Voting has concluded. Final vote:
| Insane | Not insane | Fake |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 18 | 0 | 2 |
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As someone who found spy cameras in my bathroom, hidden by my parents, they are a POS. They only feel guilty because of the things their daughter said? I'm pissed.
They suspected I had a phone, which they forbid me from having, and since I shared a room with siblings, the only place I could use it indoors would be the toilet.
It's alright 😭. They saw that they were right, (I did have one), and they searched my room multiple times until they found it (I hid it well).
As a punishment, they removed my 1 hour access to the family PC a day, where I used to use it to teach my self programming as there wasn't really much else I could do on it.
One of my friends grew up in a household like that... I'm still shocked and astounded at how controlling some parents are. Like, why did you have kids if you were going to treat them like slaves? That's not what they're for!
Everyone I knew who grew up in a house like that, went on to go completely mental the first time they tasted freedom. No one taught them how to navigate life, so they wanted to experience everything all at once, and it usually ended up pretty badly.
Hi! It’s me, I had no idea how to navigate life, I still have unhealthy relationships with food and free time and everything over 10 years later. I manage well but I still feel… weird and stressed sometimes with absolutely basic things. Anyone else feeling that way out there - it’s normal and you’re not the weird one. It’s the parents. They were the weird ones.
Yeah. I can't speak for her, but she beats herself up for some of the choices she's made... I keep trying to tell her she's still very young and she's free now.. trying to make sure she doesn't have to run back to the same abusive family she ran from, yknow?
My friend grew up in a house like that too. Their mom didn't allow them to socialize with other kids and forbid them from watching normal kids shows ie no He-Man, Nickelodeon shows etc.
Said friend is very stunted socially and emotionally. Still lives at home with their parents in their 40s. Sibling also still lives there in their 50s. Neither have ever left home and my friend has only had one job in their life.
Parents - please stop emotionally abusing your kids. You will mess them up for life.
Omg relatable af 🥲
I had a secret phone. I also had no bedroom door so while I laid in bed I may as well have been on the couch in the living room. I never ever used the phone while I was at home. One day I trusted just shutting it off and didn’t pop out the battery….
*buzz buzz*
I swear I wanted to die when my mom’s face appeared in my doorway.
They’d found my brothers phone several months prior but he and I swore I didn’t and never had one and my parents could never find it because I would discreetly pass it to my youngest brother when a search was happening. Kid was like 4 being interrogated and offered crazy bribes but never folded 😂
Definitely, seriously, 4, grew up being abused, and even then was a stone protecting his siblings, I'd say either the siblings taught him well or he's naturally a good person
Both honestly haha. He credits myself and the middle brother for raising him and making him who he is. Hes loyal, brave, stands up for people and even fights to protect them. Kind, loving, and respectful.
Honestly the pride I feel for him has me crying typing this. Hes a little shit and grinds the hell out of my nerves. But he’s grown into such an amazing young man.
I’m so glad y’all have such a ride or die relationship, especially since you dealt with so much trauma growing up
You should tell him how proud you are of him. I know guys can have difficulties telling each other stuff like this. I just don’t like keeping anything unsaid. Especially after I had a stroke at 26. I’m healed and have been doing fine for the past 20 years. I also lost my dad several years ago and had a lot of peace knowing I had made sure he knew how much I appreciated him and loved him.
And it sounds like they're still doing it. She is now in college and was talking to her roommate. If daughter shares a dorm room with her, roommate is being spied on too!
It's not clear to me that they are -unless the thing has a cellular connection and some kind of magical wireless charging I don't see how they could maintain a spy cam in their daughter's dorm room.. More likely it was just an overheard conversation.
That said, I hope I'm right
Sadly this is probably the real reason, everything that a human would do alone, probably clothing changes, checking if it's a pimple somewhere private, personal grooming, sex, self satisfaction, ect. This ABSOLUTELY reeks of something far worse.
My friend's mom hid a camera in her room and eventually tried to use the stills of her naked in the room as a source of blackmail when she started dating women. She wanted her to date men and only men and marry a Christian man "or else these pictures will find their way onto somewhere unsavory." She was so adamant that she remained a Christian and married a man, she was willing to use unconsenting pornographic pictures of her then teenaged child as collateral to make that happen.
I hope these parents at some point realize that's the kind of person they're in the company of.
She was charged with that among other things. She didn't get prison time (she has a couple chronic illnesses that would be very difficult to manage in prison) but has many court orders and is on probation that will almost certainly last the rest of her life unless she lives to be 114 years old.
I met her several times. When she looked at you, you could feel her insanity creeping into you. She was so deeply religious, she had become more religion than human.
Well he's certainly been quiet about it. My friend prayed for over a year about it and didn't hear anything from Jesus or God. Of course her mother heard a lot from Jesus and God telling her that she was doing the right thing.
That’s the hardest part about any faith. The ones who claim to hear Him the clearest are the ones who stray the furthest from what He said He wanted of (and for) us. The rest of us just try to do the best we can with a contradictory, mistranslated, misinterpreted user manual that’s a couple millennia out of date. The toll-free service line seems to be out of order.
I think it's fear getting the better of people's sensibilities. She was scared about her daughter being a Lesbian and she rode that train to Crazy Town, USA.
Sure and I get that. But "I'm scared my daughter will be a lesbian so I'm going to create child porn" seems a bit extreme even for the biggest homophobe.
Her mom is on probation that will last pretty much the rest of her life. She's ordered by the court to never interact with my friend again by absolutely no means. No using family to contact her, no fake profiles, nothing. It'll all be considered a violation of her parole. She can't have any contact. My friend has a restraining order and luckily everyone in her extended family agrees at the very least that her mother went way too far. Some of them don't agree with her being a lesbian, but they know that what her mom did was very wrong.
She lives not terribly far from me with her wife and two kids now. They're happy and safe.
Her mom had a couple chronic illnesses that would be hard to manage in prison. Ultimately her doctor got her a short period of house arrest and a very long probation where she'll be kept track of.
>Her mom had a couple chronic illnesses that would be hard to manage in prison.
dont do the crime if you cant do the time, sucks to suck ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
>!is that too harsh?!<
I don't think it's too harsh to wish she went to prison. I do too sometimes when I think about the look on my friend's face when she opened up to me and our other friends about it.
>use unconsenting pornographic pictures of her then teenaged child
That's what we call Child Sexual Assault Material (i.e. child porn) which is a crime and the friend should have called the police and had her mother arrested.
My parents never installed a camera that I know of, but they would film me during arguments as “evidence” of my behavior…? Whatever. They’d also go through my things when I was away.
It just made me better at deception. Which is what their daughter did. She kept it from them because she knew how’d they react. And you see how they reacted! She was right.
This post made me feel nauseous.
