grandma.
Kristi McVee (09:53)
Yeah, right.
Aww.
Yeah, so it's gotta be safe.
Ben (10:08)
Right.
well and and no not personally attacking her in any way, but just those assumptions were false and And at the time I didn't know about the mode and YouTube kids called approved content only mode where you could actually Pre-approve certain shows and turn off the algorithm So anyway, so we put YouTube kids and it was it was just as bad just in different ways the stuff I mean, it's really disturbing the things that people publish to YouTube kids like they're
Kristi McVee (10:15)
Yep.
β
Ben (10:35)
seems like intentionally messing with the minds of children, whoever it is that are publishing these things. It's really dark to think about, but nonetheless, that's what it is. so same thing. We just basically said, hey, you know what? The stuff that like, that's our fault actually on this one, because this platform should have been fine for you to just do whatever you want, because we told it how old you are and it's called kids, but it's not good for you. And so he...
He was bummed that he didn't get to have YouTube anymore because he watched a lot of cool stuff on YouTube too, of course, you know, but he took it really well and he for a couple of years after would always ask like, could I have the iPad back? Maybe I'll get the iPad back when I'm older. And we're just like, no, like that's going to be a while because he was gave it to him when he was five. And yeah, I think it's I mean, I don't think we're going to have him have that sort of device again until
Kristi McVee (11:06)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
Ben (11:30)
his mid teens, I don't know, I'm not sure yet, but.
Kristi McVee (11:33)
You
just don't know and the more you know about this stuff, the less likely you are to go, hey, here's another, here you go, here's the drug that we took away from you back when you were a young boy. Let's load you up again. Because ultimately we know that it does the same thing. It's the dopamine and all of that that makes our kids. And don't worry, I have done all of those things. I've talked to my daughter through them.
Ben (11:44)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yes.
Kristi McVee (11:57)
The good thing is, is when you have really beautiful conversations and you can explain it out to your kids, most of the time, most children are going to go, okay, you're just trying to protect me. It's about creating that, you know, relationship that your child can actually understand why. If instead of just saying, that's it, no, you're not having it. You know, like my parents did, you know, they took something away on their life and you're like, why, why are you taking it away? But if you talk them through it,
Ben (12:14)
Yes.
Right.
Kristi McVee (12:24)
Most kids are like, okay, I understand, I don't like it, but you know.
Ben (12:29)
Exactly and I you know when I was young and still as an adult my favorite question is why and I've never really got any good answers when I was a kid and so one of my things I try to do as a parent is to take that bias of mine and Project it onto my parenting style and say well. Here's why You may or may like you said you may not like it, but here's the reason you know
Kristi McVee (12:34)
β yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
So what do you think β with all of that knowledge that you have in, you know, doing the corporate safety and now doing parental and child safety in on the digital landscape? What do you think that most parents are missing? Like I personally have a few opinions on this because I can't like we have so much more information when my daughter got her iPad when she was allowed on, you know,
Ben (13:05)
Mmm.
Kristi McVee (13:15)
She's nearly 18, so 15 years ago was pretty much when she started using a device. And I wish I had known what I know now. We have all of the information now. We didn't have it back when she started or I was oblivious to it. So what do you think parents are missing now? Like what do you think most of them are missing?
Ben (13:34)
I think the main thing is I think that most of us are missing the base understanding of
the systems that we interact with on the internet.
of what they do to us as adults and starting there with ourselves. And I think it's very easy to take for granted all the things that we're just used to having and not really deeply asking why those things exist in the first place. And we, the core thing is to remember that we exist in an attention economy.
Kristi McVee (13:44)
Yeah.
Ben (14:07)
we, whether we realize it or not, we don't, well, here's what we do realize. We do realize that we don't trade money to use Instagram. Instagram is free in air quotes. TikTok is free, chat GBT is free, Gmail is free, Google search is free, all this stuff is free. Well, nothing's free, there's always a trade. So the trade is our attention and effectively our privacy.
But if we just focus on attention, attention is one of our core currencies as humans. And so I think that one of the powerful things of being an adult is you get to make explicit trades as you wish. I, for example, if I say I know that I'm going to trade,
Kristi McVee (14:36)
Mm.
Ben (14:58)
Four hours of my time and attention today for inst for in order in exchange for the Entertainment dopamine drip news Sort of fake social connection that I get on instagram That's great. That's fine because if you're intentionally making that trade Then I think that's great. So I think the trouble is That it's it's easily taken for granted
that are we intentionally trading our attention? And when we give and or have taken, have our attention taken, that means that the trade includes not spending our attention elsewhere. So for example, that means that I'll just use four hours a day as an easy number, because that's one that many people can relate to. If you look at the screen time stats on your phone, you might see
Kristi McVee (15:50)
Yep.
Ben (15:53)
Four hours of Instagram. That's a common one, you know And really no shame like this is you know, we're all kind of there's five billion of us on social media that have all fallen into the same trap and so Those four hours are four hours that you can't get back that you didn't spend on yourself that you didn't spend on your spouse and That you didn't spend on your kids Right and that's the deep harsh
Kristi McVee (15:55)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Ben (16:18)
Reality and so I think that's the core thing of like well, what are we not? Realizing as parents as an adult as adults It's being very very conscious of what are we trading for these things that seem free? And there's a lot more underneath there You know, like there's a whole bunch of stuff of are you being manipulated as a result of using these systems which
Kristi McVee (16:36)
Yeah.
I know. Yeah.
Ben (16:46)
The answer is yes, but you know, that's a whole nother conversation. We could spend 45 minutes just talking about that. All that stuff aside, are you intentionally making the trade with one of your most valuable currencies? And when you do that, your kids are watching. They know that that screen is between you and them.
Kristi McVee (17:11)
That's a hard, that's a hard hitting truth really.
Ben (17:11)
Right? That's Yeah,
I I as I say this I feel this in my body of like because I Intend no judgment when I say these things I say these things because i've done them myself. I do them myself this morning I woke up I typically wake up before my son does And I make coffee and while the machine's warming up. I actually don't use social media.
