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MySpace Age Verification - for Parents
unlametheweak writes "North Carolina is thinking of the children by passing a law requiring parents to verify they are parents before letting their children onto social networking sites. Notwithstanding the whole concept of an Internet ID for people in general; children are now being tracked by cellular phones with GPS, spied upon with Parent Controls (MS Vista has built-in parental spyware), and also strategically placed Nanny Cams, keyboard loggers, etc. 'Few of the proposals we've seen so far seem like good ways to [protect children], but North Carolina's approach at least has the virtue of novelty--unlike most video game legislation, which relies on similar rhetoric but has been almost universally struck down by the courts, sometimes at great cost to the states.' Is the zoo-like Minority Report world in which children are growing up in today doing more harm than good? How will this affect a 14 year old, much less a 17 year old "child"?"
1) Jailbait
2) Pedophile
Won't somebody think of the children?
When will people learn that spying on your children is not a replacement for good parenting? The fact that there's actually a demand for this sort of thing is depressing.
yeah i remember what everyone was looking for at 14-15.
Luke, I am your father.
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
What planet are people on that they think the average 17 year old needs protecting?
You either remember being 17 or you had no life worth protecting.
As someone who just moved to NC I can say this is a very messed up state.
NC does not let you put your significant other on any of your insurance if you aren't getting married within a few month time window. Why? Because it's a sin! Been in many other states and none had issues with this.
Want to get a NC drivers license to replace your out of state be prepared to:
Bring your old license
Your SS card
Birth certificate
Car insurance (how many catch 22's does this bring up)
Take a road sign test
Take the written test
Oh if you have a middle name you need a document to show the FULL middle name. Yes this means if you have a birth certificate, passport, and drivers license and none of them have your full middle they will deny you.
I could go on and on, but NC is messed up. I'm sure myspace would sue over that law. Wonder what the cost would be to verify A)someone is an adult B)someone is the guardian of that kid C) the kid who A + B verified is the one signing up.
Oh an NC makes panhandlers get a license to panhandle. They tax the people who beg for money. Go NC!
or maybe people should think of new, innovative ways to tackle the problem. Like raising their kids properly. Don't look down on them and teach them to deal with the problems that come with a phenomenon like the internet. And while we're at it, maybe people can start tackling one of those other new phenomenons that seems to have adults in an panic lately: sex
And yes, that might mean you have to spend some time on parenting instead of on your career, but that's the choice you made by having kids in the first place...
As soon as a kid shoots up a school, people ask "Where were the parents? Why didn't they see the problem?" We're very quick to point the finger at parents when something goes wrong. And then I see posts like this asserting that parents shouldn't be able to monitor their childrens' activities.
Fifty years ago, parents didn't have to watch so closely. There was far less media coming into the home, and what was available was far easier to monitor (and far more regulated, as it was all under the watchful eye of the FCC).
Now, we've got the internet. We've got a half-dozen game consoles. We've got cable and satellite television, dirt-cheap movies and music available for purchase, and a barrage of information everywhere we look. For parents to keep the same level of attention on what their kids are doing, they have to use tools like "spyware" (you know, software that lets them know what THEIR computers are being used for) to keep track of their kids and look for dangerous behavior.
I've got to say, though, that I object to nanny cams unless there is a very specific reason to have one. If you smell pot in your living room, maybe it's a good time to put in a camera to see if your kid is using illegal drugs. But putting up a camera *just in case* is paranoid.
Parents have to monitor their kids. Every generation has done so in some fashion. So long as kids know the rules, know they are being watched, then there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. I wouldn't let my kids go certain places in the city without me being around because it's risky for them; the same goes for the internet.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
...parents have every right, responsibility even, to monitor their children's actions/behavior. That's not to say that it should be 24/7, but the summary's implicit suggestion that "spying" on children is inappropriate displays a vast ignorance of/indifference to responsible parenting.
As Ronald Reagan said, "trust, but verify". There is nothing wrong with knowing what your child is doing on a home computer. There is nothing wrong with knowing where your child is. A child doesn't have the right to conceal their activities/whereabouts from his/her parents.
Again, I think legislative efforts like this have it all wrong. I just object to the summary's use of "spying" as applied to what I call "responsible parenting."
