Katie Couric, media literacy and the First Amendment's slippery slope

Well played Katie Couric. Today Couric ventures outside CBS.com into the momosphere. In a guest post on NYC Moms Blog, Couric writes about the dark side of the Internet and its affect on children:

Katie Couric on Mean Girls (And Boys) Online

"Is the genie out of the bottle?  Are parents today simply oblivious to the anonymous hate speech that’s so pervasive?   I think our jobs as Moms have gotten a lot harder, and it seems to me we need to have some kind of concerted effort, along with our schools and other leaders, to communicate to our kids that freedom of expression is a protected right in this country--but are we expressing ourselves too freely?"

My opinion? The facts of life for children, teens and their parents now include cyberspace. That's why our family computer is in the kitchen, so I can stir spaghetti while making sure I know exactly the surfing habits of our eight- and 12-year-old.

Every parent I know -- myself included -- grapples with cyberliteracy. At what age should my 12-year-old son be allowed to open a Facebook or Bebo profile? (Answer: 13, with careful guidelines.) Should my eight-year-old be allowed to play online games with a community "chat" function? (No way.) 

This is the era where parents do need an entirely new guidebook. At the same time, I love this brave new world.

Couric's question, "Are we expressing ourselves too freely?" invokes the First Amendment (um, see the top of this page) that has been sacred to me for 20 years as a journalist. "Too freely" by what measure? By whose? I respect my senators and congressional representatives enormously -- but I need to make those choices for myself and for my kids.

As in the case of religion, every person -- and every family -- must make their own choices. And that's one of the reasons I love Couric's post. An educated choice requires the kind of terrific conversation, the very real questions I see on NYC Moms blog -- hashing out the issues, sharing the difficulty of ushering our little babies through the awful adolescent years, which just got, well, a google harder.

I'm a big believer that children of every age (me included) do need now to learn how to ignore the trolls and take care of herself online. Is Juicyc*mpus, the new f*ckedcompany.com of the college world for veterans like myself, the new bathroom wall? Fine. I will say to my boys, ignore them too, honey. 

For now the Internet and all multimedia -- mobile phones in particular -- are included in the realm of my children's world. And I want them to be safe in that world. As my own mother told me, God gave you one self; treat that self with the same respect you believe other people should be treated. And follow the Golden Rule.

Or you will be sorry.

Comments

[Belinda]

My 5-year-old daughter only uses the computer when one or both of us are right next to her, and yet managed to register a Twitter account without us knowing. Obviously we were paying more attention to a book or our own laptop for a few minutes! She didn't "follow" anyone, or ever look at the page again once she registered it, but the scary fact was that a 5-year-old was able to CREATE A TWITTER ACCOUNT. I went ahead and let her set it up, locked down and "following" only family members, with the same guidelines that we follow with her email account and her blog (I KNOW), which at this age means that Mommy & Daddy own the passwords.

And did you see that BlogHer member whose 7-year-old learned to use Google at school, and then, with a lethal combination of newfound searching skills and his parents' cached Amazon password (he clicked on a Google link which took him to Amazon, which automatically signed the computer in), he "accidentally" bought over $700 worth of Webkinz in one fell swoop! The parents were unaware of this until the packages began to arrive.

I will take as much education as I can get to prepare for the upcoming years, because I have a feeling that this whole "internet thing" is going to get hairier all the time.

[Beth B.]

I wish everyone would live by "treat that self with the same respect you believe other people should be treated"! Somehow it seems people get meaner online because they feel protected behind their "avatar" or "screen names". You are right that parents educating their kids is key, and that learning respect also applies to kid's actions on the internet.