I don't consume social media, but I do have to check the comments because I like to reply to people as many as I can. And so I do open my social media apps and look through them for the comments every morning while I make coffee. And one thing I try to do my best is that when I hear my son's bedroom door open, I put the phone down so that when he comes out, I'm there. Right. And he doesn't get used to like, I never want him to hesitate.
Kristi McVee (17:41)
Yeah. Yeah.
Ben (18:03)
to say hi or to come give me a hug because it looks like I'm busy or it looks like I'm doing something that's more important than he is. You know, β and so, yeah, yeah.
Kristi McVee (18:09)
Yeah, yep. I've been there, I've been there and I've done that.
Like my daughter has actually called me out on it. Yeah, and I mean, that's the beauty of creating a relationship where you can be honest and truthful with your parents, right? Because a lot of us didn't, it is beautiful, but it's a slap in the face kind of thing, a moment where she's like, you you're never, you're always looking at your phone and stuff like that. And so, and again, my job is to be online.
Ben (18:17)
wow, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, that's very beautiful.
Yeah. β
Kristi McVee (18:38)
to do the same things that you're doing. And I haven't been intentional with it. there is, I think the other thing that you're pointing out to me as you're speaking, I'm thinking we entered into this social media world, this connection, this connected space of being able to talk to anyone anywhere. But we went in without, with basically blind and we weren't, we thought that we were connecting with others and it was all for the benefit of us.
Ben (18:40)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (19:08)
and didn't realize what's happening underneath. And we're only just starting to really get the depth of how toxic it is because Australia is banning under 16s or delaying under 16s for having social media access. Not sure how that's gonna go in a month's time, but, and so we just didn't know. The horse bolted, we thought that we were doing this great thing and it turned into like the poison apple basically.
Ben (19:16)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Right.
Well, and I mean, I'll tell you what, you know, when Facebook came out in 2007, it was a very different place than it is now. And so it's almost like getting the rug pulled out from under you, but so slowly that you don't even know that it's gone. Right? So it started off as a place where you really did see a time-based, non-algorithmic feed of the people that you knew. And there was no underlying...
Kristi McVee (19:49)
Exactly.
Ben (20:00)
mechanism to track everything you did and do all this stuff because they hadn't turned on the advertising business yet. Now they knew they were going to. That was the plan from the beginning. Same thing with Google. You know, and so it was we all very slowly stepped our way into this thing. And now if we look back, it's like, my gosh, we're actually so far away from where we started. And so that's why I say that like there's it's easy to feel shame when you see the number on your screen of how many hours a day you spend. But
Kristi McVee (20:10)
Hmm.
Ben (20:28)
I think that there's an opportunity there that's really powerful, which is to practice vulnerability with our kids and say, you know what? You see this number on my screen here. This means that those four hours weren't at least in part spent on you. And we only get to go through this life once. And so
I'm going to actually take this as an opportunity. I'm going to try to do instead of four hours, next week I'm going to try to bring it to three and a half. And I'm going to recognize that it's hard to make change and that if I go cold turkey, it's unlikely to stick. So let me make small changes one little piece at a time, three and a half. And then two weeks later you can do three and then you can show your kids and, and, and that right there.
Kristi McVee (21:08)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Ben (21:18)
is such a powerful opportunity to help them succeed in their own journey with technology in the future. You know, that's such a good practice, I think, to give a try to.
Kristi McVee (21:29)
And it shows, well, first of all, it shows, like you said, vulnerability. But I think also as parents, like we didn't have kids with the idea that we would like put something before them. When you hold that little baby in your arms, you're thinking, I just want to protect you. I just want to love you. I just want to make your life easier. And then things happen, life happens, things get in the way. We want to disassociate because life's tough. It's stressful. It's overwhelming.
And believe me, I've had PTSD. So I did all of those things whilst going through that PTSD journey. So no shame or blame for me. But I think one of the things that I realized really hard, like in the recent years is that we might, we, like you said, the rug got pulled out from us. It's like the frogs, if you throw the frogs in the pot and it's boiling, they'll jump out. But we were the, we're like literally the in the cold bath water and then we've been boiled.
Ben (22:04)
Yeah.
Yeah,
Kristi McVee (22:25)
So, you know, we
Ben (22:26)
that's right.
Kristi McVee (22:26)
didn't know what we were signing up for. We didn't know what they were going to do. We had no idea. And it, and it, and it feels, I feel betrayed if in a way from social media, because we've been conditioned to, and a lot of generations like the generation now that are in their twenties were conditioned to share every minute. Uh, you know, they basically, everything's shown online that, you know, they're showing them their
Ben (22:36)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kristi McVee (22:51)
perfect reel of, you know, every moment's amazing, but not feeling amazing in themselves, you know, like, it's just that we've been conditioned. And I say that to parents all the time, we've been conditioned to share our kids, share our lives, be online as much as possible, because if we're not online, then are we really living?
Ben (22:57)
Yeah.
Right, yeah, absolutely. these systems that we use are made by the world's best addiction experts. The neuroscientists and behavioral analysts that literally work side by side with the software engineers that write TikTok and Instagram and Facebook and ChatGPT and Google and all this stuff.
Kristi McVee (23:16)
Yes.
Ben (23:30)
This is the best, these are the best in the world at addiction. And so of course we fall into the trap. And to add to it, nobody knows how to do this. This has never existed before. know, like this is in the last 15 years or so, give or take, parenting got a new category added to it, right? So like human parenting was the same for all of time. And then now there's a new category that
Kristi McVee (23:51)
So true.
Ben (23:57)
You have to have a computer science degree to even to begin to think about. And so, you know, it's normal to have no freaking idea how to even have a crack or to even recognize what's going on in the first place. And so it's, I find it kind of ironic that
Kristi McVee (24:11)
Mm.
Ben (24:16)
you and I use these systems against themselves. You know, so we're using social media to talk about the dangers of social media, for example.
Kristi McVee (24:20)
I'm
I know sometimes I sit
there going gosh it's so like cliche right? Hypocritical whatever you want to say but you know we might as well you know everyone else is sitting there saying what they need to say so why not but I just yeah I just feel like you're right we don't have like they do have these people and I think if more parents realize this how much they're working against our own parenting instincts to keep us addicted
Ben (24:30)
Ha ha ha, yeah.