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Once they are desensitized to the idea of not having privacy, it will get easier to get them to conform to whatever the people in power want.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
Commodore64_love: I don't comprehend people who're so frightened of death that they'll bankrupt themselves to stay alive
I guess parents will have to go down to the their office. That's the only way to know for sure. Kids can steal credit cards.
and to provide for penalties; to make it a felony for a registered sex offender to access a commercial social networking web site;
How the hell are they going to enforce that until after the fact.
to increase the penalty for certain offenses of solicitation of A child by computer to commit an unlawful sex act;
Yeah whatever.
and to make it a felony to lie to a sworn SBI agent conducting
I can just see it now, some predator online actually saying, "I'm a sexual predator. I have to tell the truth. I'm really 45, fat, ugly, and I actually think some 15 year old girl or boy will see me and say, "Oh, baby! Give it to me! I just love beer bellies!'"
I prefer Flambe as apposed flamebait.
Ban on name changes by sex offenders.
... Or maybe Hack our Kids' brains'... I got it... How about government sponsored Parenting Classes that teach parents how to get involved with their kids' lives...
Funny how politicians will throw anything into the political arena during crunch time (races...). Just how do they propose to keep track of "name changes" from a sex offender. For starters they can't even maintain their own equipment, can't secure the FBI infrastructure, a company for MySpace is already reporting false positives.... Should we wait for the FBI's new and improved Carnivore?
Infiltrated dot Net
You're 17?
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Perhaps when this generation has grown up, they will be determined not to "become" like their parents, by rejecting invasive spying, and encouraging trust and responsibility. Or perhaps the opposite may come true, since they won't know what trust is, they won't ever be able to trust anyone else, and simply perpetuate their own parinoia onto the next generation.
and today is one of those days.
We have the most brain-dead General Assembly in the world. This lot couldn't pour
piss out of a boot if the instructions were stamped on the heel.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
Vista has parental controls to control access to specific accounts at specific times, etc. This gets twisted in TFS to say that Vista has parental "spyware". Nice FUD.
There is now a small, but growing movement within the psychological profession to abolish the concept of adolescence. All I can say is, IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME! Teenagers are not children. They are physically closer to adults both in terms of their physical/sexual maturity and the ability of their brains to function. In other words, a 14 year old is physically capable both in their brain and the rest of their body of assuming a position as a young, but real, adult in modern society. We just don't let them do it!
Our ancestors knew this. That is why even the advanced societies of the classical age regarded teenagers as adults, rather than as children. Even our own legal system on some level recognizes that teens are capable of functioning identically to adults because it allows them to be tried as such in violent crimes cases.
to spy on a 17-year old in this manner is basically giving them a day-by-day countdown until they're rid of you, at which point they will have good reason to rebel and unfortunately maybe go a bit too wild. Anyone who's ever seen the first 2 weeks at a freshman dorm at say, 1 am, after the 30-kegger's get going, knows what happens to kids like this.
stuff |
I mean you can still create a fake profile, right? So you can lie about your age and no one will know the wiser? Do they just not understand how this works?
Come the revolution, the Bourgeois, Capitalistic, "A PARKING STICKER HOLDERS", will be first against the wall!
It's a good thing we log everything you post to Slashdot, because your attitude is unacceptable. Just wait until your father CtlGrendel gets home, then your backside will learn what it's like to be "desensitezed to the idea of not having piracy". your mother DelGrendel.
Is the zoo-like Minority Report world in which children are growing up in today doing more harm than good?
They have to get used to being spied upon so that they can find ways to cheat early enough.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Parents are beginning to use the net, as well as games, for a babysitting device and with the time kids spend on the net, the more options they'll discover. Though they feel that changes to myspace can help lock down the reigns on their children, there are 200 other sites that they can be targeted on. If they're on the internet, they will be chased down in some way, shape or form.
If you have a hungry fox trying to get in a chicken coup, you can only fence it up so much to keep the chicken OUT. From that point on, you've got to take care of the predator.
Stronger laws must be enforced, more effective measure have to be taken care of and heavier penalties must insue. If you put a proven online pedofile away for 40 years on any charge, you'll definitely start warding them off... especially with the use of decoy children at hand.
