Shocking how many people have told me, quite smugly, that their kids don't have a facebook account. And furthermore, they would never let their kids have a facebook account.
Initially, my response was a vague - well, each to their own.
Laissez faire attitude didn't last.
Couple of weekends ago, I overheard myself saying to someone: if your kids are not on facebook there are only two possibilities: either they are lying to you OR they have no friends. Either way its bad.
How old are these kids you might be wondering? Ranging in age from just learned how to read to applying to college. Doesn't really matter to me though. If you are old enough to want a facebook account my feeling is - take that pacifier out of your mouth and knock yourself out.
To all the people who disagree, I have a piece of advice for you:
Head over to your local cinema and treat yourself to a little movie I like to call Footloose.
You will notice that in the movie, the kids are not allowed to listen to music. Music, the adults believe, is the devil's worship. Music, they believe, is a passing fad. Music, they say, is not necessarily here to stay.
See where I'm going with this?
What used to be called social media, is now called life.
If you don't like it, you should probably go outside and stop the earth from spinning on its axis. Yup, that's right. The earth is round, and it spins. Sorry to be the one to break this to you, but didn't want you to read about it on facebook.
You know, I sort of agree with you. However, it does depend on the kid. Some kids can't handle the power and cause a lot more heartache online than they would spreading social misery the old-fashioned way. Also, the newbies need supervision from parents to make sure they aren't getting into trouble themselves (privacy controls, netiquette) or causing trouble for others. Once they demonstrate responsibility in some kind of consistent way, you can back off a bit.
ReplyDeleteI agree: one size does not fit all, with social media AND with music. not all kids are ready for all lyrics and not all kids are ready for everything that comes with FB. Parental guidance in both cases.
ReplyDeleteMy kids have been on FB for nearly two years now. The day I learned about my son, he said: "Mom, I accidentally got on FB". I laughed but then I figured, ok, he's young enough that I can require access to his account at all times. I can mon...itor what's going on. In the time he's been on FB, there have been plenty of times that I needed to sit down and discuss whether or not the dialogue/posts/friends were appropriate. I've told many parents that I believe that NOW is the time to teach my kids about how to behave in a social media setting. They can experiment and make mistakes and the stakes are not so high.
ReplyDeleteI agree that FB is a way of life but like anything else with kids - it should be monitored and closely. Just like you wouldn't leave your kids alone - can't let them surf the net and join social media without supervision.
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