Kristi McVee (24:52)
and then we hand a phone or device to our own children and expect our children to use common sense and maturity to fight against it. Well, it's not a race we can win.
Ben (25:06)
Right. it's, it's our biology is being taken advantage of. And so no matter how smart or capable or strong we think we are, it's, it's a really, really difficult challenge. And, and you can tell how difficult it is if you, for example, for those listening to this right now, you're listening on a device of some sort of course.
When you're done, or even if you want to hit pause now and come back later, try to take your phone and put it in the trunk of your car. And then go around for a couple hours without it. See how weird you feel. Yeah. And like, yeah.
Kristi McVee (25:43)
You feel lost. You feel like you've lost your arm because you keep going to pick it up.
I actually did that for a week. I put my phone in a drawer and left it in a drawer. I think I last, yeah, I tried really hard. think I, the first day was the hardest. I kept looking for my phone, like where's my phone? And then I was like, oh no, that's right. I've put it away. It's impossible, impossible to.
Ben (25:53)
β wow.
Kristi McVee (26:07)
And then I would think, I've got to do that. β I can't, I've got to now sit on my laptop and try and log into my thing because everything is, you know, face ID and it's so hard. I would recommend parents do it even just for a day to see what their kids are dealing with if we take something away so that we can help transition out of it. Like the transition out of, you know, having a device, like having it ripped away from you. I mean, that's what's going to happen with kids, you know, in a couple of...
Ben (26:24)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (26:34)
weeks time in Australia, know, some under 16s are going to lose their accounts overnight. And I think that we'll see kids really struggle if they don't have something to replace that.
Ben (26:45)
They'll just install a VPN, say that they're in a different country, register at a different age and get right back on. You know?
Kristi McVee (26:46)
β True, very true. There's
a lot of people and kids already talking about doing that and they're very vocal about it. And you know, I said when this was first proposed, and it's not something I was meant to talk about today, but when this social media ban was first proposed, I actually said on the media, on radio and on TV that this generation isn't the one that's going to actually benefit from it.
Ben (26:58)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (27:14)
it's the generations coming up from here. If it is maintained and stays, they stay the path with it, then it's going to be the next generation under who hasn't yet even seen a device or hasn't been born yet. That's the generation that will benefit. So we can't, and same with like, I say this all the time, it's not the generation now because this generation is kind of like the horse is bolted, the gates open.
Ben (27:30)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (27:40)
You know, it's happened and kids know what they're missing out on. They're going to be upset about it. It's the next generation.
if a parent's concerned, you know how, well, you've done a lot of research. know what, you've already spoken about kids on VPNs and stuff like that. But if a parent was concerned about their child, because one of the things that I promote is that if you give your child a device, it is your device until they're paying the bills. So for me, and I have a lot of parents,
push back, they're like, where's their privacy? You need to respect their privacy. I'm like, no, this child is my child to protect until they turn 18. Therefore, it is my job to check their social media, check their, if they've got it, check their messaging, check everything. The rule is you're under my roof until you pay your own phone bill, I'm gonna check your messages and I'm gonna check everything. And that's a pretty policey way to talk about it. But you know, like,
Ben (28:33)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (28:37)
you might give it to them as a gift, but it's still yours. And that was always the precursor. Like I'd say, hey, here's your Christmas present. Here's your new phone that you need for school, whatever. But these are the rules of usage kind of thing. And so that was my belief. But if a parent's concerned and they haven't had that conversation or they're worried something's going on, is there anything that they can look at in a really quick
Ben (28:51)
Yeah, yes. Well, yeah, yeah.
Kristi McVee (29:04)
way. You know, because I know a lot of kids are like, don't touch my phone. Don't touch my device.
Ben (29:10)
It's so hard, if your kid is 16, right? You want to give them their space, give them their privacy. I found, like we were discussing earlier about just parenting philosophies and stuff, I find that one of the things I think about is that everything is a precedent. And so you've already established a precedent, let's say, that this is your thing and I haven't been checking it for the past four years or whatever.
Kristi McVee (29:30)
Mmm.
Ben (29:35)
But now I want to.
There's just no easy way about it. You know at the end of the day you have to change the expectation and set a new expectation and That is Boy, that's super hard to do. I don't Yeah, and I and I don't I don't know of any like non challenging way to go about that. However
Kristi McVee (29:48)
It can be quite challenging.
Ben (30:00)
Well, so there's two things. I think first comes back to the leading by example. Start with yourself first. Before you ask your kid to change, change your own tech habits first. Tell them you're making a change. Tell them why. Show them you're making the change. Demonstrate the fact that you can do it. If you can, and you can, right at the end of the day, just technically speaking, because I know again, it's not
Easy, it's hard. But I like the idea that we control our tech and that our tech does not control us. Now, is that true all the time? Sometimes it seems like it's the other way around. And in fact, for many people, because of the state of affairs, it is actually like sometimes people are being controlled by their tech. But at the end of the day, you can take that control back.
You can choose to make the hard decision and put that phone in the drawer and bear through like, wow, I really want to go get that thing out of the drawer. But first, the parent has to lead by example. And then you can say, okay, I've done it. It's been a month. Wow. Look at the changes. I want this for you too. And in fact, I need you to do this with me for your own health and safety. And here's why. And here's the changes we're going to make.
Kristi McVee (31:00)
Yeah.
Ben (31:20)
And we're going to craft a new agreement. And I have on my website on familyitguy.com for free. I have a family tech agreement that you can download and customize and all this. And you set the expectations. These are the new expectations. These are the expectations I have of myself because the family tech agreement is for all of us. You know, and so we're going to change the way that we view social media. We're going to, for example, charge our phones in the common area of the home.
and never bring our devices into the bedrooms or bathrooms. That's a big one. It's a huge, like that one right there is so big. And really just, it's demonstrating the behaviors you wanna see. I think that's the core of it. Now, could you demonstrate them and fix up your own stuff and then a month in, six weeks in, come back and say, okay, kids, it's time for you to change and then you still have the fight? Absolutely.