This shit was going on WAY before myspace in yahoo, msn and aol chat rooms. Not only that, but that was the only thing it was used for, by THOUSANDS of sick bastards looking for kids. You don't hear many incidents at all about those cases because internet crime was not as popular.
Locking down myspace is like sending your child to the down by themselves, but only accompanying them when the go into ONE specific bar.
"Please, shut up. Just when I think you can't say anything more stupid, you speak again." -Archie Bunker.
With any luck, they will turn out like me: Aggressively opposing any kind of surveillance whatsoever, up to the point of going out of their way to sabotage any attempt to invade their privacy, since they learned just how obnoxious and belitteling that invasion can be.
The most valuable thing I have now is privacy. I had none when I was a kid and, damn, how did I want some!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
As a former high school teacher and current new parent, I actually think this is a good idea. Children (and yes, HS kids are STILL children, emotionally, cognitively and in every other way that matters) are not small adults. Kids have poor impulse control, they don't consider consequences before acting, and they do not have the same rights as adults in the eyes of the law. Parents have a right and responsibility to know what their children are doing both on and off line. This is not spying, its Myspace actually acting responsibly and verifying that a child has the permission of a parent to use the site's services. The same as a school requiring a permission slip for a field trip (forged signatures aside) The parent is morally and legally liable for the actions of minors under their care. It should be up to the parent to decide how much responsibility, freedom, etc. is given to a kid. How a parent uses that technology: eg. to spy on the child, or as an incentive for positive behavior is up to them. North Carolina is simply giving parents the tools to be responsible for their children's activity on line. This isn't even that ground breaking, its the same standard that was applied under federal law to kids 0-13 under COPPA.
There is nothing on the internet that my kid needs protection from. I worry if he's taken the bicycle out in traffic or something like that but being on the internet? Yes, he can discover a lot of weird stuff but that's actually a good thing, contrary to popular fear mongering... won't someone think of the children! I do... I want him to explore the world on the internet.
While "spying on your children" is not a replacement for good parenting, what's wrong with spying on your children in /addition/ to good parenting?
/not/ use technology to help me keep tabs on what my child is doing? It's called being /involved/, and I consider that /good/ parenting.
It's my computer, my internet, and my house. I have every right to know what my child is doing on my computer, using my internet, in my house.
Why
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Give children choices that in some way affect their lives. Tell them the alternatives, and ask what they prefer. Preferably before they are 16-18.
This will:
- force them to think about who they are, what the world around them is like, what they prefer, and how their choices influence their life
- avoid them developing the feeling of 'drifting along' on the motorized pavement of life before they are suddenly let go, incidentally where everything is so carefully managed that the only way to get some excitement is to seek it out
I seem to remember a survey of school children quoted in 'Freakonomics', where children offered the children offered a chance to apply for 'better' schools and got in improved their academic results, but so did those who could apply but failed to get in.
When my child is old enough to use the computer, my instructions will be simple:
You may use this computer in any manner you like. There will be no attempts to block or filter content.
But I will be monitoring everything you do with it.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
When I was a young teen I was banned from BBS's and the internet due to all the predators that were supposedly lurking online. My computer was placed in a central area of the house where my parents could easily check up on my actions and occasionally monitor my activity. The computer was locked (internally, 286 AT case) which I learned how to disconnect. This turned me into a sneaky, paranoid kid who constantly had to look out the window and over his shoulder to make sure his parents weren't around while he furthered his knowledge in programming and music creation, while learning more about the world around him. Even worse, I almost had a close encounter with a real predator but fortunately for my quick wits I was able to deal with the situation before it reached a dangerous level and my parents never found out about it - because I was afraid they'd find out I'd been using BBS's and the internet, and would be punished.
How will this affect a 14 year old, much less a 17 year old "child"
Not too well:
1) It will create people that are used to being spied on. When they grow up and more spying comes along, they will accept it without blinking an eye.
or
2) It will backfire. When they become teenagers, they will want to strongly oppose all kinds of authority just for the sake of opposing authority. When done by a large number of irresponsible people, that could do more harm than good, and result in further spying.
or
3) It will create irresponsible people. They will grow up, suddenly lose the overreaching parental control, and go wild. Suddenly, all that was controlled and forbidden becomes accessible - so let's get/do it! Without a parent to guide them, these young people will not have developed their own judgement for acceptable behavior. They will cause problems, and the natural reaction to society will be to impose spying further into adulthood, in order to prevent (in reality - delay) this outbreak.