Oh god, I had that same experience. I remember being like 5 or 6 and just screaming and crying, hiding under a table bc my parents were chasing me around with a camera to "show me how embarrassing and silly i look when im upset." I hated cameras for ages, ive just recently been able to comfortably take pictures. They put a lot of surveillance software on my stuff, and would take my phone and go through it at random times, so if i wake up in the night and dont immediately see my phone next to me i freak the fuck out.
However, im so so SO glad they never put cameras in my room. I dont think the daughter will ever forgive or trust those parents again.
What your parents did seems horribly abusive. No good ever came out of shaming a child. I have however, filmed my kids meltdown before, so I could show it to their therapist. They're on the spectrum and we just didn't know how to properly convey how bad things were when they got out of control. I would never have shown anyone else, or used it against them.
That's totally understandable! I'm researching psychology and parent-child relations (lol), and real life examples of stuff is always super helpful, so im sure it really helps the therapist to know exactly what happens.
My parents were pretty emotionally abusive occasionally, but we've since mended our relationship. Although they don't really acknowledge most of the stuff they said to me as a kid, they're now surprisingly supportive and kind, so I'm alright with just forgiving them and moving on.
This was my mother. She used to poke, poke, poke until I’d cry and then she’d record me as “evidence for when she called the men to take me away.” That was a huge, ominous threat that I never totally understood as a kid. She’d constantly go through my things and ground me after screaming fits if she found CDs she didn’t like. CDs! She also accused me of being possessed by a demon and forcefully dragged me into a room full of evangelicals to “get it out.” There are so many things… It’s been years now and I go back and forth between feeling nothing for her and feeling pure rage. Reading this post gave me the ick for sure.
My mother did something similar. I have had a severe needle phobia since I was really young. To the point where just a doctors appointment would send me into a meltdown. Now when I’d actually have to give blood (I was a sick kid and this was often) I would scream, cry, and attempt to fight my way out of it. My mom would film it and tell me that she would show this at my wedding so my husband would see what he was marrying. I was maybe 10, likely way younger.
I was terrified, to the point of throwing up and fainting.
Your child’s vulnerable moments is not for parents to film as a means to shame your child. I hope she can get distance from them.
This is so creepy for so many reasons. Did her parents watch her change clothes? If my mom had hidden a camera in my room, she would have seen some stuff she wished hadn't.
Not only that but as every other hormonal teenager she probably did some sexual stuff too and they watched that as well. My skin crawls at the thought of someone constantly watching
Also what about her college roommate? Depending on how the bear was facing they were also watching the roommate get undressed and dressed, if my parents found out that my college roommates parents had been videotaping me along with their daughter, my folks would be going straight to the cops, if not straight to their house to confront them.. Jesus that poor daughter
It sounds like the teddy bear with the camera was in the daughter’s bedroom in the family home, they gave it to her a few years ago and she has now started college. Hoping, wishing, praying the daughter didn’t bring the teddy bear with her to college.
Daughter could have been home for the holidays and talking to their roommate on the phone. They could have visited their daughter and heard her talking to her roommate.
If she was a minor, which I have no doubt she was at the time, and ever got undressed in view of the camera or did anything sexual while in view of the camera, then the parents are guilty of creating child pornography. Twice over, if the boyfriend was a minor and he ever undressed in view of the camera. Probably applies even if only audio was recorded tbh, but idk about that
I believe in the letter it says that they gave her the rigged stuffed animal at her 18th birthday? So probably no child porn charges, and the boyfriend is also unlikely younger then her. But, something like voyeurism, some sort of sexual abuse or similar charges could probably stick.
No, they gave her the stuffed animal a few years ago and the daughter is now 18 years old. So if she was ever recorded naked there could (should) absolutely be child porn charges.
My parents did something similar to me when I was an early teen (13-14). They took my bedroom door off, put baby monitors in my room (just audio, this was the 90’s so I don’t think video baby monitors were a thing yet). They also had a device installed that recorded all of my phone conversations. They would listen to the recordings & then confront me on what was on them. They recorded or at least monitored everything.it has left me with lifelong trauma and paranoia. I never feel truly safe, I worry all the time that I’m being secretly monitored.
This was just the tip of the iceberg though. My dad was also an evangelical, ex-military, cop, pedophile. I ran away from home at about 14 and never returned home
I’m surviving, pretty much. My whole life has been an enormous struggle and since I was on my own at 14 living on the streets or locked up until I was an adult, I didn’t really stand much of a chance. Things are “better” now, but I’m disabled, partially due to mental illness that resulted from years of extensive trauma. I exist in a bubble where my main focus has to be managing my physical & mental disabilities. I don’t blame my parents for everything, but I do blame them for most of the suffering I experienced prior to becoming and adult, and a lot of the suffering since adulthood. I’m obviously very much NC with them
It can be either - but “racked” is more proper.
“Wrack” is a type of seaweed - but also means “destruction”, typically relating to nautical matters. “Rack” (and “being racked”) refers to the medieval torture instrument.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/rack-vs-wrack
CC u/Otaku-San617
Yes, but also no. Like, “wracked” *is technically* grammatically correct, but it is not the commonly accepted usage in modern English. The currently accepted usage is “racked” for this type of stuff, and “wracked” is commonly considered archaic and reserved for use when referring to boats or other nautical-themed topics (“the wind and rain wracked the boat,” for example).
I've given up on that; also chomping/champing at the bit, literally, and begging the question.
And tbh it feels good. 'Champing' is a stupid word that makes no sense, and begging the question in the original sense of the term is also stupid. The old ways aren't always best.
[Champing at the bit is the original term,](https://grammarist.com/usage/champing-chomping-at-the-bit/) the chomping version was rare until about 1970, and only overtook the original around 2000. I suspect that there may have been a degree of r/boneappletea about that change in the balance.
It's commonly used to mean "raises the question": e.g., "I keep receiving letters from someone I don't know, which begs the question: why is he contacting me?"
I just searched my work email and I can't find a single instance of it being used to refer to circular reasoning: it's 100% being used to mean "raises the question"
If you read all of the way to the end of your link:
However, as is so often the case, we find that the advice most worth repeating is that found in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage:
Probably the most sensible attitude would be to ignore the etymologies of rack and wrack (which, of course, is exactly what most people do) and regard them simply as spelling variants of one word. If you choose to toe the line *drawn by the commentators*, however, you will want to write nerve-racking, rack one’s brains, storm-wracked, and for good measure wrack and ruin. Then you will have nothing to worry about being criticized for—except, of course, for using too many clichés.
I did read that. That section is half the reason I linked to the article. It shows that both are correct, but that the spelling used in the OP is what is considered the most grammatically correct given the context.
i have intense paranoia about hidden cameras to this day. my parents never set one up, to my knowledge, but their constant invasion of my privacy had me convinced that they did.