Kristi McVee (31:54)
Yeah.
Of course.
Ben (32:15)
Are they going to just be like, you're right. You know, let's do it. No, but again, also make the changes bite sized, you know, maybe help them titrate down, you know, maybe if they have half a dozen apps that they shouldn't have, find a way to transition, you know, okay, you message your friends over here. We're to have to figure out a way to transition that to an app that actually respects your privacy and doesn't have addictive algorithms built into it, you know, so.
Kristi McVee (32:22)
One thing at a time.
Yeah.
Ben (32:42)
Really, there's no easy answer, but I think all the answers start with us first. I think that's the core of it.
Kristi McVee (32:47)
Yeah, I like that.
Yeah, I like that. I mean, I everything you said I did. Like I said, at the very beginning, I think how we start is how we should continue. And if we if we knew better, before we started, we would continue and it would be a much easier transition than having to take something away or adjust something, you know, later on. β But yeah, I had those conversations with my own daughter at times, like I would say to her, you know, and I would, you know, I also
Ben (33:08)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (33:16)
think it's really important if we're learning something, we help share it with our kids like, did you know that, you know, all of our apps are listening to us basically, because they want to put ads to us like, did you know that? have you ever noticed because this was this is how I was talking to my daughter like, have you ever noticed that, you know, you might be talking about something and next you've got an ad on TikTok or on Instagram for it, you know, have you like,
Ben (33:39)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (33:40)
here's my screen. β my gosh, look how much I've spent on you know, on social media. What's yours like, you know, and my daughter actually has and she she goes on her own tech cleansers, I think she calls them her tech cleanse. You know, yeah, and it's because I like we had these conversations. She's better at this than me. Like she
Ben (33:55)
yeah.
You
Kristi McVee (34:02)
And her gender, I don't know, she thinks that like she spends time with her boyfriend, I can't get hold of her. And I'm like, where are you? I have to message her boyfriend. And she's like, I'm spending, I'm being present with my boyfriend. I'm not on my phone. I know, I know. I don't know how she did it. Like, honestly, no, she, I did, she went, I did talk to her a lot about these things. And I mean, she has a, she's neurodivergent as well. So she can be very, you know, focused on different things, but she's very good at it. And her tech.
Ben (34:14)
Amazing! Wow!
haha
Kristi McVee (34:31)
her time online is way less than mine, which is really, which is, well, I, it's all her. Like she's done this herself because, we did have, know, Sundays, didn't, no one was allowed to touch their phones. It was in a drawer and we talked about it. We did everything you said. We put our phones, they were all charged in a public area in the home, no bedrooms or bathrooms, you know, all the things you said. And she's now.
Ben (34:34)
β well, nice job.
yeah.
Kristi McVee (34:57)
And she wasn't allowed social media until a certain age. mean, if I had have had my time again, I would have pushed it back more. I would have said, Hey, not yet. Like when we're not ready yet. she was only allowed one, one form of social media at a time. So for one year, she was only allowed one social media, and then she was allowed the next one. And she had to do a tech agreement. She had to do a presentation on why she was allowed to have it.
β you know, she had to do the pros and cons list and like the, the usage agreement and like, this is how I'm going to use it. And these are the repercussions if I don't use it properly. And she did all of that. So I think the thing is, that, well, personally, and I think you'll agree, β is that we walked hand in hand through this journey. And we, didn't just hand it, you know, I'd made the mistakes early on, but then I learned more. We, I, and I rolled it back and I went.
Ben (35:25)
Amazing.
Kristi McVee (35:47)
Okay, let's do this together. Like this is why the why question, this is why we're making these decisions. This is why we don't play this game and that app and we're not doing this until you're 13 or we're not doing that till then. And she didn't like it at the time, but she says thank you now.
Ben (35:52)
Yeah.
You know that I love that I was just thinking that is is everything I've seen everybody I've talked to every survey I've indicates that the challenge is worth it and that your kids will thank you and that it is the right move and You know like back to the vulnerability thing like hey, you know what? I made a mistake. I shouldn't have set it up that way. That's my bad
Kristi McVee (36:19)
Yeah.
Ben (36:32)
I'm sorry, this is going to be really hard. It was a mistake. And actually, we can learn from our mistakes. You know, I like one of my personal values is embracing failure and showing my kid that like, I failed. So let's have another crack at it. And let's try it this way. You know, instead of like running away from failure, trying to pretend that there's no such thing, you know, that's lovely. I think that's so cool that she
Kristi McVee (36:51)
Yeah, I love that.
Ben (37:00)
that you've got to experience that where she can look back and see the value in what you did with her and like, that's really amazing. And yes, she's absolutely like did the stuff herself and is doing the stuff herself, but based on the foundation that you helped her create, which is really awesome.
Kristi McVee (37:13)
Yeah.
Yeah, and I think that's when we think about, we often as a parent, we don't think about what we need, what all the steps that we need, all the foundations that they need to be a safe adult. Like I'm on the cusp of her becoming an adult, her spreading her wings and flying away from home or doing whatever she's going to do. She just got her first full time job. you know, like, so it's a whole new world for me, right?
your son's much younger and you're still in the thick of it, right? But we don't think about these things when they're little. We don't think about, we're actually creating an adult here. We're not parenting a, you know, because in the end of the day, they have to be able to survive out there in the world. we're talking about tech here, but their lives are going to include tech. They need to be able to manage it and they need to be able to not be manipulated by it.
Ben (37:45)
Yeah.
Yes.
Yes. Yes.
Kristi McVee (38:09)
but they also need
to know in themselves what's right, wrong or otherwise, and so that they can help themselves when they get out there. So I think that's the cool thing about being a parent. It's a tough, tough job, but if we just spent a little bit more time on it, we might actually realize how important these little lessons are in the moment. It might feel really hard, but it's really important.
Ben (38:32)
Yeah, and you know, I'd like to share some statistics that I've come across because they really shaped the the way that I look at this stuff like really changed my entire perspective so I give I've given lectures locally here in Idaho and then I've do some online now and stuff and last year I was preparing for one and thinking through
Kristi McVee (38:38)
Sure.