Pick whichever you like, but one thing is certain: spying always leads to more spying. I think parents should be there for their children but also let them get into trouble a little - it's usually fine while they are young and that's the only way they'll learn.
Rational, responsible and wealthy parents would never smoke weed but drinking alcohol where there's a higher chance they'll injure themselves or others is fine.
Pathetic!
Amen, brother, same here.
It's a good thing Luke's parents didn't let him have a MySpace page, otherwise his father might have found him with one Google search, and essentially ended the series right there.
I've raised three kids who now range in age from 24 to 31.
I'm not and never have been my child's peer or friend - I'm a parent and the relationship between me and my child is and always will be asymmetrical.
As a parent I reserved the right to investigate any aspect of my child's life when I had reason to believe that the child was at risk - and investigations into my child's sexual activity or drug or alcohol or internet use are IMO appropriate.
Minor children have an inherent right not to be physically, sexually or emotionally abused - every other right a child has is granted by that child's legal guardian. My responsibility as a parent is to protect that child until (s)he can fend for itself.
My house, my rules. Doesn't matter if the child is fifteen or thirty-five - as long as they're under my roof I will determine what does (and does not) go on in my house. For example my imaginary twenty-five year old kid is legally able to smoke cigarettes. He's still not gonna smoke them in my house. He can pretty much come and go as he pleases - with the caveat that if you're not gonna come home that night you give Mom and Dad a call so they don't stay up worrying about whether you've wrapped your car around a tree or something. Don't know about other parents but I can't go to sleep if I have a child unaccounted for.
I trust my children and always have - that doesn't mean I didn't verify where they are (and with whom) from time to time. The internet was really only an issue with my youngest but I can and have used tools to determine what he was doing on the net and wouldn't hesitate to do so again if I had a kid in the house.
The parent poster mentions spying on your children - monitoring is not spying. My kids knew their entire lives that I might call to verify their whereabouts from time to time, check their homework, call their teachers to see how they were doing in school, occasionally check the odometer in the car and yes, even monitor their internet use. As I said in the title, trust but verify.
My children also know how much I love them. They're not peers or friends and never will be - they are my children and that relationship brings both additional benefits and additional responsibilities. Doesn't mean I don't hoist a glass with my kids or seek their counsel sometimes - they're adults now and in charge of their own destiny and even though sometimes I don't agree with their decisions but I have learned to STFU and allow my kids to grow from their own choices - good or bad.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin
The human brain learns and develops from exposure. Parents attempt to limit children's exposure to the very things they need to learn to cope with and comprehend. They are unable to understand childrens increased ability to deal with these issues because they themselves were censored as children and have trouble. Even those that get the concept are afraid of how the other parents who don't get it will react when their child shares traditionally censored material with the other children.
Parent's want to keep children as children as long as possible. To that I challenge you to find many adults who would willingly become children again. You might say ignorance is bliss but nobody willingly chooses ignorance. Childlike innocence is nothing more than ignorance and by prolonging it you are doing nothing but giving children less time to accomplish their goals and achieve their dreams. Enough with the romantic nonsense. This is the only life and the only chance your children have. If you want them to spend a greater portion in ignorance babbling nonsense and blowing bubbles for your amusement I guess that is your call. If that is what you want support bills like this and censor your children from adult material. I am going to prepare my children for adult life by helping them learn to cope with both adult and child situations as soon as possible.
Teenagers will turn out in one of those three ways regardless of whether this measure becomes generalized or not - it's just part of growing up. It's a generational cycle that has never skipped a beat since the beginning of the modern era.
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
So, how will I, an adult with no children, be able to create a myspace page? Will I have to register with myspace and show ID? Isn't this overly burdensome? What if I want to create an anonymous myspace or social networking page? This b.s. is totally unconstitutional and will be struck down, since there are less detrimental alternative means to keeping children off of social networking sites without parental permission, such as asking for verification, as is the case now.
Obviously, this story is fake. But imagine it being true. How would banning people from social websites evade this? Using techniques like tor, proxies etc, one would be able to get on those sites no matter what.
