Roblox

Are your children playing Roblox? Do you feel uncertain, not knowing what they may be exposed to? Roblox is a unique platform where kids can not only play games but also create their own, raising unique challenges for parents when it comes to monitoring and approving content. On this show we share our 2 main concerns with Roblox and some practical tips for creating healthy guidelines around this game.

Transcript

Mandy Majors: 0:08

Welcome to the nextTalk podcast. We are passionate about keeping kids safe in an overexposed world.

Kim Elerick: 0:15

It's Mandy and Kim and we're navigating tech, culture and faith with our kids.

Mandy Majors: 0:20

Roblox. It's huge with kids, huge.

Kim Elerick: 0:25

A lot of kids are into it because it's such a unique platform in that you're not just playing and doing what someone else has imagined or created, you actually get to create content and that's pretty impressive. I mean that's a big draw, it's creative.

Mandy Majors: 0:45

It's always changing. It's all the things that keep you kind of engaged as a kid, right? It's almost like Google, like you're out there just looking for all the different games to play and you get to pick, and it changes every day because people are creating their own games and uploading them. You can get home from school and there's five new games to play. Oh, let's check this out, let's see what it's like. It's constantly evolving and changing and it also is very popular amongst young kids, like elementary kids. Anytime we have something changing and evolving, a lot and you've got elementary age kids, we got to take a step back and be like okay, what are the main dangers here? What are the main big things that I should be concerned about?

Kim Elerick: 1:32

Well, as we said, the content is changing every single day. It's very difficult to parent that. That's just number one, because you may look at what the games are, what your kids want to play, you may review it and you may approve it, and then tomorrow it's all different. No one can keep up with that. That's way too much.

Mandy Majors: 1:51

So when my kids you know they're older now I have a 19-year-old and a 16-year-old but when they were younger they played Roblox. And I remember one time they were playing a game and it was something like Cops and Robbers and I was like, tell me about this game, you know, trying to interact with them, whatever, and watching them play it. And I kid you not, it was you rob a bank. But then the goal was to like, shoot the police officers when they came to you, when they came to get you. So it was insane. And so I said to them that day okay, thank you so much for showing me this app.

Mandy Majors: 2:29

What do you think it's teaching you about police officers, you know, and they're like well, we're trying to run from them, we're trying to get away from them, and I'm like police officers literally put their lives on the line every day as they go into work making very little money to save us, they'll run into the burning building, they'll run towards the gunfire. When everybody's running away, you know, this is what police officers do. They are heroes, and now you are playing a game that makes you want to do this. So is this really good for our heart and mind? And so we started talking about how that would desensitize them and give them a skewed view of police officers, and so from that day forward and we still joke about it today but I was like we are not going to play the cop game, you know, like we're not, we're going to protect our heart and mind from that because that's not an okay message to put into our brain. But it was a lesson because I thought, oh, they're on there playing this game that we had played before and then the next day they were playing a new game. So it was a big lesson for me as a parent.

Mandy Majors: 3:37

And so this, this number one section of what we're talking about. One of the main dangers is content, is you have to be aware that Every day there's new games. They could create a game and also think about it. You have people you don't know worldwide that are creating games for your kids to play. So what you deem may be appropriate or inappropriate, they may not deem as appropriate or inappropriate that they're the kind of game that they're creating for your child to play. So we have to take all of this into account when we're talking about Roblox and the content that's on there.

Kim Elerick: 4:13

And I think it's important to realize also that sometimes the games like the face of the game and how it's presented may seem okay, like oh, this is a game where you're, you know, cooking in a kitchen and you're having competition or whatever, but you may not realize that within the game there's opportunity for the avatars to expose themselves, to engage in sexual acts or behaviors, if you allow your child to have the chat on to talk about things that are inappropriate or that you would deem inappropriate. So the hard part about it is you really have to play the game and because they change so often it's difficult to keep up with. So having like an approved couple of games is probably a better route to go, because it's hard to parent this content.