Okay.
Ben (39:00)
concept of kids being on social media and and you hear all over the place that there's major problems with anxiety and major problems with depression and in kids that are single-digit ages Like and just the numbers on these things are huge but the hard part is that the data around anxiety and depression is not very good because
There isn't a consistent way for mental health professionals to centrally gather and record anxiety statistics and depression statistics. And so I was thinking to myself, like, I want to know, is it really worse than it used to be? Or is it just that we have access to the information and so it seems worse? So I wanted to see trends over time.
Kristi McVee (39:46)
Yeah.
Ben (39:50)
I want to see like what did it used to be versus what is it now? And so we can't really track that for anxiety and depression but it turns out that you can track the most severe outcome of anxiety and depression, which is suicide and The there is unf well as crazy as it is to say or think about there is very good data on that
Kristi McVee (40:03)
Yeah.
Yes.
Ben (40:13)
because death certificates are something that have been collected in a relatively standardized way globally and the World Health Organization maintains a database, mortality database that they offer on their website. And so I went to the database and I pulled a bunch of data and I looked at for people in the US ages 0 to 39. I wanted to see the trend of
Kristi McVee (40:26)
really? Wow.
Mm-hmm.
Ben (40:39)
It's recorded as self-inflicted death. What are the rates of change over time? And it turns out that there are very significant changes that have occurred. So the data goes back to 1951. And when I pulled it, it went up to 2021. So for example, ages 10 to 14.
In 1951, the self-inflicted death rate was 1%. So of every 100 deaths that occurred, one was self-inflicted. And in the 80s and 90s, that went up to about 7%. Was it 5 % or 7 %? Something right around there. I have this on my website. It's called an article called Digital Danger Zone. And I have charts with all this data.
Kristi McVee (41:10)
Okay.
Ben (41:25)
And then in from between 2007, in 2007 on the chart, the line started to go up. And by the time we got to 2019, we'd gone from, I think it was 7 % to it was almost 20%. It was roughly triple.
Kristi McVee (41:44)
That's
a lot.
Ben (41:46)
So now, instead of one out of a hundred, it's one out of five. Young, young kids taking their own lives. And on these charts on my website, you'll see that I've mapped the release of all the major social media platforms on the charts, and you can see the chart go up. And when I saw that,
I First of all, I I get emotional just thinking about it, but I I'm sitting here at my desk Looking at this data preparing a lecture thinking that I'm just informing parents about well You should use the Instagram parental controls and you should use the snapchat parental controls You should take a moderate approach, but there's ways you can manage it. Then I come across this data I'm like no, no, there's no moderation
This is way too big of a problem. This is a net negative in such a severe way that children are taking their own lives because they have social media in their pockets. I don't know what else to correlate it to, right? Yeah, they can't switch it off. They've got, they're bringing their bullies into their bedrooms. They're bringing the algorithms into their bedrooms. These, these
Kristi McVee (42:45)
Yeah, because they can't switch off.
Ben (42:57)
These systems that were meant to addict adults are addicting kids. And interestingly, the rates of change are drastically different for people under 25 versus over 25. And at age 25, what happens roughly at age 25 is we finish developing the frontal lobe of our brain.
Kristi McVee (43:18)
Yeah.
Ben (43:19)
And the frontal lobe is what helps us manage a bunch of the mechanisms that are leveraged in these addictive algorithms in social media. And so for people under the age of 25, I mean, now we're even getting into young adults. This is very, very dangerous territory. They saw the same change. The chart goes up for them too. And so I just want to share that because I wish I didn't have to talk about it, but
It's there and I don't know that a lot of people know that. I did not know that. And I as a parent and maybe you can relate as a mom, of course, and as a police officer. My job, part of my job is to manage. I'm the head of security for my family.
Kristi McVee (43:52)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Ben (44:09)
Right and security in order to affect security. You have to know what the risks are You have to study them And then you make plans and you manage the risks So for the u.s and I think this may be the case for other countries in the world, but I haven't studied the data But let's just say in the u.s. Anyways, I know that the top three causes of death for people under the age of 25 our first automotive accidents suicide
Homicide for both boys and girls the same I Would have thought that boys would have had the homicide thing and girls wouldn't but anyways, it's the same Okay, fine. So if we say top three risks of severe outcomes
Kristi McVee (44:39)
Wow. Wow.
Ben (44:52)
Okay, automotive accidents. How do we manage that? We have good tires, good brakes, safe following distance. You know, if it's raining, we have a further following. We wear our seat belts. We demonstrate behaviors for our kids of how to drive safely so that when they drive, they can hopefully be safe. Okay, cool. So we try to manage number one. Number two, suicide that correlates with social media being in the pockets of children.
Kristi McVee (45:07)
Yep. Yeah.
you
Ben (45:19)
Don't put social media in the pockets of children. Demonstrate and lead by example of how to control your tech and not let it control you. And then homicide is, you know, weapon safety and making sure that kids don't have access to dangerous weapons on their own and that they have training if they do have access and whatever, right? So that, I just wanted to share that because
It's very significant and I don't see it talked about anywhere. I've never heard anybody else talk about it. I kind of stumbled upon this data and I think it's worth considering.
Kristi McVee (45:44)
No.
Mmm.
I will definitely share your link to your website because I really loved your website. There was some really good parent based β tools and information and you made it so simple that there was a three step thing like to how to I was like, that's so great. Like some for a parent that's overwhelmed three steps is easy. Right. So but yeah, you're right. I don't think anyone's talking about that. I know that we know.
Ben (46:02)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (46:14)
because we are in this world and we talk about it, you know, obviously from my perspective, I saw an increase in online child exploitation and child abuse material and the sharing of that stuff. the real, the real point is, that β social media and online is it's not something we can manage our way through. If we don't, you know, we have to be hands on with it. We can't just hand over a device and social media and go yours. You're going to be safe because there is no safety. I mean, one of the
Ben (46:39)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (46:42)
One of the things that I saw is, you know, we know that our kids get bullied and they can't get away from bullying. We know that they are exposed to adult content and, you know, indecent content and stuff like that. can't, you know, it's almost impossible to keep it out of their hands because it's everywhere and it's pushed at them. You know, if you don't want your kids, if you don't think your child is ready to see that, then don't hand them a device that can give it to them.