I'm using communities since I was 10 years old. If I would have been banned from those back then, I would have not been interested in PC's at all (that wasn't a question). If my parents would spy me like hell, I just wouldn't dare to go on the internet.
In fact, my parents don't spy me at all (believe me, a kid knows). I try to be open, so that they won't continuously ask me about what I am doing at the moment. If I show them that I am doing "useful" stuff (read: stuff for school), they won't bother asking. If they would spy me, they would get the very same results as just asking what I am doing. Spying is useless.
Now, the banning kids from the internet idea: nonsense. Yes, some moderation could be useful. But... this form, like mentioned earlier, can be evaded. Maybe kids can't easily figure out. But once one of them can, they'll tell the rest. It'll only slow things down. Need contacts? There'll be a site made outside of the system. Kids will find it.
The system won't do what it's supposed to do. Sites within it can only suffer from it and will try to stay outside of it. I personally won't join a system for which I have to verify my age. Ever. Ok, unless it's for things like, applying for a job. But that's not the thing we're talking about.
Good parenting is not about making the government do stuff for you. The whole point of parenting is that it is individual. Bringing children to a day nursery is not parenting. In the best case scenario, it's putting off parenting. Letting children having to verify parental supervision means closing the internet for those who are the future.
The poster has his own "think of the children" problem. "Poor kids are tracked a million ways and have no privacy today, boo hoo."
Today kids have all kinds of freedom compared to yesterday in a small neighborhood where every adult knew them and both wouldn't get in trouble for disciplining a fellow townsperson's child themselves, and would phone the parent and say "you know what you kid did" when the result would be some very unwanted punishment. Today's parents want to be their children's friends and don't dish out discipline. Kids know it and aren't afraid of misbehaving, tracking or not.
The odds of your kids finding a sexual predator on MySpace are vastly less than them finding one in their own circle of family and friends...The younger the child, the higher the odds that any sex crime against them will be perpetrated by a family member or a close family friend, and at NO POINT do assaults by anonymous strangers become more common than assaults by acquaintances.
So saying, "ZOMG MySpace is rife with sex predators!" is essentially meaningless; they're no more prevalent there than anywhere else. People love to cling to the illusion that the bad people of the world are all faceless evil people lurking ion the shadows, and it's just not true. But the media is pushing the idea, and parents are eating it up.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I'll go out on a limb and predict that the false positives will eventually get Sentinel sued out of business.
MySpace has a little protection by outsourcing, but I'm guessing we'll see a few richer lawyers when all is said and done.
Tomarrow: Think of the citizens
If you are about to mod me down, keep in mind that this post was most likely sarcastic.
Either ban it or criminalize it or shut the fuck up already.
Yes, eleventy 3 billion trillion% of everyone on the internet is a high on crack hardon in one hand mouse in the other child rapist with his evil sites on your virgin sons and daughters. Clearly we need to criminalize everyone's access to everything and ban the use of the internet forever. By everyone. Everywhere. For the children.
All of this crap is political grandstanding for the soccermoms, the security dads and the other assholes who think that being a paranoid insane repressive asshole is possibly the best thing since the invention of the wheel.
I give up - let's devote every last dollar and every last functioning brain synapse in America to the final solution of the massive torrent of billions of child sexual assaults and murders now occurring every second, everywhere. Simultaneously.
The government is notoriously inept at stuff like this, and I can't help thinking any attempt that is made will end in failure...They just don't understand the system. They think making the parents sign in is going to change something, but the reality is that only a tiny percentage of parents will want to do this; after the 20th time they get dragged away from the TV to enter their password so their kid can blog about their new hairclip, they're going to click "Remember Password", and that'll be the end of it.
Or kids will sign up for accounts as 18 year olds and make the whole issue worse.
When it comes right down to it there is no substitute for knowing what your kids are doing. Sure, keep an eye on 'em, but don't pull some sneaky, underhanded crap, because then you turn it into a contest; your ability to spy vs their ability to evade, and they'll probably have more time and motivation than you do, which puts you at a serious disadvantage.
As long as you show an interest, and can keep your cool and not lose your fricking mind when they deviate from what you would wish that they would do, they'll keep you informed. But if you make them feel like they can't trust you to know about their lives without trying to completely control their lives, they'll lie to you, and they'll lie to you specifically about the stuff you'll most need to know about.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
You got to shoot guns and play with chainsaws in your living room? Cool!
