Kids on the 'Net
I would like to open an active discussion with reference to the topic of "Children on the Internet".
Some things I DO NOT want to discuss include, but are not limited to:
* Who is responsible for them? (there's only one answer, in my opinion, and that is: the parent, guardian, or other authorized adult who provides them access!)
Some things I DO want to discuss include (but, again, are not limited to):
* What can we (the PennMUSH community) do to promote and encourage responsible use of Internet resources among young people (where 'young people' is defined as: anyone between the ages of 5 and 13 -- basically anyone who can type semi-coherent sentences into a MU* client and who hasn't yet taken an interest in the opposite gender)?
My first suggestion, likely to be snuffed out pretty quickly, is: Provide a 'limited time' on our MU's when "child daycare rules apply". For example: From 2-4pm on Sunday, profanity and other adult material (including political and religious topics) is absolutely forbidden (if a child wants to tell another person about their family's beliefs, they need to be tought to provide URLs... preferably to public 'generic wiki-like' sites,... and leave it at that: E.g., my family goes to the Methodist Church... accompanied by wiki link about Methodism).
This is just an initial suggestion to open up the conversation. M*U*S*H has a good reputation (per its own policies w.r.t. "PG-13" limits on all public conversation); and, I'm wondering if it's even possible to create a 'safe haven' for other, younger people to learn about and make friends with people of other cultures within their own age group (virtual real-time penpals, so to speak).
Please post your comments below.
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Starbright Foundation
You may be interested in http://www.starbrightworld.org/
More narrow than what you're interested in, but interesting.
Sex! (a clarification)
This subject heading is always an attention getter. And, although it may seem 'out of place' for this blog thread, it is on topic for two purposes.
1) to get some attention to this topic (man I'm tired of hearing about Internet-related child abductions and/or abuse).
and...
2) to clarify: In the initial blog post, 'interest in the opposite gender' should be interpreted as 'interest in having sex' (period).
See... I got to thinking about it and my first 'steady' was at age 11 and lasted several months... and there was lots of hand-holding and, yes, some kissing and stuff like that. But, sex? Nah... my peer-driven education about sex (looking at my friend's dad's Playboy magazines and giggling) didn't begin for another year or two. Additionally (as part of #2, above), I figured it might be misconstrued by the homosexual community as a mandate for only 'straight kids'.
The point is that 'sex' (initially, and ERRONEOUSLY, phrased in the politically correct form 'interest in the opposite gender') would fall under the 'adult topics' as forbidden topic matter for the example suggestion of "daycare hours"; while 'interest in the opposite gender' (ala 'childhood crush') is to be expected. I mean, seriously... As Jim Morrison wrote "The men don't know what the little girls understand." and he hit the nail on the head with that one. When I was about 6 years old, there were girls my age who knew as much about boys THEN... as I knew about girls when I was twice that age.
Summary: I don't want this thread to wear "blinders" to the reality of life. But I would like to keep it focused on constructive and responsible child-interest -- providing SOMETHING... SOMEWHERE... where kids can learn about the Internet in a responsible way.
Children
I'm not really going to go into a big debate, but as a parent and a long standing M*U*S*Her, I don't /personally/ think M*U*S*H is a particularly suitable environment for children for a number of reasons.
I certainly will not be encouraging my children to MUSH or take part in any kind of chatroom or environment which involves interacting with strangers or semi-strangers until they're much older. And I don't actually think they'd want to. My five year old is perfectly happy, secure and confident with more controlled spaces such as Nick Jr's website or Cbeebies website which are specially designed for children her age, and which provide education and entertainment that is appropriate.
I think she'd be rapidly bored by M*U*S*H and confused about what to do there, it's like sitting at an adult's table for dinner. Not particularly fun or appropriate for anyone for any long period of time.
I'm not really in favour of making M*U*S*H more child friendly. There are far more child-appropriate places on the internet, and personally, whilst sticking within the aup, I prefer it as a space for more mature conversations and experimentation. I don't want to have to be making my conversation appropriate for five year olds (and by that, I mean avoiding adult topics whether they be political, religious or sexual). If a five year old happens to arrive on M*U*S*H, I'm not going to behave badly or demand they leave, but it's not something I'd particularly encourage.