Mandy Majors: 5:00

Well, and, like you said, Kim, some of them start out like a normal game and then you take an elevator up to a private room where it's the hookup room and you can have sex and engage in like nudity and all sorts of things. And as I'm learning about all these sex rooms, they're called condo games in Roblox. You can go Google that. Make sure your kids aren't around. But if you Google condo games in Roblox, you're going to see what we're talking about here. It is nudity and sexual experiences within Roblox. So one of the things is you know, parents contact us with these. You know horror stories and, oh my gosh, this happened on Roblox kind of thing and it's like, oh, it started out as a normal game and then they went to this back room and that's where they could get naked and have sex and all this stuff. Right, One of the things in my mind when I get these horror stories, Kim, it takes me back to our virtual reality show where you were kind of telling me about all the research you were doing on that and how kids would be raped and traumatized and assaulted through VR, through this AI, this movement that we're doing, Even though it's not probably as real as an AI or virtual reality kind of sexual experience that we're moving towards in the future.

Mandy Majors: 6:19

It's a step in that direction. That you're on a game and then you get up in this elevator and you go to this private room and then you can have sex with other avatars. That's a whole move in that direction. That we talked about on the virtual reality AI show Crazy, Like we are conditioning our kids to believe that this is OK.

Kim Elerick: 6:39

Yeah, and there's so many layers to that. You first you're creating this person so you can look any way that you want to. There can be a false reality there. You can act and behave and say anything in these spaces and people not know who you really are, what you look like or how you feel about things, and you can do things that you think there will be no consequences to, like going up in an elevator and acting out in these sexual ways. I will tell you.

Kim Elerick: 7:03

In fact, my kids do not play on Roblox anymore.

Kim Elerick: 7:06

I want to be very honest about that.

Kim Elerick: 7:07

But when they did, one of the first things of a game that I approved that brought to attention for me how many weird ways a normal looking game can go was my kid came and said Mom, I just took off my pants and pooped in the game and I was like I say what? And it was true, Like it was just like you build your community kind of game and it seemed fine, we had played it together. But he was able to remove his clothes and poop in the toilet and you could see that action happening and that really opened my eyes to the fact that here I had approved this game and thought it was OK and benign. And there's all these things our kids can be exposed to and experience that we would never imagine someone would build into a game. But they do, and they do it new every single day, and so it really is something that we have to be aware of, and setting those guidelines about what we want reported are a big part of how we walk through parenting roblox.

Mandy Majors: 8:03

Well, link that show the five reporting guidelines, because that really is the first line of defense. I mean, no restriction caught that, Kim, when your kids were playing that, but it was grooming them or desensitizing them in a way that it was okay to take off their pants in an online game, and so this is not healthy for our hearts and our minds. Thankfully you had the reporting guidelines in place and your kids were like hmm, taking off clothes, it's a reporting guideline. I need to go tell mom this. So then it became a conversation and you were able to protect your kids. But if you don't have the reporting guidelines in place that we're always preaching, those five reporting guidelines are so important. If you don't have those in place, or if you do and your kid is not following them, think about how many ways this could go wrong.

Kim Elerick: 8:54

As far as the content within Roblox, Also, as we were preparing for the show, I talked to some kids who are currently on Roblox actively and I guess there's a very large amount of middle schoolers and older that are still very engaged in Roblox, and the two middle schoolers that I spoke to both said that bullying is a big culture within Roblox, like saying really unkind and mean and hurtful things Because again, they think they're on the screen and it's not a real person, and so that was one of the first things they brought to mind. And so when we're thinking about content, it's not just sexual stuff, it's not just inappropriate, it can also be just mean and violent, like you said with the cop game. So consider that in your conversations with your kids. It's not okay to be mean just because it's an avatar, and people are a lot of times detached and don't think that it's the same, but it is. Those words and those thoughts still go to a human being and our kids need to know that.