Man, you really need that seminar!
But the internet is a whole new problem. Parents that stick a computer in their hands with no supervision is like giving kids their own personal vehicle to go anywhere they want and do anything they want. Parents wouldn't do it in the real world and the virtual world shouldn't be any different.
Except they also got a device which instantly transports them back to your home whenever they're in harm's reach. It's called closing the dmn computer. There is a distinction between communicating everywhere and being anywhere.
What this bill is attempting to accomplish (others have already pointed out the loopholes, so I won't bother), is to make it so that a kid can't set up a myspace profile without his parents' knowledge.
This is not spying, this is just giving the parents a chance to sit down with the kid, before he sets up his profile, and have a talk about how to be safe online.
When you look at it that way, it almost starts to sound like "good parenting", hmm?
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
Children have parents for thoughts, protections, and random governance. Legislators like to target children because as a voting block, none of them (0%) of them vote along with 67% of their parents who can't be bothered with something so archaic as voting. Some quick math reveals that only 33% of the country's population is interested enough in our policies to vote. Assuming there are two sides to every policy (for and against), legislators know they only have to appeal to 16% of the freaky people motivated enough to vote :)
Of course we don't need one of those fancy schmancy computers to type our homework. We can use a Dactylograph or Writetyper or whatever those things were that our Grandparents used to do word processing on before they had electricity and computers.
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
I grew up with completely unfettered, unmonitored internet usage from 11 years onward. The only thing my parents ever told me was "There are a bunch of freaks on the internet, just like in real life. Be careful." Neither of them understood the intricacies of the internet or computers in general well enough to monitor what I was doing or keep tabs on me. Hell, I was the one who maintained the internet connection and computers.
Yes, I downloaded porn - terabytes of it. Yes, I used the internet to look up everything I wasn't supposed to know about. But you know what? I wasn't a complete fucking moron. I knew better than to tell random strangers information about myself. I had a few online friends who I carefully observed and tested before slowly sharing details about myself as I verified that they were safe.
Teach your kids not to be dumb asses, and then let them go and not be dumb asses. It's a remarkably effective parenting strategy I hope to pass on to my children someday.
God, I downloaded so much fucking porn...
For the whole world up to the 19th century (or 18th, I'm not sure now), and for part of it still today, there were two, and only two, ages for a person: childhood and adulthood. No middle ground. The precise age varied, but usually a male human was a "boy" until his 13th anniversary, and a "man" afterwards (12th anniversary for females). Did it work? Yes, it did. Marvelously. Faced with adult problems, the "children" of the time matured at an incredibly fast pace.
There were no reasons for things to change, except one: if you accept the invented concept of a middle ground, the so called "adolescence", you are suddenly faced with the "problem" of young adults wanting to act as, well, adults. And how do you "solve" it? Hell, by asking for government regulation, of course! Politicians, who are mad but not dumb, jumped in the bandwagon and devised all sorts of regulation to be applied to "adolescents". After all, why not? More laws always means more power.
The only solution for this kind of BS would be for a complete dismissal of the whole concept. But neither people nor politicians are able to think that much out-of-the-box. For the decades and maybe centuries following us, "adolescence" will still be seen as obviously existing, as will laws regulating it be seen as obviously needed. For a long, long time, those disagreeing with this will be only a minority.
On a side note: the same can be said regarding marriage. For most of human century it wasn't a legal matter. No government had anything to say on it. But this also changed in the 19th century, when some people began demanding for relationships to be regulated. And now we must deal with all the problems resulting from this desire. If the whole idea of civil marriage were dismissed, where would the discussion on the prohibition of polygamy (think Mormons in Utah and Muslims immigrants) be? Where would the recent same-sex marriage discussions be? Nowhere. "Marriage" would remain a purely religious concept, completely ignored by secular governments, who would simply see people living together and sharing property without any interest whatsoever on what they were doing between themselves and in relation to said property. No legal discussion would exist for lack of substance.
But go talk to anyone involved in these disputes that they (all sides: heterosexual monogamous, homosexual monogamous, polygamous etc.!) shouldn't be asking for more government interference in matters of interpersonal relationships, but for less of it, for the elimination of all or almost all laws defining and regulating marriage, and see what happens. Almost no one gets it. Marriage as a legal matter is here to stay, as much as "adolescence".