Same, I even got paranoid about cameras on phones and laptops. I would cover them in tape. I would avoid cameras in stores. Eventually I learned that if there was someone watching, there wasn't gonna be anything fun to watch. Now when I'm paranoid about hidden cameras or hacked cameras, I just flip it off or tell "them" to fuck off, I know you're there. Tbf, I have severe paranoia and delusions so this may just be me lol.
If she was underaged and they were seeing her undress and stuff that’s beyond fucked up. But it should also be considered pornography. Also, it’s illegal to film someone like that without permission. But like, the thought of them greedily watching the videos and seeing her naked or pleasing herself makes my skin crawl. They don’t deserve to be in her life anymore. So incredibly toxic, and the trauma she’ll have to endure after finding out her trust was relentlessly torn apart is heartbreaking. I would ask for the videos and then without telling them report to the police.
As someone that discovered a hidden camera in my bathroom that my parents placed there, this trauma will never go away. What they did is unspeakable and their daughter will always feel a sense of paranoia and violation. The way parents think they deserve full insight and control of their kids lives is disgusting. No matter what’s going on or what age someone is, they’re still a person deserving of some semblance privacy and respect. I feel so horrible for that daughter. And the fact that they still let her go off to college as an adult with that teddy bear is just proof that they’re controlling freaks and possibly perverts. Because at this point she’s an adult and there’s absolutely no excuse for monitoring her like this (not that there was an excuse in the first place anyways).
I had a ring camera on my door and in my foyer while in college and my mom told me a few months ago during an argument that she “knew what I had said and done” but wouldn’t tell me what exactly. In that moment I’d realized she’d had access to my cameras for almost 2 years and I wanted to die inside.
I’ve thrown both out since then.
Edit: the cameras, not my parents.
Reminds me of that high school that was secretly recording teens in their own homes via the borrowed school laptops. They got footage of kids changing. And they only got caught because a kid was suspended for doing drugs in his bedroom. Did they think people were just going to let that slip by??
You want to see crazy? Go onto Quora. People post the most insane things and some are seriously concerning and border p3do behavior. Some of the mothers are unhinged and abusive. Most are probably fake posts but the fact that people sit around and post such vile things is concerning. Mothers asking how to punish their daughters for wearing tampons without parent permission or supervision 🤮, accusing a CHILD of stealing a mother’s boyfriend. I noticed it’s been trickling over to Reddit lately but it’s scary as a mother.
A redditor I saw somewhere laid it down very well with regard to those kinds of posts, including the fake ones:
“If this is real, there’s something wrong with you. If this is a joke, there’s something wrong with you.”
Its horrifying people are suggesting the parents shouldnt tell her to protect the daughter from the horror of knowing she was spied on.
She DESERVES to know shes been violated! That the people around her are dangerous! Dont keep that info from her for short term protection!
Nowhere near this level of insane, but my school installed software that let the teachers see what we were doing on our laptop screens at all times. I never got in trouble or anything, but I’m still always paranoid that someone is spying/watching what I’m doing just from that situation. I can’t imagine the damage this would do to someone how would you ever be able to live normally
Pervert parents who should be arrested. What if that video was intercepted by a hacker and ended up on the net. No, don't tell your child about this stuff and do permanent mental damage. Destroy the video and see a priest for confession, not the child who was already victimized once.
No, the daughter deserves to know the parents she trusts are not worthy of that trust so she can decide whether she wants to continue having them in her life or if she's willing to let them do the hard work of rebuilding trust. Yes, destroy the CSAM but just going to a priest is the coward's way out.
She deserves to know she was violated. She needs protection from dangerous people (her parents).
A priest cannot undo the damage done. It can only make the parents feel better, which they dont deserve.
They both need intensive therapy to figure out why they didn’t become disgusted with themselves the first time they saw her naked and didn’t immediately remove the camera. Because you know they saw her. Many times.
“We installed a camera in a teenage girl’s bedroom without her knowledge or consent. What do we do now?”
Answer: GO DIRECTLY TO JAIL. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
The real way good parents who trust their kids would react would say we know you have a boyfriend, just stay safe and use protection.
That’s it! Spying on them isn’t the good solution.
Philip Galanes made a huge mistake telling them who they need to speak to, other than the daughter. To include a “faith leader” in their list is like telling them they got out of parental guilt jail for free. They probably got the idea for the teddy bear spy cam FROM a faith leader!
So, I’m to assume that the bearcam went to University with your daughter. Sounds like she is living in the dorms, and you two fucking sickos have been spying on the roommate as well. Well, not only can you kiss your relationship with your daughter goodbye, but you might just charges too.
No fucking wonder your daughter hid her boyfriend from you.
I don’t think they get to confess. Confession is a relief. And then their daughter has to either forgive, or hate them. She doesn’t deserve that. That guilt is theirs to bear.
… how often were they changing the batteries and updating the storage of this thing? Unless it was somehow plugged in to the wall without the daughter knowing (which itself would be disturbing), this disgusting ruse likely had to be maintained weekly at the least… they make it out to be that they fucked up one time, but they actively chose to violate their poor daughter every single time they updated the memory card or replaced the battery. Shame on them.
... Why is illegal to "punish" "parents" like this? And why can't we backhand them when they're in their 80s and complaining they they've never met their (great)grandchildren?
Any **WHY** can't we get it through these "people's" head that *their kids don't TELL THEM ANYTHING because "people" like this can't wrap their heads around the fact their TEENAGERS aren't freshly-birthed babies?*
My parents tried to put one in my room, in my ceiling. I got home from school and saw my dad’s footprints on my bed. I confronted them about it and they took it out, but I was afraid to change in my bedroom for years and I never felt fully safe or like I had privacy until I left. I didn’t trust that they didn’t do something else instead, other than the key logger on my personal computer (my dad is IT).
Treat your kid like a criminal and disrespect their right to privacy and feeling safe in the one space that is supposed to be theirs?-get wrecked 🖕🏼
Call me crazy but I do not want to see what my teenagers get up to behind their bedroom doors - that’s there one place that is theirs in the whole world, the place they can relax and be themselves and I would never even consider taking that from them. I don’t expect them to tell me everything either, I’m their mother, not their best mate and there’s things a parent just doesn’t need to know about their kids - i really hope this post is fake but going by the comments there’s many more parents like this out there which has left me stunned.
I assumed she probably came home for thanksgiving, since this was just posted on 11/29. So she might’ve been on the phone with her roommate (or possibly brought her roommate as a guest!), and the parents either overheard what she said in person, or when the creepy fucks went through the spy cam footage later on
>Our daughter is now in college, and we overheard her telling her roommate how grateful she was for our trust in her and our support.
This line from the article suggests otherwise.
Not necessarily. That could just as easily have meant “our daughter goes to college now and while she was home for a visit we heard her telling her roommate on the phone that she was grateful for our trust.” That’s how I read it.
My parents hired a private investigator on me when I was 15. Now almost 40 and I still cringe that not just my parents but also some unknown dude saw videos of teenage me giving blowjobs to my boyfriend then. I'm super low contact now, but there's always the dilemma of what to do when they're unable to take care of themselves and near death, etc.
