When are kids too young to blog or MySpace?
Everywhere you turn these days, you can hear an exchange of kids asking for email addresses, MySpace accounts or blog addresses. I’ve heard them from kids ranging in age from 7 up. I know of one little girl who is 4 who has an online profile, but her mom has complete control over the activity.
Concerns about internet safety for children have become more realistic tragedies as the 2006 suicide of 13-year-old Missouri girl, Megan Meier. She hanged herself after receiving nasty online comments from a MySpace friend that turned out to be the creation of trusted adults in her neighborhood.
While social networking sites such as MySpace offer some safeguards to keep children safe, blogs tend to be more open to the general public.
Does your child have a MySpace account or blog?
Do you personally monitor their online activities?
How far would you go to keep your kids safe from cyber-bullies – up and to including not allowing the online profiles at all?
Have you ever encountered a cyber-bully harassing one of your children? If so, how did you handle it?
Now, considering your answers to all these questions, do you think the sentence should stand against the adult who lead the hoax of creating a false identity that lead to the death of Megan Meier? Defense attorney for Lori Drew, argued in court papers that prosecutors are bending a cyber crime statute to prosecute his client
Please take a moment to check out Megan Meier Foundation – read the entire heartbreaking story and support the efforts of her family to create laws to protect our children.
I wrote some thoughts about online safety here: http://empathic-parenting.com/parentingforhumanity/blog/2008/08/proposed-guidelines-for-technology-and-family/
but basically, I think communication is the biggest piece of it- talking to your kids about what’s going on, and being aware of all of their internet activities. I’m eager to read other people’s responses!
Both of my daughters have a MySpace account. My younger daughter, I am a “friend” of her account, so I am able to oversee everything that goes on there. She did have one “friend” who was rude and I had her delete the girl.
My older daughter, she is 16 and I only recently allowed her to take me off of her account. It’s a trust thing that we are working on.
I have followed the Megan Meier story. I read the blog of the lady who set the account up and she sounded as if she believed that she did nothing wrong. Reading her side of the story was pretty distressing – she sounded like a child, not an adult, blaming everyone else.
My older daughter has had problems with cyber bullying – people hacking her myspace account, threats, ect. We talked about it and at one point, she even spoke with the police. On the other hand a few years ago, I some read things that she wrote and explained to her why I felt that what she was saying was inappropriate.
I would like their to be strict anti-cyber bullying laws. Unfortunately, some people will use the annonymous aspect of the internet to strike out at others. I have stressed to my girls that I find that sort of behavior unacceptable and I try my best to lead by example. I tell them to not say anything online that they would not be comfortable saying to another person’s face.
Heck, I’m 37 and I don’t have a blog or a MySpace page. What’s wrong with, I dunno, making real live friends?
But then, I also don’t let my kids use the computer. When they have a legitimate need, they will, but I treat it as a tool, not a toy.
I’m 18 and my younger sister and I just got Facebook (it’s like MySpace). My mom has our passwords so she can moniter out activities. There is also a blocking feature so that people that I know would bully me can’t see my profile. I’ve heard there is an age rule to posting on the internet (no younger than 13).
I know a girl as young as 10 years old with a myspace acct. I dont know how she got it but I do know she acts and live way beyond her age. It’s sad and scary when someone so young wants to act older and don’t know the consequences of it
i have a myspace and im only 10 there’s nothing wrong with it but facebook is definatley safer but parents are too protective
I had a man that I was dating and his teen girls and him had myspace pages as well. I checked his girls pages for comments left and was surprised that he didnt seem to monitor them as well as I did. I told him of some totally vile and way out of line comments when I saw them until the girls made them private.
I hope this mother gets life in jail.
I have been a victim of online hate mail and if I am not in the right frame of mind or already upset about something comments made from anyone, even a complete stranger can cut like a knife. I try to remember that they dont really know me in person but my fear is that it is someone that does know me and is doing it on purpose to hurt me
And I am 50 years old so …. I can imagine what a child like Megin was thinking and going through