Those who know better? Their only option is to endure the whole madness. Sad, but true...
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
Maturity is a social construct, not a biological one; Joan of Arc was 17 when she led the French to victory against the English. The longer we treat our adolescents as children, the longer they will act like children. It is only when they make decisions for themselves that they will mature into adults. You cannot keep people "innocent" and ignorant forever.
We have computers and monkeys that can simulate adult humans already, so I doubt a teen will have any difficulty in "authenticating" they are a parent.
Example: What profession did everyone want to be when you were 10 (born in 1960) - Astronaut.
Anyone can look these up.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
> Is the zoo-like Minority Report world in which children are growing up in today doing more harm than good?
/. articles. If that were in a reply, at least it could be modded as flamebait, if not troll.
It's definitely harmful to them to have to read such hysterical FUD as that sentence. For that reason, they should not be allowed to read
Children are, for the most part, smart enough to know what to ignore. It's adults playing power games who use children in their arguments for reasons that really have nothing to do with children, and everything to do with not having faith in their ability to make their point without appeal to emotion.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
All this really means is democracy is a failed experiment, in a free society you would be free to scrape your knees or not what we have now is the future we have seen it and it is worse than anything we could have ever imagined.
Let's just give you guys a situation.
This message is written by a 15 year old boy (btw, i'm looking for paedophiles. Any friends of Jack around?). Obviously, I'm getting asked by old men to come by daily. And obviously, I have the time and freedom of my parents to do so. I'm watching porn daily, and show random people on the internet my dick. My parents are at work 24/7. They do care about my life, so they installed a spy program on my own PC. Thus, I'm writing this message via my dad's. That'll give me access to his credit cards as well. I'm looking for certain sexy friends, please respond if you're interested in my service.
Obviously, this story is fake. But imagine it being true. How would banning people from social websites evade this? Using techniques like tor, proxies etc, one would be able to get on those sites no matter what.
I'm using communities since I was 10 years old. If I would have been banned from those back then, I would have not been interested in PC's at all (that wasn't a question). If my parents would spy me like hell, I just wouldn't dare to go on the internet.
In fact, my parents don't spy me at all (believe me, a kid knows). I try to be open, so that they won't continuously ask me about what I am doing at the moment. If I show them that I am doing "useful" stuff (read: stuff for school), they won't bother asking. If they would spy me, they would get the very same results as just asking what I am doing. Spying is useless.
Now, the banning kids from the internet idea: nonsense. Yes, some moderation could be useful. But... this form, like mentioned earlier, can be evaded. Maybe kids can't easily figure out. But once one of them can, they'll tell the rest. It'll only slow things down. Need contacts? There'll be a site made outside of the system. Kids will find it.
The system won't do what it's supposed to do. Sites within it can only suffer from it and will try to stay outside of it. I personally won't join a system for which I have to verify my age. Ever. Ok, unless it's for things like, applying for a job. But that's not the thing we're talking about.
Good parenting is not about making the government do stuff for you. The whole point of parenting is that it is individual. Bringing children to a day nursery is not parenting. In the best case scenario, it's putting off parenting. Letting children having to verify parental supervision means closing the internet for those who are the future.
Never in the history of mankind have children been monitored so heavily from so many different points of observation. By participating in such actions, we've effectively criminalized our children and all people in the world around them. In some ways, it's almost a perfect representation of a post-9/11 United States... only to a far more extreme level.
If you think we've already lost much of our civil rights to our government under the guise of "protection", just wait until the next generation, who have never even had the chance to experience true freedom and also see constant monitoring/surveillance as normal, begin to take over. Our limit of "acceptable" loss of freedoms in exchange for security will likely end up being dwarfed by whatever legislation our children come up with. Be prepared for nothing short of curfews and martial law with severe penalties for violations.
We're just seeing the tip of the iceberg here...
8==8 Bones 8==8
This lot couldn't pour piss out of a boot if the instructions were stamped on the heel.