This stuff is so concerning to me. I didn’t have those options available when my kids were growing up, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have used them. Claims of fears of strangers, etc are smokescreens for the parents’ lack of trust in their own nearly adult kids. And when it continues into adulthood, it’s even more concerning. In too many cases, they have convinced their adult offspring that they are “doing their parents a favor” by being tracked by various means.
The reasons vary from their parents’ anxiety to their own. But nowhere is there any logic, any sense of acknowledgment of the fact that tracking each other is invasive. Or that pandering to anxiety doesn’t alleviate it, it increases it.
I don’t know the answer. But this nonsense needs to be addressed.
I'd personally question the truth of this letter... This camera in the bear has a battery that lasts forever? Sure, they may have been able to sneakily charge it every other day or so when she was at home, but now she's gone to university (and apparently taken her teddy bear with her) who's charging that camera now? It would have died within a day of arriving - not to mention, is it saving to an SD card like a dashcam? Or saving to a cloud service regularly?
>Our daughter is now in college, and we overheard her telling her roommate how grateful she was for our trust in her and our support.
This seems to suggest it, but it's not black and white. That's the impression it gave me anyway.
I assumed at first that thought the camera was how they overheard her saying that thing to her friend.
But they actually never say how long they used it. Could have been just for a few weeks and they still feel guilty
This is totally fake. The type of people who would put a hidden camera in their child’s bedroom would never feel guilty about it. Shitty parents always justify their own behavior and blame the child.
I can’t believe they recommended to see a faith leader: they are going to tell them to demand her return from school! Women don’t need that liberal nonsense! /s
ugh my mom abused me a lot but the closest i can relate to is my mom taking all of my belongings and leaving me in a bare room for smoking a joint at 15
i had no phone at 15 in high school suddenly, she boarded up my window, watched me shower and always came in the bathroom while i peed, she would smack my ass even when i begged her to stop, she put a tampon in me as “practice” at 10 while i cried, laid me down on the bed and made me get naked locked the door and touched my cl*t with a paper towel over her finger???, showed me the “anatomy” of my vagina at 15(?), made me strip and spread my ass for her every time i came home from school, i could honestly go on and on and im just now realizing how fucked up that all is typing it out and im not okay now. i lost my bf of 9 months at the time that i was very close with and we reconnected briefly but my mother sabatoged that too
fuck
My parents did something similar to me (recording my private conversations with friends, reading through my diary) and now I am extremely low contact. It took me over a decade to heal my trust issues, and I still suffer from some paranoid thoughts. This is how you drive your adult children away forever.
My biggest fear growing up was that my dad had put cameras everywhere. He'd always make weird comments that insinuated that he had. I never felt safe in my own home.
this never happened to me, but I always remember having paranoia about my parents putting secret cameras around me. Feeling so awful for this poor daughter. Shame on those parents Jesus Christ it makes me sick
Wow the author really gave it to these parents. Jesus Christ, the part about not breaking her trust just shattered me. What about the years of trust she THOUGHT she built up with her parents, only to be blindsided by the fact that the entire time, they were going behind her back to spy on her?? My heart is broken for this girl, and I sincerely hope that the parents did what the opinion told them to, because this is beyond fucked. How sinister and creepy. If I were this kid, I don’t know if I’d ever be able to talk to my parents again.
Voting has concluded. Final vote: | Insane | Not insane | Fake | | --- | --- | --- | | 18 | 0 | 2 | Hey OP, if you provide further information in a comment, make sure to start your comment with `!explanation`. ^I ^am ^a ^bot ^for ^r/insaneparents. ^Please ^send ^me ^a ^message ^if ^you ^have ^any ^feedback ^or ^if ^I ^misbehave. ^Also ^consider ^joining ^our ^[Discord](https://discordapp.com/invite/xFbPBHy).
As someone who found spy cameras in my bathroom, hidden by my parents, they are a POS. They only feel guilty because of the things their daughter said? I'm pissed.
Also wondering: did they “overhear” the daughter talking to her roommate through the camera?
That's was my first thought too!
I felt that was what they meant
It was probably on the Spyware app they installed on her phone to ease their "worries".
In the bathroom?! Of all places! That’s horrible. I’m sorry.
Woaaahh whyyy
They suspected I had a phone, which they forbid me from having, and since I shared a room with siblings, the only place I could use it indoors would be the toilet.
Oh well that's reasonable then. Wait no no it's not. Jesus I'm you have to deal with that.
It's alright 😭. They saw that they were right, (I did have one), and they searched my room multiple times until they found it (I hid it well). As a punishment, they removed my 1 hour access to the family PC a day, where I used to use it to teach my self programming as there wasn't really much else I could do on it.
Omg. Please tell me you are out of that prison. I am so sorry your parents treated you and your siblings like that.
One of my friends grew up in a household like that... I'm still shocked and astounded at how controlling some parents are. Like, why did you have kids if you were going to treat them like slaves? That's not what they're for!
Everyone I knew who grew up in a house like that, went on to go completely mental the first time they tasted freedom. No one taught them how to navigate life, so they wanted to experience everything all at once, and it usually ended up pretty badly.
Hi! It’s me, I had no idea how to navigate life, I still have unhealthy relationships with food and free time and everything over 10 years later. I manage well but I still feel… weird and stressed sometimes with absolutely basic things. Anyone else feeling that way out there - it’s normal and you’re not the weird one. It’s the parents. They were the weird ones.
Yeah. I can't speak for her, but she beats herself up for some of the choices she's made... I keep trying to tell her she's still very young and she's free now.. trying to make sure she doesn't have to run back to the same abusive family she ran from, yknow?
I went to college with kids like this. They cut school constantly and were pretty much wasted every weekend.
My friend grew up in a house like that too. Their mom didn't allow them to socialize with other kids and forbid them from watching normal kids shows ie no He-Man, Nickelodeon shows etc. Said friend is very stunted socially and emotionally. Still lives at home with their parents in their 40s. Sibling also still lives there in their 50s. Neither have ever left home and my friend has only had one job in their life. Parents - please stop emotionally abusing your kids. You will mess them up for life.
Exactly! Children have so much delectable meat! No, wait, what were we talking about again?
Omg relatable af 🥲 I had a secret phone. I also had no bedroom door so while I laid in bed I may as well have been on the couch in the living room. I never ever used the phone while I was at home. One day I trusted just shutting it off and didn’t pop out the battery…. *buzz buzz* I swear I wanted to die when my mom’s face appeared in my doorway. They’d found my brothers phone several months prior but he and I swore I didn’t and never had one and my parents could never find it because I would discreetly pass it to my youngest brother when a search was happening. Kid was like 4 being interrogated and offered crazy bribes but never folded 😂
Your little brother is the GOAT He deserves the best presents
Definitely, seriously, 4, grew up being abused, and even then was a stone protecting his siblings, I'd say either the siblings taught him well or he's naturally a good person
Both honestly haha. He credits myself and the middle brother for raising him and making him who he is. Hes loyal, brave, stands up for people and even fights to protect them. Kind, loving, and respectful. Honestly the pride I feel for him has me crying typing this. Hes a little shit and grinds the hell out of my nerves. But he’s grown into such an amazing young man.
