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An ocean of social sites and other easy links grow as places you don’t want your child to see, or be seen. Editor’s Note: This year, OC Family Magazine has studied the Internet, trolling video sites such as YouTube and social sites such as the mammoth MySpace to learn and see firsthand if the purported dangers that we’ve reported about are, in fact, out there. And they are. From inappropriate video to obscene images, from aggressive language to suggestive poses, it is no longer acceptable for parents to expect that their son or daughter can go online and somehow miss this kind of growing content. It is everywhere. Here is our update to last October’s story about online predators – a call to action to protect your children. Tamyra Pierce’s subspecialty is MySpace.com. The assistant professor and graduate director in the Mass Communication and Journalism Department at Fresno State University has studied the social site’s phenomenon and its growing influence on young minds. In one respect, she understands the era in which we live, as she watches her college students leap from their seats when class is over to begin text-messaging to the world. Pierce’s research shows that the amount of time spent on MySpace – the world’s most popular social site with more than 100 million users – is affecting grades and leading to poor choices, such as posting suggestive photos on a personal page and prompting online behavior that probably would be avoided in face-to-face communication. “The 12- to 17-year-olds are...building their identity,” Pierce says. “So I think MySpace helps them to express who they are...It’s also a time when they are exploring or experimenting with their sexual identity. Now, if you add MySpace in with that, and they are expressing themselves, and putting in sexual content and talking in sexual ways with total strangers, it is a bomb waiting to explode. It seems the younger teens or even pre-teens...have this false sense of security where they think nobody is watching. “In fact, the whole world is watching.” Del Harvey, an assistant director for Perverted Justice, helps find potential predators preying on young people, get them arrested and convicted. In a speech in Orange County earlier this year, Harvey pushed ongoing education for parents. “Parents are starting to get that the Internet is sort of like the park...The Internet is like that dark alley at night.” MYSPACE STEPPED IT UP In December 2006, MySpace began building a database that, for the first time, compiles a list of all registered sex offenders nationwide. Called Sentinel Safe, it checks sex offenders’ identities against MySpace profiles. However, predators, like anyone, can easily fake their identities online. That’s why MySpace has suggested that probation officers begin collecting email addresses of registered sex offenders, according to MySpace spokeswoman Tracy Akselrud. Of course, nothing could really stop these same predators from acquiring another email address and not reporting it. As proof, Advertising Age reported that the North Carolina attorney general’s investigation had identified 29,000 registered sex offenders in July on MySpace; the portal immediately shut down the sites of the sex offenders. Another catch: Although MySpace can delete the profiles of suspected sex offenders, it’s up to law enforcement to request the names of suspected predators from the social-networking giant. So far, only two dozen states have made such a request, Akselrud says. North Carolina has been the most successful to date. IT’S STILL NOT GOOD ENOUGH Most sex predators aren’t registered offenders. In June in Orange County, a judge sentenced a 29-year-old Texas man, Kiley Ryan Bowers, to 9 years in jail after he seduced a Lake Forest 15-year-old girl over the Internet. He visited her in Orange County, had sex with her, and soon abruptly ended the relationship. Her subsequent depression led her to suicide: She hung herself. Also in June, a 19-year-old Rancho Santa Margarita college student, Donna Jou, disappeared after hopping on the back of a motorcycle with a man she had met over the Internet. Authorities have arrested John Steven Burgess, a registered sex offender from Los Angeles, in Jacksonville, Fla., and are questioning him about her disappearance. THE VICTIM IS THE ISSUE In an odd twist, more and more young people are creating pages on social sites that any normal parent would object to. So, the group we’re trying to protect has become, in some cases, both victim and purveyor at the same time. Professor Pierce analyzed content on 700 U.S. sites. She found: > 59% of individuals included risqué or sexual poses. > 28% included partial frontal nudity of males. > 17% included partial frontal nudity of females. > 9% included links to pornographic sites. > 6% had full frontal nudity of females. Pierce is asked why this kind of diary, which used to be so private, kept locked under a child’s bed, is now so public. “That’s the question in my mind, too; I don’t understand this. Many of them post their whole lives online. So many of them are so lonely, or bored. They just spill everything out, and they express themselves through background colors, music they put on, the videos they put on.” In a sinister way, the pornographic industry has found a toehold, Pierce believes. Links to these sites often advertise for