Elv
Good Points
Elvira makes some really good points. First, and foremost, I want to whole-heartedly agree with her sentiments with reference to M*U*S*H, specifically. I honestly don't think I'd want my online haven invaded by a lot of youngsters; I wouldn't want M*U*S*H's aup to become 'puritan'. M*U*S*H's policies and procedures are clearly and adequately spelled out and disclaimed in a way which provides ample protection in the public areas for the occassional youth who wanders through, while also providing an enormous amount of freedom for the (primarily) adult crowd of regulars to comfortably engage in mature subjects and activities throughout most of the remainder of the game. So, I suppose my reference to M*U*S*H in the original post should be tempered with the caveat that it was simply an example from which to begin this discussion.
Furthermore, I also agree that there are a great many 'child-friendly' places on the net. Javelin's post references a pretty cool one, from what I've seen of it on a cursory review. And my brother has allowed his children to explore a great many other such sites.
That having been said, there still remains the summary inquiry: What, if anything, can we (the pennmush community, not specifically M*U*S*H) do to promote and/or encourage 'child safety' on the net?
Please don't misinterpret this next part as a direct personal attack to Elvira (from what I know of her and her domestic environment, I don't think her kids have a great deal to worry about... but that can't be said for everyone).
The problem is that there is an enormous amount of parental irresponsibility contributing to 'child dangers' on the 'Net. Getting back to my 'PC as babysitter' reference. I know that most (if not all) seasoned game administrators are quite familiar with the trials and tribulations of dealing with the occassonal unruly, unsupervised, just-turned-teen-aged young adult. (I just got my own PC for my birthday! Yay! I'm all growd up now and can do anything I wanna! and you're not the boss of me!) It's parental naivete that creates the problem for the Internet. So, my question still stands: What, if anything, can we do to help deal with this social phenomenon?
Promoting
While visiting family this past weekend, I had the opportunity to see the results of one type of responsible parental supervision; and I wanted to share, here in my blogspace, what I witnessed... and what I gleaned from discussion with the parents in question.
My brother has two young children: a daughter age 10, and a son age 7. They've found a website which has activities for their children (I'll not mention it in this message, in an effort to retain some privacy for my brother's family). And my niece is at that age where 'chatting with friends' is becoming part of what she does within this site.
Getting to the point... the kids were wanting to show me the cool stuff on this site (and, I must admit, it was pretty cool). They navigated around so quickly that I didn't keep up with everything, but my niece did show me the chat interface, which brings me to the point at hand. As she was showing me the list of 'people online', I noticed she was deleting people from the list. And as she was deleting names, I noticed one name which was (in my opinion) highly suspect for a site catering to children (something akin to ProfessorPassion, or the like)... which my niece deleted from the list.
I didn't comment to the kids on their responsible behavior (I was impressed... with the whole experience: the site, their behavior, their willingness to share my mom's PC without fighting ... much, etc.). However, I did later discuss what I'd seen with my sister-in-law (their mom), mentioning this specific event (my niece deleting 'suspect' names from the chat list). My sister-in-law told me that she'd done some similar 'supervising' earlier with her daughter, in which she'd inquired about a few such names (Who is that? / I dunno. / Well, I don't want you talking to people you don't know. Can you tell me who some of your friends are? / Yeah, that's Jill, and that's Bobby, and that's , etc. / Okay, well just make sure you don't talk to people you don't know.).
As our discussion continued, my sister-in-law told me how they deal with internet supervision in their home. First and foremost, the internet access is restricted to one location in the home... a location which prevents the kids from 'sneaking around' behind their parents backs. Right now, it's in their bedroom. But they have plans to move it to a more public area (living room, breakfast nook, somewhere that the kids won't be kicking off their shoes, dropping their bookbags after school, etc. right there in her bedroom).
I think this is brilliant. This allows the kids the freedom to USE the internet, freely... and pretty much whenever they want... but in a highly supervised manner... a high-traffic location in the house where the 'temptation' to explore unsafe activities is absolutely squelched. They have no intention of giving their kids 'private access in their bedrooms' until... well, probably not until their kids have jobs and can pay for it themselves. THIS is a WONDERFUL example of responsible parenting. It gave me great comfort to know that, because of my brother and sister-in-law's parenting practices, my niece is already developing responsible behavior... AND an awareness of the potential dangers of the 'Net... WITHOUT long speeches, WITHOUT having to learn tragic lessions, and WITHOUT having her fun spoiled by lots of restrictive rules.
These two kids (my niece, and my nephew because his sister is setting a good example already) are off to a wonderful start.
I've shared this experience here for two reasons.
1. To re-emphasize that this thread is not about discussing "who is responsible?" - the parents are, without question.
and...
2. To give an example to others of how to be responsible, if you find yourself in the position of supervising children.