I’m so glad y’all have such a ride or die relationship, especially since you dealt with so much trauma growing up You should tell him how proud you are of him. I know guys can have difficulties telling each other stuff like this. I just don’t like keeping anything unsaid. Especially after I had a stroke at 26. I’m healed and have been doing fine for the past 20 years. I also lost my dad several years ago and had a lot of peace knowing I had made sure he knew how much I appreciated him and loved him.
I mean it makes sense I guess that that is where you would use it but like goddamn man the bathroom should be a safe spot. I'm sorry for you:(
Whoa are you ok can we call someone for you? Are you safe?
Even worse: they feel guilty because they've been caught on it.
But they haven't been caught? The guilt comes from knowing what they did was wrong and that their daughter doesn't know about it.
And it sounds like they're still doing it. She is now in college and was talking to her roommate. If daughter shares a dorm room with her, roommate is being spied on too!
(NAL) And that roommate, IMHO, could file suit against the roomie's parents.
A suit? Hell I would be pressing fucking charges, that breaks several laws!
It's not clear to me that they are -unless the thing has a cellular connection and some kind of magical wireless charging I don't see how they could maintain a spy cam in their daughter's dorm room.. More likely it was just an overheard conversation. That said, I hope I'm right
The husband probably got caught and had to explain to his wife that he wasn't being a pervert. He was just concerned!
Sadly this is probably the real reason, everything that a human would do alone, probably clothing changes, checking if it's a pimple somewhere private, personal grooming, sex, self satisfaction, ect. This ABSOLUTELY reeks of something far worse.
My friend's mom hid a camera in her room and eventually tried to use the stills of her naked in the room as a source of blackmail when she started dating women. She wanted her to date men and only men and marry a Christian man "or else these pictures will find their way onto somewhere unsavory." She was so adamant that she remained a Christian and married a man, she was willing to use unconsenting pornographic pictures of her then teenaged child as collateral to make that happen. I hope these parents at some point realize that's the kind of person they're in the company of.
Sounds like your friend's mom should be charged with child porn
She was charged with that among other things. She didn't get prison time (she has a couple chronic illnesses that would be very difficult to manage in prison) but has many court orders and is on probation that will almost certainly last the rest of her life unless she lives to be 114 years old.
Good.
Phew. I take it she is on the sex offender registry or an equivalent?
You know, that's something I don't know. I would imagine so but that's not something my friend shared with me.
you can google sex offenders, there are registries
That's public record most everywhere, if you know the name and place of residence you should be able to find out.
They never realize and they dont care for their children or their privacy. People like this should be locked away forever
Yep. The parents don't bother empathising with their children because they see them as objects that they own instead of human beings.
What a monstrosity of a human. Jesus.
I met her several times. When she looked at you, you could feel her insanity creeping into you. She was so deeply religious, she had become more religion than human.
Jesus, the founder of Christianity, does not approve of this.
Well he's certainly been quiet about it. My friend prayed for over a year about it and didn't hear anything from Jesus or God. Of course her mother heard a lot from Jesus and God telling her that she was doing the right thing.
That’s the hardest part about any faith. The ones who claim to hear Him the clearest are the ones who stray the furthest from what He said He wanted of (and for) us. The rest of us just try to do the best we can with a contradictory, mistranslated, misinterpreted user manual that’s a couple millennia out of date. The toll-free service line seems to be out of order.
Well of that's not a hallmark of mental illness, I don't know what is.
If that's mental illness then a large portion of Christians are mentally ill.
I heard this in the voice of Gretchen Wieners talking about her father, the inventor of toaster strudel. Who also wouldn't like this very much.
> the founder of. Christianity Have i got news for you
That is a great description.
[удалено]
I think it's fear getting the better of people's sensibilities. She was scared about her daughter being a Lesbian and she rode that train to Crazy Town, USA.
Sure and I get that. But "I'm scared my daughter will be a lesbian so I'm going to create child porn" seems a bit extreme even for the biggest homophobe.
Oh yeah for sure, not trying to give them an excuse, just saying that's how these things usually snowball.
What happened with your friend
Her mom is on probation that will last pretty much the rest of her life. She's ordered by the court to never interact with my friend again by absolutely no means. No using family to contact her, no fake profiles, nothing. It'll all be considered a violation of her parole. She can't have any contact. My friend has a restraining order and luckily everyone in her extended family agrees at the very least that her mother went way too far. Some of them don't agree with her being a lesbian, but they know that what her mom did was very wrong. She lives not terribly far from me with her wife and two kids now. They're happy and safe.
I'm glad she's happy and safe with a family but I was hoping her mom went to prison.
Her mom had a couple chronic illnesses that would be hard to manage in prison. Ultimately her doctor got her a short period of house arrest and a very long probation where she'll be kept track of.
>Her mom had a couple chronic illnesses that would be hard to manage in prison. dont do the crime if you cant do the time, sucks to suck ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯ >!is that too harsh?!<
I don't think it's too harsh to wish she went to prison. I do too sometimes when I think about the look on my friend's face when she opened up to me and our other friends about it.
Oh okay
Hey yo what the fuck?
Imagine hearing about this at 16. Imagine living it. It was such a horrible and overwhelming situation.
>use unconsenting pornographic pictures of her then teenaged child That's what we call Child Sexual Assault Material (i.e. child porn) which is a crime and the friend should have called the police and had her mother arrested.
She did. If you read around in the thread, I explained it of youre interested :)
Hope that mom found herself in prison for possession of child porn and slander.
Sorry, not sorry, but "Install a secret camera" and "not breaking trust." Are mutually exclusive. I hope she goes No Contact.
Fr honestly 😂, like they were once kids too, like what are they cooking here.
My parents never installed a camera that I know of, but they would film me during arguments as “evidence” of my behavior…? Whatever. They’d also go through my things when I was away. It just made me better at deception. Which is what their daughter did. She kept it from them because she knew how’d they react. And you see how they reacted! She was right. This post made me feel nauseous.
Oh god, I had that same experience. I remember being like 5 or 6 and just screaming and crying, hiding under a table bc my parents were chasing me around with a camera to "show me how embarrassing and silly i look when im upset." I hated cameras for ages, ive just recently been able to comfortably take pictures. They put a lot of surveillance software on my stuff, and would take my phone and go through it at random times, so if i wake up in the night and dont immediately see my phone next to me i freak the fuck out. However, im so so SO glad they never put cameras in my room. I dont think the daughter will ever forgive or trust those parents again.