young women who might like this kind of work, she says. “That tells me that they are recruiting...” Her research also links poor grades to heavy MySpace use. “Those that kept MySpace open while doing homework tend to have low grades...We also found this with cell-phone use and text messaging.” PUTTING UP ROAD SIGNS Chapman University’s Pamela Ezell is an assistant professor of English who also has studied the effects of the new-media age’s effects on young people. And, like Pierce, her fear is not necessarily the process, but the possible outcomes. “I think, obviously, there are some real problems with children, and even teenagers, anybody under age, having access to the unlimited potential of the Internet. It’s frightening. They can certainly come into contact with a predator and other people their own age who are less supervised, who come from a different type of home. “There is a lot to fear from something that is unlimited.” Ezell is concerned that programs such as the popular Dateline show that catches predators who drive to homes where they hope to meet an underaged child may present too overblown a scenario. “In a similar way, it’s like the war on terror; there are real risks to the era that we’re in, but...the fear may far exceed the risks. At the same time, if you are a parent, you don’t care about statistics, you care about your one kid.” Information highway vs. a treacherous road True, the pure purpose of the Internet – to have access to everything, all at once – is an unprecedented tool for information and for education. But the dark side lurks next to a search for Wikipedia. From Ezell’s view, there are challenges. “Parents don’t always have good awareness of what kinds of sites their children are visiting, or how much time they’re online, and that’s problematic. I do believe that the power of pornography is pretty strong; you wouldn’t expect your children to use just a little bit of drugs. “We’re in the era of the permissive parent, to be your kid’s friend. And they need you to be their parent, and to know what they are doing.” Spin the age group ahead to the college years. As Ezell explains, she teaches students how to use the Internet. “The future for them is the digital media. That’s not the future. It’s next week.” At the same time, online usage plays to the voyeur, as well as the narcissist. Answers Ezell: “That seems to be a contradiction, but we live in an era that is both those things. We have blogs; online digital pictures of us doing our daily lives. On one hand, it’s like, who cares?” Yet the confirmation found online – people who share favorite bands and photos of themselves, who reveal what they like to wear...“In a strange way,” says Ezell, “it is a way to have community in a world that is so alienating and fractured.” Fresno State University Professor Pierce has studied the effect of videogame violence on children; school shootings and the media coverage of them; and aggressive behavior among children. In terms of concern, she puts her MySpace research at the top of the list. “All of the others were important, but instant interaction with total strangers and the ability to expose everything about themselves...they are putting their lives out there. We’ve got to educate young people with no fear, that you should have fear.” JOHN WALSH SPEAKS OUT “Kids think they are bullet-proof,” says John Walsh, host of “America’s Most Wanted” and a repeat guest on “Larry King Live.” More than most, he has helped raise the level of awareness about the dangers of missing and exploited children. He has lived the tragedy: Son Adam, then 6, was abducted from a department store in 1981, and killed. That prompted the family’s first-ever campaign. In June, the day of the second National Teen Summit on Internet Safety in Washington, D.C., Walsh spoke with OC Family Magazine about the dangers of the Internet, a new-media reality that amplifies the forces of evil that faced his son just 26 years ago. The summit is sponsored by Cox Communications with partner National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. Walsh and Miss America, Lauren Nelson, joined in the discussion, and later that day went with the 20 teens to Capitol Hill to discuss the Internet with members of Congress. One idea percolating from the meeting would be a law that makes Internet safety part of any schoolwide computer training class. “The Internet is perfect for pedophiles,” Walsh says. “It’s the perfect place to be anonymous and to solicit kids day and night...We have a lot of law enforcement agencies to catch these (pedophiles). . .but they are some of the most cunning people out there.” While more and more groups are now working to stop the exploitation of children – even the parent company of MySpace.com is seeking ways to catch the bad guys – it is a parental issue as much as anything, Walsh believes. Asked if a new-age question should be asked when your child goes to visit another family – “Will they have unsupervised use of a computer?” – to go along with the age-old question of: “Is there a loaded gun in the house?” Walsh says, absolutely! “Those are parallel questions and part of being a good parent.” What he learned from the Teen Summit: Middle-school children, ages 11-14, are most at-risk; teens don’t generally mind if their parents have the passwords to social sites to check up on what’s online. However, teens are reluctant to