Hey, at least be proud of your incisive local sayings.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
You know, the more you try to restrict someone from doing something, the more they want to do it. Furthermore, parents should realize that kids don't learn entirely from advice. They learn from failure many times, just as their parents had. I don't know if this would be a better or worse world if everyone actually took advice seriously, but that's dependant upon the people that mould it then. I think the extent that these things are starting to show up on the 'net is a little bit alarming.. I guess the thing that gets to me nowadays is the amount of "disinformation" in the world. I don't know what to believe anymore on most political levels, business levels, and lately social levels, as the world becomes more cut throat, all the more I feel as though I'm stuck sitting in a chair facing The Wall. Maybe this is for the better though, perhaps less people will use MySpace. Any page I've seen on there thus far is a horrible display of layout and "crap" that is supposed to represent someone's inner being.. cute, huh? These kids need to start learning to create some real, meaningful content :)
"Protecting" children by monitoring them is quite an idiotic idea when you consider the alternatives. Give them knowledge for god's sake! Treat them like an adult and tell them the truth. Tell them how Myspace is a horribly made website, and how much of a waist of time it is. Tell them about how some child molester off in his trailer somewhere is just as able to visit their profile and view their pictures as their friends are.
Online messaging is not an evil thing. The only evils here are the horrendous communities that build up around shit retard-magnet sites like Myspace. The internet is a tool, designed for communication. Show your children how to communicate responsibly with responsible individuals. Show them that there are better tools to use then dangerous sites smattered with commercial advertisements and untrustworthy people. If you treat them right, they may even convey the message to their friends.
There have been a few people who have called my post FUD.
/'ers are educated enough to both understand this and appreciate this. If I thought /'ers weren't (capable of this) then I assure you I would have worded the article differently. The use of a Science Fiction movie as a metaphor for reality should be obvious in this regard. BTW, I was actually thinking of The Truman Show, but in my enthusiasm to post (my first post, and it got accepted... woohoo!), I let that mistake slip through (my bad).
c es. Ask yourself how many politicians have done indepth studies of the Internet or the Social Sciences before passing laws. I personally have had formal and informal education in both the social sciences and IT. I think my opinion is worth something. I just thought I might share it.
First off, the use of rhetorical and literary devices does not constitute FUD. They can emphasize a point of view and make a statement or idea stand out. I'm sure
Somebody also had exception to my use of the word "spyware" for describing Vista Parental Controls. While not in the conventional sense is this spyware; this tool does allow parents to see what Web sites there children view, etc. In this regard (and keeping with the theme of the article) I will stand by this statement. And yes I realize that guns don't kill people, and technologies can be used for good, but that obviously wasn't the premise of the article.
I could very well have made the article sound more dry ("dull and lifeless" - WordWeb), but I wanted to echo the sentiments of what I felt like growing up with old-world over-protective parents. I certainly wouldn't want to grow up with over-protective parents in this day and age.
Last Thoughts:
These laws and technologies will never make good parents be bad, but they will enable bad parents to be do even more harm.
In hindsight it is easy for me to see the children I grew up with who have had over-protective parents. Many of them now have criminal records (nothing serious like murder, etc as far as I know). I don't keep in touch with them anymore. I have seen the "control-freak" (for want of a better word) parents control their kids to the point of neurosis.
I think we all want kids to be safe. Taking simple and reactionary solutions usually doesn't work http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unintended_consequen
Parent: "I have no idea what my child's doing online so much. Can't someone help me?"
Child: "Just leave me alone, I'm playing here."
Predator: "It comes down to being in control."
Police: "You Must Conform!"
The problem is really none of the above. It's *all* of the above.
Parents want to protect their kids, but are themselves often overwhelmed just trying to get by.
Kids want to explore their own boundaries, and as sophisticated as we think they are these days, are still kids.
Predators are very confused, either by nurture or nature, and should not interact with kids lest they imprint their confusion upon others.
Police (aka our social structure) often lose track of individuals trying to protect the group.
The Parents can do more by taking the time to develop trust in their children.
The Children can do more by learning to trust their parents.
The Predators can do more by seeking - and more importantly, accepting - help.
The Police can do more by not acting like overwhelmed parents, instead treating individuals as just that - individuals, not groups. This may be the hardest task of all, as it asks them to take an active interest in each and every one of those whom they have sworn to serve, and protect.
It's not easy, but not much of the really worthwhile stuff is.