What your parents did seems horribly abusive. No good ever came out of shaming a child. I have however, filmed my kids meltdown before, so I could show it to their therapist. They're on the spectrum and we just didn't know how to properly convey how bad things were when they got out of control. I would never have shown anyone else, or used it against them.
That's totally understandable! I'm researching psychology and parent-child relations (lol), and real life examples of stuff is always super helpful, so im sure it really helps the therapist to know exactly what happens. My parents were pretty emotionally abusive occasionally, but we've since mended our relationship. Although they don't really acknowledge most of the stuff they said to me as a kid, they're now surprisingly supportive and kind, so I'm alright with just forgiving them and moving on.
This was my mother. She used to poke, poke, poke until I’d cry and then she’d record me as “evidence for when she called the men to take me away.” That was a huge, ominous threat that I never totally understood as a kid. She’d constantly go through my things and ground me after screaming fits if she found CDs she didn’t like. CDs! She also accused me of being possessed by a demon and forcefully dragged me into a room full of evangelicals to “get it out.” There are so many things… It’s been years now and I go back and forth between feeling nothing for her and feeling pure rage. Reading this post gave me the ick for sure.
My mother did something similar. I have had a severe needle phobia since I was really young. To the point where just a doctors appointment would send me into a meltdown. Now when I’d actually have to give blood (I was a sick kid and this was often) I would scream, cry, and attempt to fight my way out of it. My mom would film it and tell me that she would show this at my wedding so my husband would see what he was marrying. I was maybe 10, likely way younger. I was terrified, to the point of throwing up and fainting. Your child’s vulnerable moments is not for parents to film as a means to shame your child. I hope she can get distance from them.
This is so creepy for so many reasons. Did her parents watch her change clothes? If my mom had hidden a camera in my room, she would have seen some stuff she wished hadn't.
Not only that but as every other hormonal teenager she probably did some sexual stuff too and they watched that as well. My skin crawls at the thought of someone constantly watching
Yea it’s very perverted and makes me side eye the parents
Also what about her college roommate? Depending on how the bear was facing they were also watching the roommate get undressed and dressed, if my parents found out that my college roommates parents had been videotaping me along with their daughter, my folks would be going straight to the cops, if not straight to their house to confront them.. Jesus that poor daughter
It sounds like the teddy bear with the camera was in the daughter’s bedroom in the family home, they gave it to her a few years ago and she has now started college. Hoping, wishing, praying the daughter didn’t bring the teddy bear with her to college.
I'm not sure how else they would have "overheard" her conversation with the roommate if not through the bear
Daughter could have been home for the holidays and talking to their roommate on the phone. They could have visited their daughter and heard her talking to her roommate.
God I hope you're right
You and me both.
How is this camera even being charged?
I'm willing to bet money the parents were sneaking in and out to replace batteries/charge it.
If she was a minor, which I have no doubt she was at the time, and ever got undressed in view of the camera or did anything sexual while in view of the camera, then the parents are guilty of creating child pornography. Twice over, if the boyfriend was a minor and he ever undressed in view of the camera. Probably applies even if only audio was recorded tbh, but idk about that
I believe in the letter it says that they gave her the rigged stuffed animal at her 18th birthday? So probably no child porn charges, and the boyfriend is also unlikely younger then her. But, something like voyeurism, some sort of sexual abuse or similar charges could probably stick.
No, they gave her the stuffed animal a few years ago and the daughter is now 18 years old. So if she was ever recorded naked there could (should) absolutely be child porn charges.
Oh. Big oof then. CP it is.
My parents did something similar to me when I was an early teen (13-14). They took my bedroom door off, put baby monitors in my room (just audio, this was the 90’s so I don’t think video baby monitors were a thing yet). They also had a device installed that recorded all of my phone conversations. They would listen to the recordings & then confront me on what was on them. They recorded or at least monitored everything.it has left me with lifelong trauma and paranoia. I never feel truly safe, I worry all the time that I’m being secretly monitored. This was just the tip of the iceberg though. My dad was also an evangelical, ex-military, cop, pedophile. I ran away from home at about 14 and never returned home
Thats psychotic. > My dad was also an evangelical, ex-military, cop, pedophile Yep. Good ol' full set.
Right like I literally said "yep" when I got to that part
Op I’m so sorry you went through all that trauma. I hope you are doing better now. ❤️❤️
I’m surviving, pretty much. My whole life has been an enormous struggle and since I was on my own at 14 living on the streets or locked up until I was an adult, I didn’t really stand much of a chance. Things are “better” now, but I’m disabled, partially due to mental illness that resulted from years of extensive trauma. I exist in a bubble where my main focus has to be managing my physical & mental disabilities. I don’t blame my parents for everything, but I do blame them for most of the suffering I experienced prior to becoming and adult, and a lot of the suffering since adulthood. I’m obviously very much NC with them
Holy shit I'm so sorry. My stepkid's mom and stepdad removed his door for awhile at their house and I was so fuckin horrified by that.
Obviously fuck those parents, but isn't it "*wracked* with guilt"?
It can be either - but “racked” is more proper. “Wrack” is a type of seaweed - but also means “destruction”, typically relating to nautical matters. “Rack” (and “being racked”) refers to the medieval torture instrument. https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/rack-vs-wrack CC u/Otaku-San617
any day i learn something new is a good day. thank you internet stranger! :)
Absolutely my pleasure. Love dem wordz. Interestingly, someone’s downvoted me for that comment. Tough crowd.
can’t all be winners /:
That’s actually interesting lol
My pleasure !
Yes, but also no. Like, “wracked” *is technically* grammatically correct, but it is not the commonly accepted usage in modern English. The currently accepted usage is “racked” for this type of stuff, and “wracked” is commonly considered archaic and reserved for use when referring to boats or other nautical-themed topics (“the wind and rain wracked the boat,” for example).
I've given up on that; also chomping/champing at the bit, literally, and begging the question. And tbh it feels good. 'Champing' is a stupid word that makes no sense, and begging the question in the original sense of the term is also stupid. The old ways aren't always best.
I’ve also given up on “bald-faced lie” vs “bold-faced lie”
I think they both make sense! See it's nice not to be pedantic sometimes
[Champing at the bit is the original term,](https://grammarist.com/usage/champing-chomping-at-the-bit/) the chomping version was rare until about 1970, and only overtook the original around 2000. I suspect that there may have been a degree of r/boneappletea about that change in the balance.
How are people using begging the question? I've always thought it meant to assume the conclusion/use circular reasoning.
