Bad News for Moms: Facebook Will Allow Kids Under 13 | The Stir.
Having read the link of fellow CafeMom’s blog The Stir, I am quite sure it stirs up different opinions about membership of minors under thirteen years old on Facebook (or to any other social networking site).
Well, this is not new. I have to agree with another fellow CafeMom JessLogansMommy (http://www.cafemom.com/home/JessLogansMommy) that what we don’t know is that there are more minors who have registered themselves to social networks and gaming networks as well using bogus ages.
My minors for instance have Facebook and Friendster accounts after efforts of trying to keep them away from the cyber network where a lot of anonymous people prey on ignorant users. My real aim though that I kept them away at first was that I wanted a more quiet life after freshly assuming the single parenting status. I used a pseudonym for myself that only people who are really closely associated with me would recognize. At least, it would take time searching for me on the social network by my legal name. I did it to protect my own minors.
But minors cannot remain minors forever. In this age where technology never sleeps, there’s no escaping what good or bad effects that modernization bring. What we ‘technologically conservative’ moms can do is to raise the awareness of our children about bigger responsibilities. The best approach is still the old parent-to-child conversation. Application of technology for this purpose would be ideal to test our children how the appreciate modernization.
Years back, I opened an email account for each of my children. I taught them how to use the internet through sending them simple emails and encouraging them to send me emails back. In my mails, I concisely and lovingly explained what to expect in cyberspace. With intelligent offspring like I have, it felt like sending the little birds to fly on little wings. I told them how much I trust them. I have to set the example on the use of the net so that any occurrence not like how my children and I interact online would be irregular, unethical, rude, and all the other terms to describe BAD.
Until a few more years later, they begged to have a Facebook account. At first, I was reluctant (I am a normal mother still!). But I wanted myself to remain as their model, so I allowed them to get one with their ages to correspond to my years. What I avoided that way was that they get their accounts secretly and hide more things from me. My rule about cyber networking was transparency. Although they used the email accounts I created originally for them, I taught them how to change their password for their protection. What I aimed for this time was recognizing the value of respect. I do not pry on their accounts nor their emails. And because I keep myself virtually distant about it, they voluntarily offered me their passwords so that I can access their accounts too. (Just because of this game called Farmville where they asked me to help them harvest crops, I did that for sometime and then completely forgot about their passwords.) See what trust and respect can do?
So to my fellow moms (and CafeMoms) out there, let’s stay in control by discovering things with our children. This way, at least we get a baseline of what they know ensuring that they know the essentials. And then let go a little while keeping up with them at a safe distance so that in case things get unexpectedly out of hand then we still claim control over things by being able to help them out when they run back to MOMMY!
Pretty Little Rosebuds 