On Sat, Jul 02, 2005 at 07:29:56PM -0400, Mike Branda wrote:
> On Sat, 2005-07-02 at 12:21 -0400, michael hast wrote:
> > Hey, everybody. I just set up a Knoppix-box in my six-year-old's
> > room. Needless to say, he's thrilled. I know that there's a bunch of
> > garbage on the net that is unfit for little eyes, and I don't want to
> > have to be answering tough questions too soon.
<snip>
> Well after reading the rebuttal of the rebuttal of the.....ahh
> whatever... :^)
>
<snip>
I hate to say all this thrashing about is for naught, but no one has
mentioned what happens when this kid goes over to his friends' houses. I
can absolutely guarantee you that whatever you strove to prevent the kid
from seeing will be readily available at one or more of his friends'
houses. My daughter graduated high school five years ago, and we had
blocks on various channels on our TV. So she just went over to other
kids' houses and watched the stuff we blocked. (The internet was a
little new at the time and she expressed no interest in it, so we
avoided that problem.) He's going to have friends whose parents are less
than bright about the internet. And one day they'll discover this whole
new world called "porn" or "warez" on the internet. And he'll be there
the day after they do, surfing with them while their parents are
oblivious. Prepare yourself for the questions now, buddy. And prepare
yourself to be the most hated single person on this planet, when you try
to assert your parental right to snoop into his business.
I'm only putting this forward as something to consider. I agree with the
others on this thread that you have to do what you can as a parent,
regardless of outside influences. Filters and proxies are a good idea,
along with supervision. In fact, you can have the contents of his
internet cache emailed to you if you like, so you can see exactly where
he surfed (albeit after the fact). But you can't hold his hand forever.
In this day and age, he's gonna want to be on the internet, if for no
other reason than that his friends are. And if he's going to be
technologically literate, he _needs_ to be on the internet. Do what you
can, snoop as stealthily as you can, and be prepared for the tough
questions and bitter arguments.
Paul
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