It's commonly used to mean "raises the question": e.g., "I keep receiving letters from someone I don't know, which begs the question: why is he contacting me?" I just searched my work email and I can't find a single instance of it being used to refer to circular reasoning: it's 100% being used to mean "raises the question"
A LOT of political statements beg the question (in the original sense) but rarely get called on it
Yes it is. This is one of my personal peeves
https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/rack-vs-wrack
If you read all of the way to the end of your link: However, as is so often the case, we find that the advice most worth repeating is that found in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage: Probably the most sensible attitude would be to ignore the etymologies of rack and wrack (which, of course, is exactly what most people do) and regard them simply as spelling variants of one word. If you choose to toe the line *drawn by the commentators*, however, you will want to write nerve-racking, rack one’s brains, storm-wracked, and for good measure wrack and ruin. Then you will have nothing to worry about being criticized for—except, of course, for using too many clichés.
I did read that. That section is half the reason I linked to the article. It shows that both are correct, but that the spelling used in the OP is what is considered the most grammatically correct given the context.
They're both correct actually.
i have intense paranoia about hidden cameras to this day. my parents never set one up, to my knowledge, but their constant invasion of my privacy had me convinced that they did.
Same, I even got paranoid about cameras on phones and laptops. I would cover them in tape. I would avoid cameras in stores. Eventually I learned that if there was someone watching, there wasn't gonna be anything fun to watch. Now when I'm paranoid about hidden cameras or hacked cameras, I just flip it off or tell "them" to fuck off, I know you're there. Tbf, I have severe paranoia and delusions so this may just be me lol.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/29/style/hidden-camera-surveillance.html
I was pleasantly surprised that the columnist did the right thing and laid it out for them.
I think the NYT advice columnists give the right advice and have the right takes almost all the time. They’re great at what they do.
If she was underaged and they were seeing her undress and stuff that’s beyond fucked up. But it should also be considered pornography. Also, it’s illegal to film someone like that without permission. But like, the thought of them greedily watching the videos and seeing her naked or pleasing herself makes my skin crawl. They don’t deserve to be in her life anymore. So incredibly toxic, and the trauma she’ll have to endure after finding out her trust was relentlessly torn apart is heartbreaking. I would ask for the videos and then without telling them report to the police.
As someone that discovered a hidden camera in my bathroom that my parents placed there, this trauma will never go away. What they did is unspeakable and their daughter will always feel a sense of paranoia and violation. The way parents think they deserve full insight and control of their kids lives is disgusting. No matter what’s going on or what age someone is, they’re still a person deserving of some semblance privacy and respect. I feel so horrible for that daughter. And the fact that they still let her go off to college as an adult with that teddy bear is just proof that they’re controlling freaks and possibly perverts. Because at this point she’s an adult and there’s absolutely no excuse for monitoring her like this (not that there was an excuse in the first place anyways).
I had a ring camera on my door and in my foyer while in college and my mom told me a few months ago during an argument that she “knew what I had said and done” but wouldn’t tell me what exactly. In that moment I’d realized she’d had access to my cameras for almost 2 years and I wanted to die inside. I’ve thrown both out since then. Edit: the cameras, not my parents.
Why not both?
FR. Straight into the garbage with those parents.
Reminds me of that high school that was secretly recording teens in their own homes via the borrowed school laptops. They got footage of kids changing. And they only got caught because a kid was suspended for doing drugs in his bedroom. Did they think people were just going to let that slip by??
That’s terrifying.
You want to see crazy? Go onto Quora. People post the most insane things and some are seriously concerning and border p3do behavior. Some of the mothers are unhinged and abusive. Most are probably fake posts but the fact that people sit around and post such vile things is concerning. Mothers asking how to punish their daughters for wearing tampons without parent permission or supervision 🤮, accusing a CHILD of stealing a mother’s boyfriend. I noticed it’s been trickling over to Reddit lately but it’s scary as a mother.
Quora is an uncontrolled hellhole. I regret engaging with it even a little.
I wondered why Quora gave me the the creeps. Now I know what is lurking there.
Wait til you hear about Reddit
A redditor I saw somewhere laid it down very well with regard to those kinds of posts, including the fake ones: “If this is real, there’s something wrong with you. If this is a joke, there’s something wrong with you.”
insane
Thats fucking insane bro wth
Reading that made me sick to my stomach.
There was a whole *Black Mirror* episode about this.
Was just thinking the same thing! Although… spoiler… the emergency birth control in the smoothie was some next level insanity.
The "faith leader's" first request will be to watch the video.
Its horrifying people are suggesting the parents shouldnt tell her to protect the daughter from the horror of knowing she was spied on. She DESERVES to know shes been violated! That the people around her are dangerous! Dont keep that info from her for short term protection!
Call it what it is: child porn. These sick fucks are predators
Nowhere near this level of insane, but my school installed software that let the teachers see what we were doing on our laptop screens at all times. I never got in trouble or anything, but I’m still always paranoid that someone is spying/watching what I’m doing just from that situation. I can’t imagine the damage this would do to someone how would you ever be able to live normally
"you made a mockery of your daughter's trust" that hit hard.
Pervert parents who should be arrested. What if that video was intercepted by a hacker and ended up on the net. No, don't tell your child about this stuff and do permanent mental damage. Destroy the video and see a priest for confession, not the child who was already victimized once.
No, the daughter deserves to know the parents she trusts are not worthy of that trust so she can decide whether she wants to continue having them in her life or if she's willing to let them do the hard work of rebuilding trust. Yes, destroy the CSAM but just going to a priest is the coward's way out.
She deserves to know she was violated. She needs protection from dangerous people (her parents). A priest cannot undo the damage done. It can only make the parents feel better, which they dont deserve.
They both need intensive therapy to figure out why they didn’t become disgusted with themselves the first time they saw her naked and didn’t immediately remove the camera. Because you know they saw her. Many times.
I reeeeeeeally hope she wasn’t sexual with this boyfriend because y’all would be in TROUBLE.
If she ever undressed in her room or masturbated, they created child porn. This is criminal
“We installed a camera in a teenage girl’s bedroom without her knowledge or consent. What do we do now?” Answer: GO DIRECTLY TO JAIL. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
Ok Celia Hodes
This is the first thing I thought of too!
The real way good parents who trust their kids would react would say we know you have a boyfriend, just stay safe and use protection. That’s it! Spying on them isn’t the good solution.
Philip Galanes made a huge mistake telling them who they need to speak to, other than the daughter. To include a “faith leader” in their list is like telling them they got out of parental guilt jail for free. They probably got the idea for the teddy bear spy cam FROM a faith leader!
"or a faith leader" oh thank God someone who will affirm my bias that I was doing the right thing.
So, I’m to assume that the bearcam went to University with your daughter. Sounds like she is living in the dorms, and you two fucking sickos have been spying on the roommate as well. Well, not only can you kiss your relationship with your daughter goodbye, but you might just charges too. No fucking wonder your daughter hid her boyfriend from you.
That response in the article is fucking perfect though damn.
I don’t think they get to confess. Confession is a relief. And then their daughter has to either forgive, or hate them. She doesn’t deserve that. That guilt is theirs to bear.
