Am I overreacting...

My 14yo niece has added her friend's dad on facebook. She swears she knows him and he's ok, and that her dad knows she has friended him... but to me it just seems inappropriate.

Here's a conversation from tonight: (first post is the usual teen angsty crap lol)

Teen girl
You dont need to think about that . I know we aint close anymore but even I know you shouldnt be thinking that way . ♥ Take care of yourself!!

Friend's father: hey u,how ya doing

Teen girl: Good thankya:) You?

Friend's father: yeah had a busy day today

Teen Girl: Thats good:)

Friend's father: u had a good day?

Friend's father: how is dad doing

Teen Girl: Yeah, it was a good day , studied mainly. Hes good:)

Friend's father: oh ok good girls studying,so was darrell,he has a big test this week!!

Friend's father: well i will leave you to it,take care.x.

Friend's father: be good,keep up the good work

Teen Girl: Okay:) You too!

Friend's father: night.x.

Teen Girl: Niiight:)

Friend's father: bye:)

I may well be seeing things which aren't there, but he just seems to be the first to answer her posts a little too often... to me it feels creepy.

Second opinions?

Hi Jenna,

you obviously have access to the posts so can keep an eye on them.

In my opinion there is nothing creepy in there.

My first thought was - what kind of relationship does this girl have to her own father? I remember myself at that age and I had a better relationship to my best friend's father than to my own and got some really good advice from him, some of which is still useful today. He gave me late night rides home, too, because my own father disapproved of me going to parties so did not provide a ride and forbade my mum to give me a ride. This man was the only person who enabled me to get a taste of teenage life, together with his daughter.

Even now, decades later, there is nothing creepy that I associate with him. I know, it's always better to be careful, but most men I have talked to about this issue say things like they don't even feel comfortable intervening when a child is being bullied at the playground when the parent is not there to help because of the possibility of being branded 'dirty'.

If it was a friend's mother would you feel differently? I can't see anything bad in there, just because someone is male doesn't mean they are automatically up to something bad.

I have something similar with my boys - a friend's mother talks to them as if she were a teenager herself. That crosses a boundary that I don't think the above conversation does. The above seems very matter of fact, and innocent. And of course all their comments are public, and you can keep an eye on it if you are worried.

Could go either way depending on other factors. By having 'spectator' status to the goings on you are in a valuable place to monitor what is going on and by posting the odd comment the other parties will be aware that they are being watched.

Be aware though that Facebook does now have a selection of levels (i.e puplic, friends, ?) that the poster nominates it viewable by, so if the conversation discontinues or seems disjointed from time to time consider the possibility that you can be cut out of the chat if either party chooses to do so

Can you see the times the posts are made? This could tell you if he was sitting there waiting to respond or just at the computer and responded each time chat popped up.
In my mind the conversation does not seem to be leading anywhere, it seems to be the normal random responses to a live chat.

Is your niece's friend on there also? If not, could some of the conversations be on her/his behalf (or with her/him via the dad's account).

I am 'friends' with a couple of my son's friends, but only because I won't let my son have a Facebook account, and any conversations I have with them are with my son standing there and telling me what to write! Having seen some of mindless postings and swear words my son's friends write on a public forum (they are 14 - and what I would describe as nice, respectful boys in 'real' life) has reinforced the decision not to let him have an account until he is mature enough to watch what he says in public.

In another context, eg mother to friend's daughter, the conversation posted seems harmless in itself. The situation as a whole obviously has made you uneasy, so worth monitoring for your peace of mind.

Hi Jenna

I don't feel you have anything to worry about. This day in age, with the amount of social networking, and how easy it is to get in contact with anyone you want, the type of talking people do has changed a lot. It's a lot easier to talk with people on the computer then it is to talk in real life, IE with your own parents/friends/partner etc etc. So, I wouldn't want to make her feel uneasy about you seeing these things until you have proof that there's something sinister going on.

If it's a daily thing, every evening etc etc and that's all she seems to do on the computer, then maybe keep a closer eye on it and have a chat to her about it, and try not to make it to obvious if you are feeling worried

Thanks for your responses everyone. I'm still a bit concerned by a few things that ring little alarm bells so I'll keep an eye out but not panic at this stage

Sounds very sensible, Jenna. It may well be innocent, but it was the x and the signoffs that got my antenna twitching ever so slightly. So easy for things to be misunderstood at that age.
Cheers, Mich.

I'm niggly with it but as with the others, keep a quiet eye on what is going on. I remember only too clearly a young girl that had a crush on my ex and displayed inappropriate behaviour but he was really uncomfortable about the whole thing.

I just don't get why an adult male is communicating with a young girl on the Net but then, we don't know the background relationship and whether this is appropriate or not.

I can't see anything inappropriate about that conversation, but you are the person on scene and I think it is very important for you to trust your instincts. There is a reason people have them, and if your 'lizard brain' is still sending of danger signals despite you rational brain trying to shout it down, well, there's probably a reason. All we're seeing is the text on the page, you know the people involved and have a lot more to base your judgement on.

Ah the joy of 14 yo's and facebook.... my recent experiences have seen me remove my 14 yo niece from both my and my daughter's FB page due to inappropriate conversation. The first time was with a university student who was her ''friend'' and the conversation went very quickly in talking about removing her underpants etc and she was leading him on. I posted on her wall to one of his replies that I would involve the police for their state and did he know he was talking to a 14yo. The reply i got was of sheer surprise and then all the posts disappeared. i don't know how she managed that or if another aunt had taken action too.

I emailed her Mother directly and didn't receive a reply...

roll on to friend no. 2 and this time its language and where that was leading. In the end I thought well if the mother can't respond to my earlier email, I am not watching this so deleted 14 yo. I have snuck back a couple of times via the father's account and its a lot more moderate (for now).

I consider myself a pretty open minded person and if this had been one of my female friends I wouldn't have cared, good luck to them, but for my 14yo niece, no way, not acceptable to me.

So in saying that I can understand the alarm bells but I thought the postings were ok at this stage. Just keep an eye on them and please keep in mind the written word (as we have seen with posts on this forum) can be taken in many different ways. If you think things are getting grim, step in and say hey!!!

Jenna, I agree with Mich. It may be perfectly harmless but it does seem a little odd for him to be signing off with kisses to a girl who's not his daughter, and also the 3 posts in a row are a bit odd because the 2nd one is clearly a sign-off, but having got no response it's like he feels he has to say something else to elicit a goodbye. It might be easier to assess if the time between posts was visible (for instance if his 2nd and 3rd posts were right on top of each other that would seem less calculated). As others have said, trust your instincts and keep an eye on the situation.

Yep, I'd be keeping a close eye on it too. There are several things about it that I don't like. One is that HE started the conversation, if she'd started it and he was just politely replying that would be one thing but why on earth would an older adult male be starting chats with teens?? Like Didi, I totally don't get that. IMHO the only reason an older adult would be chatting to teens on i/net whether male or female would be if they were relatives or to offer some sort of specific information such as for a school project etc. The other thing is the x's, seems totally over the top to me. Sure it may be totally innocent, but I think it is unusual, and no doubt that is what got you questioning it in your mind in the first place.

I have a couple of alarm bells going off but only faintly atm. I agree with the 'trust your instincts advice'

I wonder if he is new to computers and the Net? I have come across a few (and there are fewer and fewer of them these days [:0]) who are new to the whole thing and haven't grasped the nuances of it yet. So he might be just replying to the FB post without realizing it was not directed specifically at him. And, also why he is looking for answers to his posts lol, not realizing just how rude and abrupt internet communication can seem to be.