Mandy Majors: 9:51

Well, and that's one of the nextT alk five reporting principles is bullying, threatening, mean language, violence, anything like that? So the cop game was caught by my kids because they were like red flag alert. We got to go tell mom this, you know, we got to talk about it. And the same thing with these kids if they're being bullied or they're seeing any bullying going on. That's something that we need to address. So content is this big, huge umbrella thing under Roblox that we need to be thinking about. And I want you to visualize Roblox. I do want you to see like an umbrella with all different kinds of games and apps underneath it, because that's what it is and, like we said, it changes all the time. So content is huge. The second main concern, big one strangers.

Kim Elerick: 10:38

I will tell you. When my kids were on Roblox, that is the first time that we experienced a stranger reaching out to my kid and asking for personal information Again with the next talk guidelines. Thankfully, he immediately reported it to me and said this person is asking these questions about. You know where I live and where I go to school. It is prevalent on Roblox. Strangers asking for personal information or talking about inappropriate topics happens all the time in these games.

Mandy Majors: 11:07

We grew up in the generation of you know, don't get in the car with the guy offering you candy or with a cute puppy, right? We still need to be concerned with our kids being kidnapped. Obviously, yeah, it's still a concern. But today, how has that shifted? Your kid can be next to you on the family sofa playing Roblox with who they think is a 12 year old kid who they're interacting with, but it's actually a sex trafficking pimp trying to build a relationship with your kid. This is why it's changed.

Mandy Majors: 11:42

The strangers are coming into our homes and building a relationship with our kid through Xbox, through PlayStation and things like Roblox, where they're able to communicate. And now I know some parents are being like well, I have the chat disabled. Well, definitely, I would say disabled the chat, especially if your kids are younger. Disabled the chat, but they can also go over to Discord and be talking to people they met on Roblox from there. So there's also needs to be another layer of a conversation.

Mandy Majors: 12:15

If your kids are young, yeah, we're going to disable the chat, but also, you're not allowed to have Discord, because that is a communication app where all the strangers can go talk, and so it is a conversation. If you're going to allow your kids to be on this, that you're expecting them not to communicate with anybody who they don't know in real life. It's different if their friends from school are on and they're chatting with their friends or whatever. That's different than people you don't know in real life, because this could be anyone. This could be somebody in a prison somewhere Communicating with your chem through Roblox.

Kim Elerick: 12:49

It's so easy for us. You know we think okay. Well, yes, my kids on Roblox, but I've disabled the chat, I've set up the parental filters and all of those things. And, yes, those filters are designed to block offensive language and they even are designed to block personal information sharing. But Roblox is the first to say things get through all the time. We do the best that we can, so we cannot take our hands off the wheel and think our kids are safe on Roblox because we've put all these parameters in there. Nothing is a hundred percent. Things get through all the time. Your kid could be contacted by a stranger regardless of these security measures that you've taken, and that's why we're saying Having those guidelines in place where your kid reports anything and everything that you've laid out for them, is Really the most important thing, especially with something like Roblox, which is so hard to monitor.

Mandy Majors: 13:40

Absolutely, and you know, roblox has a 12 plus age app rating and what I find is a lot of kids seven and eight play Roblox Because they're fun little games. They're fun little games. Discord has an app rating of 17 plus, obviously because you're communicating with strangers, and so there, just there's a discrepancy there. But a lot of kids are Gonna be on Roblox and then get engaged and communicate with other people that they're meeting with through Discord and other third-party apps like that, so we need to be careful of that. So the two main things with Roblox is the content and the strangers. Those are the two main things. But we want to give you also just a couple practical things that, if you are gonna allow your kids to play Roblox, just some things that you need to keep in mind. And one is and this goes for any kid when they're younger, don't have your real name as your account name. You Don't do that Now. When they get older, that's a different conversation. And if they're accounts are public or private, that's a different conversation is they get older, you're going to evolve with your kid and they're going to be earning trust, but when they're little, just no account names.

Mandy Majors: 14:49

The other thing is parental controls, privacy setting, most of the time on apps. We don't want to give you a play by play because it changes all the time, right With updates on how to address this. Oftentimes, if you're looking for parental controls one, you can Google it or look for the three little dots or something that says account profile. Anytime you can find that area. Typically, then you can find privacy controls, parental controls, things like that that will allow you to turn things off, like the chat, or will allow you to disable some things. And, kim, you mentioned this earlier in the show and this is something I did when my kids were younger and playing it. I would only allow them to play certain games within Roblox, and if they wanted to play a new one, the first step was I was going to play it with them first to make sure it was okay and there was no hidden crazy rooms or something violent or just something that I didn't think was appropriate for their heart and mind.