Ben (47:01)
Yeah.
I that. I say something very similar. I really appreciate that. It's, yeah, I mean, the way I put it even more bluntly is like, if they're not ready for porn, then don't give them YouTube, social media, and unfiltered internet access. You have to give them...
Kristi McVee (47:09)
You
Control that.
Ben (47:24)
Yeah, like even though technology is not the answer you should use filtering mechanisms that are built into all the devices so Android you have Google Family Link iPhone you have the screen time controls and there's similar things for Windows and Chromebook and stuff and You should use those you in my opinion you like you really should use those and for young kids You can take what's called a whitelist approach in the tech industry. We call the whitelist approach which means
You start with a blank slate. You have no access to anything. And then as your parent, I add individual apps, websites, whatever it might be. And you only have access to those things. Now at some point as you mature, you can change to a blacklist approach. That means that you have everything except for the following, you know.
Kristi McVee (48:13)
whatever you choose. Yeah, I like
that. I like that idea a lot. And that's why I think parents are going to like the bark phone or we don't have that in Australia. But you know, like the old flip phones where they don't have access to the internet or, you know, my daughter had a space talk watch, which was like, literally, all she could do was text like she would, you know, very minimal amounts of information, but and she could call me.
Ben (48:27)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (48:38)
β That's how she started with a device. And then, yeah, I basically blocked everything and she was only allowed certain things with, you know, with whatever I decided. And a lot of the things were not appropriate. But it's only through my work that I was able to work that out. And it's only through my knowledge of working in these spaces that I was like, wow, if I hadn't have seen it, I probably wouldn't have known and I would have done what most parents do is think that it's safe.
Ben (48:38)
Yeah.
Absolutely
absolutely and in fact I'm gonna change my website soon because although I've I've got it set into three of these pillars I've actually now boiled it further down to two and so the because I think really this simple is good, know, like if you can the fewer things to think about the better and And so if we've covered the first one, that's the algorithms
Kristi McVee (49:15)
That's good.
Ben (49:26)
And algorithm is a technical term, it's, call it anything with a bottomless feed. If you scroll and it never stops, that's a red flag. That correlates to the suicide statistics. It correlates to all the mental health problems. The second problem is online chat. That ties directly into your work. And the statistics are also really, really bad. In the U.S.
Kristi McVee (49:33)
to know.
Yes.
Ben (49:55)
There's a group that the federal government funds that's called the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Yeah, great stuff, really good work. They coordinate with the FBI and a bunch of police departments, and they actually have a service called the Take It Down service, and they'll work with the big tech companies to get your photos removed if somebody has shared photos of you. The statistics indicate...
Kristi McVee (50:01)
neck-neck.
Ben (50:18)
That in 2023 and I'm trying to remember the exact number roughly 150 000 reports of sexual exploitation from adults to children, adults exploiting children sexually online, roughly 150 000 reports in 2023 in 2024 the number was 546 000 of which 100 000 were AI deepfakes
Kristi McVee (50:29)
Rock.
Holy crap.
Wow.
Ben (50:49)
which means that the kid didn't send a naked photo and then get blackmailed and get extorted and get taken advantage of. These people took a regular photo of a kid, turned it into a naked photo, and then exploited the kid using that photo. And in 2025, we're gonna finish the year at about 1 million.
Kristi McVee (51:04)
Wow.
my gosh, it's just so bad.
Ben (51:12)
So this is
the rate of growth. Like I say, like it's, think it's worth paying attention to the rate of change. The rate of change is significant. And if you, so that's why there's two, those are the two problems to focus on. Addictive algorithms, AKA bottomless feeds, social media.
an anonymous online chat. And the anonymous online chat is, that's the chat function in the games. That's the DM, the direct message function in the social media apps. That's what that is. And that is where the folks that you used to arrest might go and try to find kids in person. Now,
Kristi McVee (51:44)
Yep. Yep.
Yes.
Ben (51:58)
Speaking of VPNs, they go on a VPN. They register on roblox. They register on instagram They register on snapchat And they're they're doing like a full scale. Some of them are automated There's even entire criminal networks now. So most of the world's gangs like organized criminal networks Do this for blackmail for financial purposes. They'll blackmail kids in exchange for money and
Kristi McVee (52:11)
Wow.
Yes.
Yeah, we've
got a lot of that happening here.
Ben (52:26)
Yeah, it's really, the stuff that I've learned is just terrible, but we have to know about it. It's to the effect that some of these networks have.
Kristi McVee (52:34)
We have to.
Ben (52:39)
Women attractive looking women and they're probably who they're probably not even doing it by choice But I don't know standing in front of green screens that will get on a video call with a teenage boy And say yeah, I am an attractive girl. This is real Here's a naked photo of me. Go ahead and send one back Every teenage who's not gonna fall for that. That's your biology is is meant to react to that
Kristi McVee (52:53)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah,
they're biohacking kids defenses. You know, we can sit there and say, they can, we can sit there and say, don't talk to strangers, but you're a teenage boy, you're going through puberty, you, you know, you might not be feeling very good about yourself right now. And this hot young woman comes into your DMs and says, Hey, I'll send you a photo if you send me one of you. I mean, literally, they've got like, I don't know any boy who wouldn't.
Ben (53:08)
Yeah.
I mean, yeah, and so that's why it happened so much. And so it's just an enormous problem. it just, it sucks because, well, aside from the obvious reasons, mean, you know, there's also like mostly great things happening on these chat systems. You can make friends, you can share hobbies, you can learn things, and then these predators are really ruining it at scale and hunting for kids.
Kristi McVee (53:55)
hunting.
Ben (53:58)
And they do it through online chat. And so the unfortunate reality is that, and let me know if you agree, the other police officers and psychologists that I've spoken with have told me that their impression is, if you put a kid on an online chat system, they will, with 100 % certainty, be targeted by predators. Now they may not fall victim, but they will be targeted and most likely contacted by predators.
