Conversations about Children and Online Safety
This past week at the New York State Association of Independent Schools Education Technology 2006 Conference (what a mouthful, eh?) there were many sessions and thoughtful conversations about the safety of students in this online-infused world. The issues are complex: there are the duty of care issues in schools, with local and federal laws, a school community's moral responsibility to it's members, and then things like lawsuits from families, especially in a litiginous society like the US.
I'm not sure what to think or do yet. I have to engage in the conversations about this. In fact, that is probably the most useful thing any of us can do - talk to each other (including kids!) about it. My kids are young adults and we talk about this stuff, but I don't have to confront some of the things my friends with younger children are seeing. So I may see it in a different light. I tend to cringe at some of the more strident responses and knee-jerk legislative reactions like DOPA, but I don't want to minimize the problem.
One of my online friends works in the youth online space and has started a blog about the issue. Barbara has lots of thoughtful things to say - you might want to take a look at The Watchful Eye. The stories she tells send chills. We need to be proactive. The thing I find really useful that Barbara has started to surface is that the distributed network afforded by the internet allows predators to support each other anonymously, without personal relationship, by sharing kiddie porn. This is outside of the (hopefully) self correcting boundaries of a community. I know I'm not being very clear here - not allowing sufficient time to write this out, but I wanted to try and "tag" that thought in Barbara's piece. This is where we look at the strengths and potential threats of networks. They are not all value neutral.
My one caution to all of us is not to separate totally the online and offline world; it's risks and our actions in response. Yes, the only world makes an easy channel for predators to get to kids. But it is the world, as a whole, that creates conditions where predation exists. We can't separate the two. Nor should we address one and ignore the other - at our peril.
posted by Nancy White at 1:54 PM
3 Comments:
Hi - I linked over to Barbara's post and that set me off on a long rant of my own (about balance in all this).
Coming back to your page and finishing it your page, I see that we're thinking along the same lines - but it does strike me from what you say that the education of American teachers, librarians etc in this area might be a little further advanced than in the UK. Of course, I think the UK has something of a headstart in camera and video phone bullying but I'm sure it must be a substantial issue in the US by now...
(un)relaxeddad, thanks for jumping in. You made me remember to think about this from a global, and not strictly local perspective.
What is the situation in S. Africa? In India, Portugal, Norway and Brazil?
How can we see this as a systemic conversation?
Amber (30) & I, Lion Kimbro (29), have given our daughter Sakura (5 1/2): a computer in her bedroom, a door that she can close, her own camera, a cell phone (FireFly, because she can't use anything more sophisticated yet,) and her favorite video games: Lost Labyrinth (OpenSource,) StarCraft, and Barbie: Rapunzel. (Yes, she plays all of them.) We do not censor Internet or media or game use in any way. Her favorite site presently is a "Star ABC's site." She chooses her own clothing.
As she learns more and wants more technology, we're happy to give it to her. We will not monitor her Internet use, outside of the usual "I can't stand it, the curiousity is driving me crazy" monitoring that our whole family performs on each other, usually with some feeling of embarassment.
Our family is incredibly cohesive, and we think that a big part of that is the freedom that we grant to each other, and our mutual love (and I do mean *LOVE*) of technology, and the gifts it brings to us. Our family is one of love, discussion, reason, ideas, and technology. Sakura does contribute to policy-making, as much as she is interested.
We are not fearful about addresses and phone numbers, and have them listed on our website. We have not once ever received a call that we did not want.
Just so that folk know that there are other perspectives out there.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home