Kim Elerick: 15:45

Another thing to keep in mind is you can have multiple accounts on Roblox and so you want to have the conversation with your kids that we are going to have one account and so that you're able to monitor it and you're able to see exactly what they're playing and, again, things that you have approved and that you can revisit to make sure it hasn't changed.

Kim Elerick: 16:01

That's something too. Games can change, they can re upload with updates, and so it's important to check back in often, even on the games that you have approved. Another thing that we did with our kids which I think was really helpful is we sat down with them and we read through the expectations of players on Roblox and reporting when something was not good, and so the rules, all the things that they were not allowed to do. We walked through those with our kids. They knew that it was serious and what was expected of them when creating an account and then what to do if you saw something inappropriate. So when that happened, it was great because I was able to walk my kid through reporting an inappropriate exchange between him and someone else who is asking for personal information, and so it was an opportunity for my kid to feel like he was helping another kid stay safe by having this other person reported and blocked, and so walking through those steps is also super helpful with your kids as you're getting into that space of Roblox.

Mandy Majors: 16:58

Well, and we said the two main things are content and strangers. We stand by that. We think those are the two biggest dangers. But there's other things that you have to be concerned about with Roblox too. Kim, you were telling me about a kid spending lots of money on just their avatar, like for sure.

Kim Elerick: 17:13

For sure. So there's something called Robux, and so that's where you load up your account with real money. And so if your kid has a checking account or access to a card or your card, they may be loading money up and spending it on Roblox just to, like you know, get a bandana on their avatar or whatever. It is something special, and they can end up going down a deep hole of spending a ton of money. So have that conversation with your kid about your expectations about that and their expectations. Are they thinking that's something they want to spend their money on? Is that a good use of money that you've been given or you've earned? So some great conversations there. And then also, if your kid is wanting to create content, that's a big conversation because now they've incorporated some AI to make it easier. They want everybody to feel confident in creating on Roblox.

Kim Elerick: 18:00

So, as before, there was a lot more hurdles to jump through and I think kids, especially younger kids, were more discouraged in creating content. They don't want that. They want everyone to feel like they can create something on Roblox. So you need to have that conversation with your kid If they're going to want to create. What does that look like? What's OK, what's not OK. Do you need to approve it before they publish it? Those type of guidelines and even things like Roblox is wanting to go into the area of catering to their older population, of having some dating games and different things and so making sure your kid knows what games they are not allowed to pursue, and again, checking on that regularly, because Roblox changes constantly and always will.

Mandy Majors: 18:42

You have got to get a handle on that. The content and the strangers are a big deal, but there's lots of other concerns to you that we've gone through. We hope we've given you some practical tools if you are going to let your kid play Roblox, to keep them safe, but also realize those five reporting guidelines and the communication. That's the first line of defense, because even these restrictions, even disabling the chat, your kids are still at risk on Roblox. We've seen this with our own family, kim and I, and the only thing that kept them safe was our next talk. Reporting guidelines those are very important.

Mandy Majors: 19:17

We're going to link that show. If you're like I don't even know what that is, we're going to link that show so you can have the reporting guidelines for yourself. We understand why kids love Roblox. It's creative, it's changing all the time and they're looking for all sorts of ways to get you more engaged in to the app. But we need to keep our kids safe. We need to make sure that we're aware of these two big things do some practical things and always, always, keep talking. This podcast is ad free because of all the people who donate to our nonprofit.

Kim Elerick: 19:53

Make a donation today at nextTalk. org.

Mandy Majors: 19:57

This podcast is not intended to replace the advice of a trained healthcare or legal professional, or to diagnose, treat or otherwise render expert advice regarding any type of medical, psychological or legal problem. Listeners are advised to consult a qualified expert for treatment.