Kristi McVee (54:24)
Yeah, yeah, my own daughter. My own daughter has had it. She just knew enough to know that that was a, know, like if they're slipping into the DMs and they're approaching your child and you know, your child. I mean, my daughter has done all of the things and she's, you know, she was, even says, Hey, mom, look, that should I play with them? And I'm like, no, you should not just block and report. Like, you know, and I'm like, but the I mean, she was about 15 at this age, but you know, like all kids will get approached all children.
Ben (54:44)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, it sucks.
Kristi McVee (54:52)
And it depends on, it depends
on, you know, like, how they are you supervising? Have you put restrictions in place? Do they know enough about what's, you know, ex daughters, sex daughters, you know, all of these predators, and it's not just sex daughters or financial gain. Some of them are there to actually obtain children's photos for the purpose of selling them online, sharing them on the dark web to gain a relationship with children. You know, I talk about the different types of online abuse.
And, you know, they all start with a predator approaching a child.
Ben (55:25)
Yeah. Yeah. And I'll tell you, it's, the U.S. is the biggest consumer. Apparently 62 % of the demand is inside the United States.
Kristi McVee (55:36)
Look, Australia is not immune to it either. We have a large network of people in Australia who are consuming child abuse material, exploitation material, and they also, we have a large network of people who get live material from places like the Philippines. So it's horrendous and it's not something that we can police out of. We actually need to as parents work with, you know, work with
police and work with these systems. It's not about, and I get so many, I made a comment about roadblocks on my social media that it's not for kids. And you know, like I've been, I've played roadblocks because that was what my job was like to sit and learn about it, right? And I get people like, you can't tell me what's good for my child or not. And I think that's the thing, like people get so defensive about someone pointing out that maybe what they're allowing isn't actually really good for their kids. I'd imagine maybe,
Ben (56:17)
Yeah.
Right.
Kristi McVee (56:31)
I don't know if you don't get those critics, right? But I get the critics because, yeah, they don't want to be told because they just, it's, you know, imagine the fight that they have to have with their child if they have to take action.
Ben (56:35)
I do too,
Yeah,
well and and and of course they're like hey look You know, there's there's 112 million people that play roblox every day 40 million of them are under 13 So my kids on there, they're playing a safe game. They you know, they're fine, you know It the fact of the matter is whether we like it or not. It's a high risk activity If you put a kid on roblox, it's it's high risk. I mean it
Because at that point it's like, look, we're not even, even if we're not telling anybody what to do, we're just letting you know it's a dangerous place to be. You could drop your kid in the wrong parts of New York City on their own at night and then, hey, see you later, you know, hope you come back in one piece.
Kristi McVee (57:12)
Yeah.
Yeah, that's it's literally what
they're doing. I made the comment the other day and you might like this one because I said, if you were at a playground and the playground was full of kids, right? And then an adult male came in and started playing with the kids. Would you sit and allow that for the next hour or 20 minutes or whatever? Would you sit there and just allow an adult male or an older teenager come and play with four and five year olds or 10 year olds? No, you wouldn't. You would pull your kid out or you would tell them to go away.
Ben (57:46)
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (57:49)
yet we allow this in online spaces. the, just doesn't make sense.
Ben (57:49)
Yeah.
Right, right. And it's really, I think a big part is that our DNA doesn't know how to do this. Right, we're not built to handle this stuff. And, you know, I don't know what it was like in previous generations. I know what it's like now. And I know that a lot of people are having a rough time. A lot of people are really financially stressed.
Kristi McVee (58:01)
Yeah, you pointed that out before.
Ben (58:16)
You you've got a lot of a lot of homes in which both parents have to work and they have to be gone all the time and you've got a lot of homes where it's single parent homes and I grew up in one of those, you know and and It's a tough time it's a high stress time Nobody's having an easy go at it and it seems like it's getting harder day by day Things are getting more expensive Things are getting more stressful people are losing their jobs And it's like now we got to worry about all this
Kristi McVee (58:21)
Yeah. Yeah.
I know, I know. I have a lot of parents say the same thing. Like they're just like, well, you know, it's just too much to deal with, too much to do. So I guess to finish up and wrap up, what would you, balance that, to try and balance all of this out, you know, you're a parent, you're struggling, right? And you don't know what to do. You know that it's not great and you're just trying to make it work. Is there any key things that you think parents should focus on?
Ben (58:43)
You know, it's, yeah, it's.
Kristi McVee (59:12)
just maybe one thing or two things that they can change today or talk with their child about today that might make a big difference.
Ben (59:20)
So aside from the stuff that we've spoken about already, I think it's good to think about the importance of education. that's why consuming content like yours and consuming content like mine and sharing that content with our kids.
I've had some really surprising positive feedback from parents that have said they've taken my videos that I made for parents and Showed them to their kids as young as you know seven I've actually oddly enough had a number of people specifically say that age seven and that their kids get it and Totally digest it and actually go like wow. That's a good point I'm gonna let me not play roblox anymore or let me know I know when somebody reaches out to me. I can be skeptical and
Very impressive. I kids, I often, don't give kids enough credit. You know, yeah. And so education, expose them, unfortunately expose them to the reality of the situation. If they have access to these things, they have to know. And, you know, in the US we have, many states have,
Kristi McVee (1:00:06)
β they're pretty amazing, really.
have to.
Ben (1:00:23)
an internet crimes against children task force and the internet they're called ICAC ICAC many of the ICAC groups put on training and education events for the community so you know look up and and and if they don't call them and ask them where can i go to learn where are events they and they may know i really suggest taking your kids to you know
the many police departments do events like this. Bring your kids, let them hear somebody else tell them. Let them hear a police officer in a uniform say, here's what's going on. Like this, think that would be a really good move.
Kristi McVee (1:01:02)
Yeah, and I have been that police officer and I have been that presenter in a school in Australia, like the AFP has a Think You Know program, which is similar to the ICAC program. We have the e-safety commissioner who has heaps of information. We've got, you know, personal presenters who go to schools. I think what I find, what I found difficult was when the schools put on something, parents don't show, like it's the parents that don't need the information that turn up and the ones that don't.
