Scoble writes about his experience’s with Second Life, and the fact he has been basically forced to stop his 12 year old son using it.
Now he talks about the Nanny State and the fact that we have to many rules from above. Can’t say I disagree with him on that one. Western Australia is the ultimate in nanny states, and Australia as a whole isn’t much better.
The drinking and gambling ages in the US are a complete joke. You can die in Iraq at 18 but you can’t have a drink until 21. It’s stupid.
But I’ve got to ask. Is it right that Scoble exposes his 12 year old son to virtual porn and gambling?
I can remember last year I read that he let his son listen to the Dawn and Drew Show. Now personally, I quite enjoy the Dawn and Drew show, but it ain’t suitable for kiddies. I was going to write about it at The Blog Herald at the time, but I was already in the middle of a flame war on another topic and didn’t want the grief.
Now I read that he allows his son to play the Adults Only Second Life, a world which I’m personally quite into, but again, it’s AO.
Now I’m all for teaching your kids about this stuff….eventually. I’m certainly no prude. But Scoble’s son isn’t even a teenager yet, and he’s being let lose in a world which made headlines last week because some of its participants are engaging in virtual sex acts where one plays the role of a child. Yep, virtual paedophilia.
Writes Scoble:
The thing is, I don’t necessarily buy into the rules of society, or the rules of Linden Labs. If I don’t mind my son getting into a Poker game, or seeing a virtual sex act, isn’t that my right as a parent to let my son experience those things?
Actually you know what, I honestly don’t believe it is. A 12 year old is not ready to be exposed to this sort of thing. Personally I think it’s totally wrong. Indeed, in Australia you’d probably end up being investigated by Child Services (or similar bodies depending on your state) for allowing these things to happen.
Of course, we all know from our own childhoods that, particularly as teens, we all eventually get up to some no good. But we aren’t even talking about a teen here, we are talking about a pre-pubescent child. Children do need protecting, and I’m even going to dare to suggest that in this case, I’d think Scoble’s son may need protecting from him.
How do you feel. Would you let your 11 or 12 year old child view porn and gambling? Flame away if you must, but I can tell you my son will be a fair bit older before I start teaching him about this sort of thing. Kids should be allowed to be kids whilst they still can be, and nothing positive can come from exposing a 12 year old to virtual sex acts.
Tags: robert scoble
Just in case, I’d suggest you get your flame suite on…
Actually, now that I read his post I see were you’re coming from. I thought you were starting a fight based on an offhand comment in one of his posts, but when he does a whole write-up on it he’s obviously asking for it.
All I can say is I’m glad I wasn’t raised that way. How mature a kid is doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not they should be seeing adult content
And look, to be honest I believe it’s best that kids do eventually find out about this sort of stuff in the supervision of a parent, alcohol, gambling, that sort of thing, but 12 is way, way to young in my books.
I enjoy reading Robert, but his post didn’t make much sense. If you extrapolate his argument you could easily go the route of “well, I don’t buy into these rules of society that say I can’t randomly assault people, so don’t tell me I can’t punch you if I feel like it!” Societal boundaries are there for, amongst other reasons, protection. The same law makers that protect me from getting regularly beaten by strangers have the same social responsibility to protect children from harmful things – in this case society deems certain elements of Second Life as harmful to twelve year olds.
Hope you don’t mind the (public) anonymity!
Yeah, I think learning from parents and not friends or internet searches or whatever is best, but I can’t help but wonder if playing an adult video game with your son is the best way of teaching…
and yeah, 12 is young
I watch how my son uses Second Life and he has no interest in the adult parts of it.
The problem is, I am a bad parent. I have no control over where he goes. Why? He lives 1,000 miles away from me and he has a computer that he controls and his mom has no interest in.
When he was seven years old he, and a bunch of friends, visited a porn site (whitehouse.com). Why? Cause his teacher told him not to. That was real bright. When you tell kids not to do something the first thing they want to do is check it out when they are out of your control.
By not making it a big deal I haven’t given him a guilt complex and I haven’t given him any more incentive to try and check out this stuff.
It also means he talks with me about what goes on on the playground (it’s far worse than what happens in Second Life, believe me) and he also tells me about everything he sees in Second Life.
I see your point, Robert.
It reminds of some story about two neighbors who were best friends, and they desperately wanted their kids to marry. Thus while their kids were growing up they pretended to hate each other and told their kids never to go near the neighbor’s kid.
And guess what happened?
That’s a great post, Duncan. I enjoyed reading it. I’m not gonna wade in with an opinion because I can barely look after myself and I have no idea how I would look after a child.
Instead of feeling angry or disgusted at Robert Scoble, I feel sad. Especially after his comment. 🙁 It’s so hard to raise kids the “right” way. I struggle with that every day and I’d venture a guess that everyone does too. If you, Duncan, and Robert didn’t care a whit, neither of you would be writing about it. But the fact that you both are means you’re both thinking and that’s a good thing.
It’s a tough world to raise a kid in. I know my approach doesn’t agree with many others. Most parents try to shield their kids from anything bad. I think that approach is going to backfire in today’s world.
My job as a parent is to prepare my son for the adult world, not to shield him from it.
I remember someone I knew in high school drank himself to death (not on purpose, either). Why? Cause he didn’t have the skills to deal with the peer pressure and didn’t know the dangers.
My son won’t be such a casualty.
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