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LisaR
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 11:46am | IP Logged
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I am just disgusted. I recently spent more time on myspace than I ever have before, checking out the my space sites of several Catholic homeschooled and Catholic schooled teens. ALL of them had this horrible my- space provided profile that was partially or totally filled out on the left hand side. asking very sick questions about s*xual preferences, when lost virginity, favorite body parts. ect. SICK!! I am wondering how one can even justify using My Space if this is what is "provided" for our teens to fill in??
now, to their benefit, most of the teens did leave quite a few of the answers blank, but dosen't this just show us all the integrity of My Space at its core is not good??
forgive my harshness, we are dealing with some very graphic and heartbreaking news regarding what some high school catholic homeschoolers are involved in, and this is what led to my sleuthing a bit more into the world of myspace....
and...what about the Ads??? some people have told me that the kids can choose what ads they want sponsoring their site?? is this true?? I saw some pretty offensive ones (girls in string bikinis) on a few boys sites....
lastly, in the homeschool co-op there is no restrictions or bans on MP3's Ipods, Cell Phones, etc. a few of the moms have complained about/asked what the kids were watching/listening to during recess time and just got a response from the director that it is up to each individual family to monitor, allow their child to use during co-op. Problem is, for those of us whose kids don;t have these things, they feel left out during the common times at the best, and are viewing offensive things at the worst. I don;t agree that watching Sat Night Live clips as a 10 y/o is acceptable. Why not just have a ban??
Makes me kind of glad that my oldest ds is in a school this year that does not allow for any of this on campus. sigh, it is my 11 y/o who is saying "everyone" does these things and that he is the "only one"....
thanks for listening, and I'd love more opinions, thoughts on these issues!
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Bookswithtea
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 12:28pm | IP Logged
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I pulled out of a coop that had some problems related to this (among other things). Ipods/MP3's are all the rage, but when I found out (here, actually) that kids can download videos and other stuff onto them, I was horrified. We refuse to own any of this stuff. I cannot stand talking to a child who has one of these stupid things in their ear at the same time. Totally rude. 
Homeschool groups, youth groups and family values can vary wildly. No matter what environment your kids are in, you just have to know *who* your kids are spending time with.
Very frustrating...you have my empathy... 
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Blessings,
~Books
mothering ds'93 dd'97 dd'99 dd'02 ds'05 ds'07 and  due 9/10
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LisaR
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 12:34pm | IP Logged
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sometimes for the sake of respecting parents as primary educators reason and a sense for the "common good" fly out the window?? I just don't get it.
wow, dealing with tween/teen stuff is hard.
and time consuming.... 
on another note, praying for you Bookswithtea as your due date approaches!
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Bookswithtea
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 12:43pm | IP Logged
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LisaR wrote:
| sometimes for the sake of respecting parents as primary educators reason and a sense for the "common good" fly out the window?? I just don't get it. |
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I don't get it, either. Sometimes it seems like parents just give up on any kind of sheltering when their kids hit 14 (even hs parents). I'm not suggesting over-sheltering, but I still believe parents are parents.
The worst part is trying to help kids overcome the "everyone else is doing it" thing. Funny you should mention this. My 11 yr old dd came out for an activity this morning in a t shirt that no longer fits. I sent her back to change her shirt because it was too tight. She told me, "Mom, that's why I like it! I feel weird wearing modest t shirts when everyone else is wearing the tight ones!" Sigh...also a hs event we were heading to...I still haven't figured out what I am going to tell her. I left it at, "Well, we can talk about it later but for now, go change so we aren't late!"
LisaR wrote:
on another note, praying for you Bookswithtea as your due date approaches! |
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Thank you so much! I am getting nervous about L and D...
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Blessings,
~Books
mothering ds'93 dd'97 dd'99 dd'02 ds'05 ds'07 and due 9/10
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Barbara C.
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 2:03pm | IP Logged
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I just want to note that whatever profile information you found on those MySpace pages was put there by the kids themselves. The standard profile does ask about sexual orientation, but the rest of it is about what kind of books, movies, music, and television shows you like; who your heroes are; how you would describe yourself; your marital status and child status; and where you attended school (this is so you can look up other members who also attended your schools). I certainly don't have anything about body parts or sexual preferences on my MySpace page.
Now I've used MySpace to mainly re-connect and keep in touch with friends from high school and college. It's also kind of helped my sister and me connect a bit better. I've got a jukebox of my favorite songs and one funny video and a bit of a blog. That being said I would closely monitor any teen of mine who wanted to set up a MySpace page, and I would be hesitant to just ok it without a long talk.
