All you need to know about the message boards

Trigger warning – This section contains information about self-harm and suicide which may bring up difficult feelings

Lots of young people use the boards to help them cope. It’s okay to talk about self-harm, running away or feeling suicidal, but we might not be able to accept your post if it:

• Encourages people to self-harm, hurt themselves or run away
  It’s important that the boards are safe for everyone, so we can’t accept posts that say self-harm, suicide or running away is the right choice. We also can’t accept your post if it talks about self-harm as a coping method, as this might encourage others to do it.
• Gives ideas about how to hide things like self-harm
  It’s okay to talk about covering up old scars, or if you’re worried about someone finding out about your self-harm. But it’s against the rules to give ideas to hide self-harm from other people, as this could make some people more unsafe.
• Has graphic descriptions or ways of hurting yourself
  We’re not able to allow posts on the boards if they include details of how to hurt yourself, or if they go into a lot of detail about wounds, injuries or how you’ve been hurt.
• Might make people feel like they have to keep you safe
  It’s okay to post about feeling suicidal or if you’re having suicidal thoughts, but if you’re worried that you’ll hurt yourself right now or you’re planning on doing something then it’s better to talk to a Childline counsellor instead. Remember that you can always call 999 when you need help right away or you feel unsafe.

We always want to accept your post if we can. Sometimes we might need to take out a few words or a sentence if it breaks our house rules, but if we do we’ll always send a message to your Childline account you to let you know. And we’ll try to make sure that we don’t change the meaning of what you’ve said.

If you post something that makes us think you’re unsafe, we might also contact you on your Childline account to offer you support. Childline is confidential, but we might need to tell someone else if:

• you ask us to
• we believe your life or someone else's life is in danger
• you're being hurt by someone in a position of trust who is able to hurt other children like a teacher, religious leader, sports coach, police officer or doctor
• you tell us that you're seriously hurting another person
• you tell us about another child who's being hurt and is not able to tell someone or understand what is happening to them
• we're told we have to by law, for example for a court case.

Find out more about Childline’s confidentiality promise.

Replies on threads that are more than a year old won’t always be allowed. This is because they can push newer threads down.

For some young people, things may have changed a lot since they first posted so having newer replies can bring up difficult feelings.

Trigger warning – This section contains information about eating disorders which may bring up difficult feelings

The boards can be a great way to talk about how you’re feeling about yourself or how you look.

Lots of young people who use Childline have an eating disorder or struggle with their eating, so there are some rules to stop people sharing unhealthy or dangerous ways of losing weight:

• No posts with calorie counts or weight targets
  Even if you think your target is healthy, it can make people feel competitive and encourage people to diet in unhealthy ways.
• Don’t talk about ways to hide food or lie about weight
  It’s okay to say if you’ve been hiding an eating disorder or you’re struggling to get help, but anything that might encourage people to hide an eating disorder is against the house rules.
• Only talk about healthy ways to diet or lose weight
  Posts that encourage unhealthy ways of losing weight, or encourages eating disorders aren’t allowed on the boards. But you can talk to a Childline counsellor about them if you need support.

Talking about how you look

Lots of young people use the boards to post about their bodies or when they don’t feel ‘normal’, and it’s always okay to talk about this.

There are some rare times that we might not be able to accept posts when you’re comparing body shapes, parts or sizes, but we’ll always contact you to explain why.

It’s okay to swear on the boards. But it’s important to be respectful to other young people and to people at Childline.

We might not accept your post if you:

• Swear at someone on the boards, or call them a name
• Reply to someone and call them names or insult them
• Use words that lots of people find very offensive
• Type in all caps, as this can be seen as shouting
• Put pressure on other young people to reply or call out other young people

There will always be times when you disagree with other people on the boards, and it’s okay to say if you don’t agree as long as you’re not insulting people.

If someone’s upset you on the boards, it can help to talk about it. You could reply to the person to say how you’re feeling, or talk to a Childline counsellor about what’s happening.

It’s against the rules to ask people to reply to other people asking them to comment on your post. This is to stop people replying on lots of posts to advertise theirs.

If you want support for yourself, it’s always better to start a new thread.

The boards can be a great place to ask about sex and relationships. You can ask other young people about anything that might be on your mind.

We might not be able to accept your post if you:

• Give dangerous or wrong information about sexual health, consent or contraception
• Post over and over with similar questions about sex
• Ask for detailed methods on how to masturbate or use sex toys
• You’re replying to a younger message board user with advice that might not be suitable for them

If you can’t post on the boards, there are still lots of ways to get support:

• Talking to a Childline counsellor
• Reading letters to Ask Sam
• Find advice on masturbation from Brook

We know that it can be important to share details of what’s happened to help explain things, and it’s okay to go into detail when you need to. To protect other young people, there might be times that we’re not able to accept posts that have talk in detail about sexual acts or activities, but we’ll always contact you to explain this.

Even if you’re not able to post something on the boards, you can talk to a Childline counsellor about anything.

It’s okay to share your opinions on whether someone might be ill or have a mental health condition. And it’s okay to say if you think someone should speak to someone like a doctor or school nurse. But specific medical advice isn’t usually allowed.

Your post might not be accepted if you:

• tell someone they definitely have an illness, or you diagnose them
• give medical advice that might not always be safe, like taking medication
• try to encourage people to stop taking prescribed medication, or go against a doctor’s advice.

The reason we don’t always allow medical advice is that even if something is safe for one person, it might not always be safe for other people.

To help keep everyone anonymous on the boards, we have a few rules about what you can and can’t share about yourself.

Your post might not be accepted if you:

• Share links to your social media, email or any other way to contact you off the boards
• Tell people where you live
• Give your date of birth, or tell people when your birthday is and how old you are – For example, you can’t tell people that it’s your birthday on 1st September and that you’re 14
• Share details of events you’re going to
• Give lots of information about yourself, like the names of your friends, family and pets

If your nickname is used on social media, it also might not be accepted even if it’s not your social media account. Don’t worry though, you’ll still be able to post on the boards with a temporary nickname and you can change it any time here.

Sharing links and apps

We need to be careful about which links are allowed on the boards. Some social media sites and websites can’t be accepted because they’re not suitable for everyone on the boards or are unsafe.

We’re also not able to accept links to websites or apps that we haven’t checked. It’s okay to mention their name, but the link may not be accepted.

We can’t accept direct links to videos on social media.

It's okay to ask others about themselves on the boards, especially when you’re trying to get to know people.

Childline might also post surveys and questionnaires sometimes to get your opinions. But we're not able to accept formal questionnaires or research from other people. This is because we need to make sure we know where the results and answers might be used.

Even if a post isn’t against the rules, we might not be able to accept it if it would put you or other young people at risk.

We might not be able to accept a post if we’re worried that it’s:

• Being dishonest or giving wrong information
• Sharing fake news or trying to make people believe a lie
• Trying to hurt other people on the boards
• Sharing something you’ve done that’s illegal, or encouraging other people to break the law
• Breaking copyright – It’s okay to post quotes, but we can’t accept large parts of songs, poems or stories

If a post is rejected, we’ll always contact you on your Childline account to explain why.

Posts in other languages

We can only accept posts in English, or with phrases in other languages that most people will understand. This is because the people who check the messages can only speak English, and we need to make sure we can keep everyone safe.

If you’d rather speak Welsh, you can still speak to a Childline counsellor.