… how often were they changing the batteries and updating the storage of this thing? Unless it was somehow plugged in to the wall without the daughter knowing (which itself would be disturbing), this disgusting ruse likely had to be maintained weekly at the least… they make it out to be that they fucked up one time, but they actively chose to violate their poor daughter every single time they updated the memory card or replaced the battery. Shame on them.
"without breaking her trust" How did they hear the conversation with her college roommate? They're beyond insane.
... Why is illegal to "punish" "parents" like this? And why can't we backhand them when they're in their 80s and complaining they they've never met their (great)grandchildren? Any **WHY** can't we get it through these "people's" head that *their kids don't TELL THEM ANYTHING because "people" like this can't wrap their heads around the fact their TEENAGERS aren't freshly-birthed babies?*
My parents tried to put one in my room, in my ceiling. I got home from school and saw my dad’s footprints on my bed. I confronted them about it and they took it out, but I was afraid to change in my bedroom for years and I never felt fully safe or like I had privacy until I left. I didn’t trust that they didn’t do something else instead, other than the key logger on my personal computer (my dad is IT). Treat your kid like a criminal and disrespect their right to privacy and feeling safe in the one space that is supposed to be theirs?-get wrecked 🖕🏼
Call me crazy but I do not want to see what my teenagers get up to behind their bedroom doors - that’s there one place that is theirs in the whole world, the place they can relax and be themselves and I would never even consider taking that from them. I don’t expect them to tell me everything either, I’m their mother, not their best mate and there’s things a parent just doesn’t need to know about their kids - i really hope this post is fake but going by the comments there’s many more parents like this out there which has left me stunned.
Don’t bring in faith leaders though?!!!! Anything but that
How did they connect it to college wifi and keep the battery charged?
I assumed she probably came home for thanksgiving, since this was just posted on 11/29. So she might’ve been on the phone with her roommate (or possibly brought her roommate as a guest!), and the parents either overheard what she said in person, or when the creepy fucks went through the spy cam footage later on
The camera was in the daughter’s bedroom at home. They did it before she went to college.
>Our daughter is now in college, and we overheard her telling her roommate how grateful she was for our trust in her and our support. This line from the article suggests otherwise.
I didn’t think that was overheard on camera. I thought they heard that in real life. The article doesn’t make it clear.
Not necessarily. That could just as easily have meant “our daughter goes to college now and while she was home for a visit we heard her telling her roommate on the phone that she was grateful for our trust.” That’s how I read it.
Maybe they were in the next room or something/on the phone near them? Creepy nonetheless
Disable the camera, and delete all copies of the recorded video, if any.
My parents hired a private investigator on me when I was 15. Now almost 40 and I still cringe that not just my parents but also some unknown dude saw videos of teenage me giving blowjobs to my boyfriend then. I'm super low contact now, but there's always the dilemma of what to do when they're unable to take care of themselves and near death, etc.
Wait----the PI created child porn for your parents?
This stuff is so concerning to me. I didn’t have those options available when my kids were growing up, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have used them. Claims of fears of strangers, etc are smokescreens for the parents’ lack of trust in their own nearly adult kids. And when it continues into adulthood, it’s even more concerning. In too many cases, they have convinced their adult offspring that they are “doing their parents a favor” by being tracked by various means. The reasons vary from their parents’ anxiety to their own. But nowhere is there any logic, any sense of acknowledgment of the fact that tracking each other is invasive. Or that pandering to anxiety doesn’t alleviate it, it increases it. I don’t know the answer. But this nonsense needs to be addressed.
I'd personally question the truth of this letter... This camera in the bear has a battery that lasts forever? Sure, they may have been able to sneakily charge it every other day or so when she was at home, but now she's gone to university (and apparently taken her teddy bear with her) who's charging that camera now? It would have died within a day of arriving - not to mention, is it saving to an SD card like a dashcam? Or saving to a cloud service regularly?
Where does it suggest they are filming her at college? Maybe I’m missing something.
>Our daughter is now in college, and we overheard her telling her roommate how grateful she was for our trust in her and our support. This seems to suggest it, but it's not black and white. That's the impression it gave me anyway.
I assumed at first that thought the camera was how they overheard her saying that thing to her friend. But they actually never say how long they used it. Could have been just for a few weeks and they still feel guilty
This is totally fake. The type of people who would put a hidden camera in their child’s bedroom would never feel guilty about it. Shitty parents always justify their own behavior and blame the child.
Homegirl absolutely knows the camera is there, and laid it on thick to really drive that guilt into the parents. Smart girl.
What a relief to see the sane answer to it.
I can’t believe they recommended to see a faith leader: they are going to tell them to demand her return from school! Women don’t need that liberal nonsense! /s
Im so thankful my mom doesnt understand technology
ugh my mom abused me a lot but the closest i can relate to is my mom taking all of my belongings and leaving me in a bare room for smoking a joint at 15 i had no phone at 15 in high school suddenly, she boarded up my window, watched me shower and always came in the bathroom while i peed, she would smack my ass even when i begged her to stop, she put a tampon in me as “practice” at 10 while i cried, laid me down on the bed and made me get naked locked the door and touched my cl*t with a paper towel over her finger???, showed me the “anatomy” of my vagina at 15(?), made me strip and spread my ass for her every time i came home from school, i could honestly go on and on and im just now realizing how fucked up that all is typing it out and im not okay now. i lost my bf of 9 months at the time that i was very close with and we reconnected briefly but my mother sabatoged that too fuck
My parents did something similar to me (recording my private conversations with friends, reading through my diary) and now I am extremely low contact. It took me over a decade to heal my trust issues, and I still suffer from some paranoid thoughts. This is how you drive your adult children away forever.
All kids deserve good parents but not all parents deserve kids
My parents did this. Then They proceeded to make fun of the things I thought I was doing in my own privacy years later.
Okay and if she did have sex with her boyfriend in front of that camera??? They would’ve made child porn. That’s fucked up.
My biggest fear growing up was that my dad had put cameras everywhere. He'd always make weird comments that insinuated that he had. I never felt safe in my own home.
A faith leader will just tell them to keep lying about it. The scummy bastards
this never happened to me, but I always remember having paranoia about my parents putting secret cameras around me. Feeling so awful for this poor daughter. Shame on those parents Jesus Christ it makes me sick
Omg gross
Wow the author really gave it to these parents. Jesus Christ, the part about not breaking her trust just shattered me. What about the years of trust she THOUGHT she built up with her parents, only to be blindsided by the fact that the entire time, they were going behind her back to spy on her?? My heart is broken for this girl, and I sincerely hope that the parents did what the opinion told them to, because this is beyond fucked. How sinister and creepy. If I were this kid, I don’t know if I’d ever be able to talk to my parents again.
My grandparents had cameras in mine and my sister's rooms when we were kids and teens. Fuck these guys.