As for the ads, I'm not experienced enough to know if you can choose your own ads. And to be honest, I guess I am so desensitized to commercials that I pretty much ignore them. I couldn't even tell you what one of the ads were when I checked my page today; I was too focused on my messages and such.
As for the co-op problems, I wish you luck. Luckily at our homeschool play group most of the older kids seem to just be wrapped up playing their DS's or whatever the current Gameboy is. Although, apparently one day during a parent's meeting, a bunch of the kids started playing Truth or Dare. I don't think it got raunchy, but after that it was decided to have a parent or two patrol every so often whether there was a meeting or not. Of course, our group just started a co-op day on Thursdays where the older kids (8 and up) can be dropped off, and I haven't heard how that is working out.
I do understand your concerns, Lisa. I just want to note that when it comes to MySpace the majority of inappropriate content (with the possible exception of some ads) is the responsibility of the teens themselves and their parents for not supervising them properly.
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Barbara
Mom to "spirited" dd(9), "spunky" dd (6), "sincere" dd (3), "sweet" dd (2), and baby girl #5 born 8/1/12!!
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LisaR
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| Posted: Nov 02 2007 at 5:19pm | IP Logged
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see, some of the kids changed their S*ual orientation, and their age, because I think you have to be a certain age to sign up for an account? and I really think the profile must be provided by my space in some way- maybe they are "choosing" it when they register- but I honestly do not know how more than one child could have the exact same questions in the profile- I just don;t think they would try to "coordinate" that sort of standardized thing...
and the ads are worse than the yahoo groups ads. Women and girls can "ignore" the ads, but most men and boys don't....
I totally agree that the parents are not monitoring it. I fear that they think that it is just "email" when it is so so much more.
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Philothea
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The questions are the standard Myspace profile template, the answers are given by the kids. So the kids did not choose to have "s*xual orientation" as a question for display, but they did provide the answer when they filled in their profile.
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LisaR
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Philothea wrote:
| The questions are the standard Myspace profile template, the answers are given by the kids. So the kids did not choose to have "s*xual orientation" as a question for display, but they did provide the answer when they filled in their profile. |
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so why are more parents not upset about the "leading" questions that are on that standard profile template??
favorite body parts, etc??
It just seems like the company itself is not one I would want to be associated with.
lastly, if your son was asked to view a myspace site, and you told him you as a parent were going to check it out first, would you then notify the parents about the F word, the references to underage drinking parties, and so on that are chatted about on this child's site?
I am also just kind of in awe that all of this is chatted about so in the open. I would want another parent to alert me if my son were doing immoral/illegal things, what do you think I should do?
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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JennGM
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| Posted: Nov 03 2007 at 8:33am | IP Logged
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I recently posted about this article which relates to My Space phenom.
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Barbara C.
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Again, I should state that the profile about body parts is not the standard one that comes with the account. There lots of websites out there whose sole purposed is to offer options for people to customize their MySpace page. For instance myspaceoryours.net offers backgrounds. I got my jukebox from projectplaylist.net. There are tons of these type sites with different profiles, surveys, polls, and personality tests that people copy and paste the code from and insert into their MySpace page. Most of these sites also have specialized codes to insert the same thing into Facebook and other similar things. And if the kid has knowledge of html they can design their own and work on the design codes of their profile.
And usually what happens is you start with the basic profile and start adding friends. Then one of your friends mentions that this website has backgrounds or different profile questions, etc. Then you mention it to another friend. It kind of becomes a chain reaction that spreads. And the kids may not be sitting around having a vote of which profile questions to use, but kids often have a copy-cat mentality.
As for the ads, since your first post, Lisa, I started looking at what came up on mine each time. Mainly I've had Netflix, Ebay, some network television shows, a Christian dating site, Healthy Choice, etc. There has been nothing offensive so far. And the ads with pictures only appear on the page with my complete friend list and the page to edit my profile. Now it's possible that they are tailoring the ads to my age and marital status, but I still think those kids must have requested those ads if they are on their main profile page.
Like I said, the plain profile does ask about sexual orientation, but there must be some way to delete that because I just noticed that a friend of mine who is gay did so. The only thing close to "body parts" on the regular profile is it asks for your height and body type (thin, stocky, carrying a few pounds, etc).