Ben (1:01:26)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kristi McVee (1:01:30)
are ones that need it, right? I think from my, β I don't know about your stuff, but I think also, you know, I used to say to my daughter, if I if I heard something or something happened at work, I'd be like, you know, what happened today? This happened to this child. You know, have you ever seen or heard anything like that happen to your friends or, know, I used to I call them side door conversations where you're like, what could kids do if or what could has any of your friends ever had this happen?
Ben (1:01:32)
It's so true.
Kristi McVee (1:01:57)
I'm not making it about my child. I'm just making sure they know the information so that, and then if she was to say to me, yeah, that's actually happened to my friend, Sienna, I'd be like, β now I know she knows about it. Now I know I need to teach about it.
Ben (1:02:12)
Yeah, I think that's really great and and at the end of the day if there's nothing going on in your area If you have the capacity you could try to organize it yourself I've actually got a video that I just did with my colleague Mary where she talks about how she organized her community and she got her school principles to actually bring in So she organized the whole thing. She brought in police officers. She brought in psychologists the principals facilitated having school presentations
Kristi McVee (1:02:18)
There's so much online.
Good point.
someone.
Ben (1:02:41)
So sometimes you got to make it happen yourself, education is where it starts. think, you know, that's, that's a really good area to focus on.
Kristi McVee (1:02:49)
Yeah. Yeah. And not just educating yourself. and sometimes I get parents like, I don't know how to talk about this stuff. And I'm like, we'll say, I listened to a podcast today with this guy from the US or, you know, Christie from β Australia. And this is what they said. And hey, I didn't realize like, I think I might've stuffed up a bit. Like, what do you think? You know, you're like, you said that seven year old onwards, I think our kids can process and
and they have the capacity, you don't have to overwhelm them with information, but you can say, I think I might've stuffed up a bit here. do you have any thoughts on this? And I think it's helping them make critical decisions, helping them think through like their own usage, their own issues. Because I have had seven year olds come to me, eight year olds come to me and say, I saw something online that is making me feel really sick. can't sleep at night.
I don't know, I can't talk to my parents because they'll take my device away. And that's my, I guess, from your point, I'd imagine you say the same is that we have to be approachable and we need to have a calm reaction because if we're going to explode and start yelling and blaming, then they're just not going to feel safe.
Ben (1:03:46)
Yeah.
That's so true. I really, I agree. And really, it's not only important for the first time, but it's probably going to happen more than once. And so you want them to be capable of coming back to you every time. And so when you do the family tech agreement, you can include a free pass. If you get in trouble, if you make a mistake, you're not in trouble. Come to me, I'll help you.
Kristi McVee (1:04:12)
Yeah, it does.
Ben (1:04:29)
I will react calmly, I will help you. And I think that's a big one.
Kristi McVee (1:04:35)
I will add, I had a moment where my daughter saw porn at 10 and she came and told me. So she's, she Googled, like she's doing, you know, puberty education and she's, she Googled sex. And I thought my, I thought it was all locked down. I thought it was all locked down. No, it was not. And she saw porn and she came and told me about it. And I remember, and so this is something I tell parents all the time. If you can't control your face and your reaction, tell it, just say, that's really important. I really want to like,
sit and talk to you about this. I just need to go to the toilet for a minute and just go to the toilet and freak out in the toilet. So you give yourself a moment to just chill out because if you can't control yourself, just give yourself like a pass to go and like scream into a pillow or something like that because β I know I remember having to say that to my daughter because I was sitting there like freaking out. My face was not controlled. I can do it with anyone else's job but not my own and and she's she'd asked me to sit down and I just said
Ben (1:05:13)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Right?
Kristi McVee (1:05:34)
I just need to go to the toilet. I thank you so much for telling me like I just had the thing in my head. Thank you so much for telling me that's really important. I'm just going to go to the toilet and then we're to have a sit down and talk about it. And I went off and screamed into a pillow because I was like, my God, what did I do? my God. So yeah, I think that's you know, parenting is not easy. I think you and I both agree like you can you do your best and when you know better you can do better.
Ben (1:05:48)
β yeah.
Yeah, that's right.
Kristi McVee (1:05:59)
Well, it's been an amazing chat. said it would be about 45 minutes. We've gone one hour and eight minutes now. So I can talk to you all day. love you. I love how calm you are. you're just so like, everyone's on this journey. We're all trying our best. Like, let's try and do it, you know, and I love that. So then just share with everyone how they can find you.
Ben (1:06:04)
Nice. Same.
Yeah.
Yeah, sure. Yeah, think try my website first, familyitguy.com. And then at the bottom, I've got links to my YouTube and my Instagram, and I've got a podcast. I'm, like you're saying, ironically on all the channels that we talk about, because I want to be where everybody is. β so yeah, feel free. I've got 99 % of what I do is free. I'm just here to help. So.
Kristi McVee (1:06:32)
Yeah.
People are. Yeah.
You're amazing. Thank you so much for having a chat. I think we should do this again. We should maybe dive into another topic, but I'm sure parents will parents will definitely get a lot from this. So thank you.
Ben (1:06:54)
Sure.
Yeah, I'd love to.
Yeah, you're welcome. Thanks for having me.
Kristi McVee (1:07:02)
You're welcome.
Kristi McVee (1:07:04)
Thank you for listening to this episode. Education empowers children, strengthens parents and most importantly, prevents abuse. That's why I do this work and that's why you're here. So truly thank you. If you'd like more support or resources, follow me on social media under Kristi McVee or CAPE-AU where you'll find all the links in the show notes. You can also grab a copy of my book, Operation KidSafe, a detective's guide to child abuse prevention at www.cape-au.com
where you'll find further resources and self-paced courses to help you in this journey of protecting your kids. If you found this episode valuable, please take a moment to leave a review or share it with someone important. Your support helps more parents and caregivers discover this important information and take action to keep kids safe. Check the show notes for extra links and support. And most importantly, thank you for showing up and taking action to protect your kids. See you next time.
