Virtue Alert: June 2005

BLOGGERS BEWARE!

Do you know what a “blog” is? If not, don’t worry! We’ll educate you quickly because it’s all the rage among teenagers, especially teen girls who like to talk about any and everything!

Simply put, a blog is an online journal. Some use their blog websites to detail their days, life experiences and ensuing drama, while others use it to expound on deeper issues. In teenage culture, you will usually see the former.

In researching for my upcoming book, Your Boy, Raising a Godly Son in an Ungodly World, I researched this blogging phenomenon. Out of curiosity, I signed up for my own profile at myspace.com, a popular blog site for teens.

I logged onto the site, created a user profile (see glossary), and ran a group search by plugging in the name of the high school where my own kids attend. Fortunately, I didn’t find profiles for my kids on the site, but I did find many of their friends registered. Most profiles were innocent enough and highlighted their interests in sports, favorite movies, random thoughts, etc…

I was proud of myself for figuring out the system, so I went a step further and decided to plug in the name of the high school where most of the youth at my church attend and easily found some church youth among myspace.com users. Some of their profiles and pictures were appropriate and some were not. Several blogs included weekend drinking adventures, and many confessed on their profile with a “yes” when asked about drinking and smoking.

Some of the girls posted pictures of themselves in swimsuit tops posing seductively, while some of the boys posed shirtless, flexing their muscles. Some users’ “friends list” had hundreds of images from girls they had met through the myspace.com community, including girls baring cleavage, wearing thongs, and some were even labeled “XXX Model. What really struck me was the cavalier and carefree attitudes that many of the students displayed on the site. It was as if they never imagined that an adult could penetrate their “private” online world. Yet, there it was, public information—for all to see. I sure hope they don’t run for public office, someday!

For further research, we recruited an office volunteer to register at myspace.com as well. Read the excerpt below that our volunteer submitted after doing this research.

At the initial registration (which is free), I was surprised to be directed to click ‘straight’ or ‘gay’ to describe my sexual orientation. After creating my profile, myspace.com suggested several people in the Austin area with whom I might want to be “friends.” Even though I signed up as  a 16 year old student, one profile made available to me was a 32 year old man who lists “drinking Lone Star…[and having sex with] Anna Lamphear” under his general interests. This man also had a picture of a half naked woman on his profile.

 I had only been a member of myspace.com for a matter of minutes and was saddened and shocked. In almost two hours of searching high school students’ profiles on myspace.com, I found only one that didn’t have any sexually explicit material, cuss words, or discussion of drugs or drinking.

Myspace.com encourages users to select a “mood” with each post (see glossary). Some suggested moods to click on were crappy, devious, dirty, ditzy, drunk, flirty, and horny. There is also an “other” box where a user can type in his or her mood, often times using words like “stoned” or “drunk.

Myspace.com has a minimum age limit of 16, but there is no maximum. Therefore, jr. high and high school students can read college students and adults blogs, filled with information they should not be reading. Additionally, you are able to manipulate the system by simply choosing a birthday that fits within the boundaries. There is truly no secure block to younger children.

Another popular teen blogging site, xanga.com, proves to be a haven for premature exposure of filth to teens. Even though my username was “Jesus Freak”, I received an email from xanga that I had a comment in my guestbook (see glossary). The message was a solicitation from someone called “playboymonica” to watch her webcam. Keep in mind, I did not enter ANY information on my profile except my username (JesusFreak).  In an attempt to report the abuse to the website, I was brushed off with a standard response claiming they “don’t have the resources to fully investigate every abuse report, we are always happy to cooperate with police investigations.”

Our job as mothers is to examine these “influences” and determine a)whether our child will use it for good and b)if those who use it for evil will come in contact with our child and rob them of their innocence. I want to encourage you to play an active role in your children’s online choices. Even though you can’t be by their side every time they access the internet, you can establish basic guidelines and safeguards to encourage them to make good choices online.

TIPS TO POLICING, uh PARENTING YOUR CHILD’S ONLINE JOURNALING:

1. Place home computers in public areas such as kitchens or family rooms to discourage improper behavior online.
2. Become aware of what blog sites your teens are posting to and reading! They could be exposed to information well beyond their years.
3. Do your own research on the sites your teen visits.
4. Create your own username and profile and take a few weeks to see what is out there and what you find! It’s the same information your teen can find.
5. If you allow blogging or IMing, caution your teen to limit the personal information she shares on her profile, including personal pictures. Most will require an email address.
6. Read some of the journal entries of your child’s friends. If you come across inappropriate material, address it with your child and if appropriate, the child’s parents.

Glossary:

Archives: Previous posts on any particular bloggers site

Blog: An online journal

Guestbook: people who visit your profile and leave you messages

Post: Noun=an entry in your online journal; Verb=to post an entry, picture, etc. to your online journal

Search/Find People: lets you find people and blogs that share similar interests

Username: The name created by a person to use on that particular website

User Profile: includes information, sometimes very personal in nature, about the person who is blogging. Profiles (anywhere on the internet) can be a dangerous place for your teen to be tempted to share too much personal information with anyone who accesses the site.