And I wouldn't be above mentioning to a parent that they might want to check out their kid's MySpace page. I mentioned to my sister that my step-niece (who is 20) had a page, and I didn't even realize that my niece had started putting scary stuff in her blog. Apparently, she was really depressed about her dad being in Iraq and drinking heavily and stuff. My sister was able to get my niece's aunt and grandmother to intervene.
I just want to be clear that MySpace doesn't have to be a horrible, godless thing in and of itself. When used or monitored by a responsible adult, it can be a neat way to stay in contact. In fact, just this morning, I had a message from my cousin who I haven't seen or talked to in two years. With the exception of one band in my friend list, I have known every one on my friend list in real life.
I totally understand your concerns about your teen being on there and the concerns about them getting too wrapped up in it (the narcissistic side of it). That's a problem sometimes for adults as well. And, like I said, I don't know if I would let my teens have a page even if I was monitoring and laying down a ton of rules for it. I guess just want you to have a clear understanding of how it really works.
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Barbara
Mom to "spirited" dd(9), "spunky" dd (6), "sincere" dd (3), "sweet" dd (2), and baby girl #5 born 8/1/12!!
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LisaR
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| Posted: Nov 03 2007 at 10:53am | IP Logged
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Ok, on most of the teens sites, there is a referece to "pimp my space.com" or something to that effect, so that might be the connection as to why they ( the profile questions) all seem similar? the ads are vulgar for the most part- bikini clad girls, raunchy sports ads, etc victorias secret,
and a few of them had registered as 35 y/o females so the pimp myspace might be overriding what "normally" would be on there?
just trying to figure things out. I am not trying to condemn anyone specifically, only trying to figure out modern technology better and if the good outweighs the disappointing negatives that I am currently encountering...
thank you for clarifying things for me!
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Lisa
dh Tim '92
Joseph 17
Paul 14
Thomas 11
Dominic 8
Maria Gianna 5
Isaac Vincent 9/21/10! and...
many little saints in heaven!
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Angie Mc
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LisaR wrote:
lastly, if your son was asked to view a myspace site, and you told him you as a parent were going to check it out first, would you then notify the parents about the F word, the references to underage drinking parties, and so on that are chatted about on this child's site?
I am also just kind of in awe that all of this is chatted about so in the open. I would want another parent to alert me if my son were doing immoral/illegal things, what do you think I should do?
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We're not on myspace but on Facebook and have had to deal with this question. Part of the privilege of being involved online for our teen is the responsibility to report "big harm or big damage" concerns to us. She needs to report these concerns to us for two reasons. One, she shouldn't have to carry the burden of heavy stuff on her own and we need to contact parents for follow-up. Big harm or big damage includes: anything having to do with suicidal ideation or behavior and anything illegal (under-age drinking, drug use, etc.) Other than that (cursing, parent-bashing, teen angst drama, etc.,) we don't contact parents. Why? Because it isn't immediately life threatening and we assume that the parent is monitoring their teen's online activity. Also, it comes down to how much of a relationship I have with the parents. Without the context of a friendly and trusting relationship with them, I know that any of my concerns would be perceived as judgemental, holier than thou, nosey, and embarrassing - as well they should - which helps to keep my motivation in check. Two examples:
My teen showed me a very unnerving post by a local friend about suicidal thoughts. This was shortly after this teen had experienced the loss of a neighborhood teen to suicide. Because I had regular contact with this teen and a friendly relationship with his mother, I copied the post to a word doc. and called their home. The teen answered and I asked how he was doing, told him I read his post and was concerned, and asked him to have his mom call me back. In the mean time he deleted the post and didn't have his mom call back. I called the next day, told her about the post, and she had no idea that he was online in this way. She came by and got the hard copy and was very grateful. They went on to get him some support and my relationship with them is fine.
After a costume party, a "friend of a friend" posted pictures of my teen's friend in costume that were inappropriate, in seductive poses and showing slight "undressing" and such. My teen asked me what she should do. Since it wasn't a life-threatening or illegal situation, I encouraged her to go straight to her friend with her concerns. She did. The friend asked her friend to take down the pictures. She did. Done. If she hadn't, I was considering going to the mom of the friend because she's a dear friend of mine and I would have risked sharing the information because we trust each other's motives and can readily agree to disagree.
Clear as mud, huh?
Love,
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Angie Mc
Maimeo to Henry! Dave's wife, mom to Mrs. Devin+Michael Pope, Aiden 20,Ian 17,John Paul 11,Catherine (heaven 6/07)
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4Real Forums : High School Years and Beyond
Topic: My Space Profile???