report dangerous signs from sites of friends and acquaintances, such as nude pictures and drug deals. “I didn’t grow up with a computer,” says the 61-year-old. “And most parents didn’t. The kids are much savvier. It’s important to open up lines of communication (and) the point is to educate parents the right way.” As Teen Summit attendee Christina Johnson sat outside Sen. Barbara Boxer’s office, prepared to give the senator a briefing, she talked on the phone about the right ways and wrong ways for parents to address the issues. “We all agreed that communication with parents is a vital part,” says the Palos Verdes Peninsula High School graduate. “With my parents, we only have one computer that has Internet access, and it’s in the kitchen. (The group) also stressed that communication has to be casual, otherwise, kids won’t be open.” She says parents need to find a balance between the graphic stories coming out of the Internet, and being too lenient about the dangers. This is crucial in reaching the target audience of 12- to 15-year-olds, she says. “Caution,” she says about the message, “but not paranoia.” RESOURCES > Go to Cox Communications’ ongoing parental education website initiative: Take Charge! (cox.com/takecharge). Among questions asked and answered: “How safe are your children online?” A companion site: safeteensonline.com > To report suspicious behavior, use the following number and also urge your children to do so: It reaches a professional at the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children; it goes to the organization’s CyberTipline: 800-THE-LOST. The website: missingkids.com Should you suspect immediate danger involving your child, call 911. Turning tragedy into a crusade for children Erin Runnion, the Orange County mother who lost her 5-year-old daughter, Samantha, more than five years ago to an abductor – the little girl was found dead in the Inland Empire – held a fundraiser early this year for her nonprofit, The Joyful Child Foundation. Among her guests were Marc Klaas, father of Polly Klaas, who was abducted from her Northern California home in 1993; and Ed Smart, whose daughter was grabbed from their Utah home and later found alive. The teen was held for nearly 9 months before she was reunited with her family in March 2003. Smart, who has worked to get congressional approval for more stringent laws protecting children, remains a father who hopes that his strong words will move mountains. “How can these things happen in our society?” he asked. “I remember our first press conference, asking and pleading and begging for the abductor to release her.” For a parent in which the unimaginable happens, Smart asks, “How do you survive? The not knowing is the worse than the knowing.” The Smart family got their daughter back – “If anyone could have asked for a miracle in their life, I got it,” Smart says – and so began the healing. As Erin Runnion pointed out that day, when the families of 7 abducted children gathered together: “We’re a select group of heartbroken parents.” IMPORTANT ALERTS! Here are 2 ongoing programs to get public help in finding abducted children, and helping to protect all children from predators. Ed Smart, father of Elizabeth Smart, says of one of the efforts: “Why does (Amber Alert) work? Because people care; people are looking; people are helping.” Amber Alert: This is a missing-child response system. Media and law enforcement come together to inform the public of the abduction, then radio-television broadcasts are interrupted to tell of the incident that occurred so people can be on the lookout and report any information leading to the crime. The system is best known for utilizing freeway signs to describe a potential getaway car. Megan’s Law: Established in 1996, it is based on the 1994 Jacob Wetterling Act. States must register convicted sex offenders and the community must be informed. Why this matters: Based on 2006 statistics, there are 87,060 registered sex offenders in California, the most in the U.S. Parents need to understand those numbers, as well as these (because sex offenders often troll the Internet for unsuspecting victims): An analysis of content following Fresno State University Professor Tamyra Pierce’s research on MySpace and other social sites found this correlation: > 51% of teenage survey respondents said they had been contacted by a stranger. > 10% had met with a stranger they first became acquainted with online. Rules of the Internet highway Should your child have access to a computer, there are rules to follow to keep him or her safe: > A child can’t have a password that a parent doesn’t know. > There is no expectation of privacy. If your child tells you to trust him, tell him you can’t trust the Internet. > Be aware of software that “blocks” objectionable material. It is easily disabled, and your children typically are more technology savvy than you. > Keep the family computer in the middle of a well-traveled room. None are allowed in a child’s bedroom. > If your child says she needs a social site, you need to ask yourself (not her), “Why?” Here is the detail to that answer: If you would feel comfortable having your daughter go meet a stranger in a park, then you’ll be comfortable letting her have a social site that isn’t overseen by you. Craig Reem is the executive editor of OC Family Magazine. |
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