<p>boysmom2-</p>
<p>Yes, your situation does seem that the parent might have tried reaching you first. Thanks for the heads up about the blogs.</p>
<p>Boysmom2 - I can't believe the other parent didn't contact YOU instead of the school. How strange. </p>
<p>I have read quite a few of these in looking at various colleges. Some of what I've read has curled my hair. Both my son and my daughter have had blogs at various times that I have stumbled across and I've had to warn them about what they were posting being read by the universe. I would say I don't understand the attraction of airing your life in public but then I post here all the time. :)</p>
<p>I can understand why a parent might not contact the parents of a student about whom they are concerned. I am NOT saying this applies to Boysmom2's situation, but I have read blogs in which kids describe dangerous, illegal, and/or self-destructive behaviors and in the same breath express alienation and hatred for their parents. In the absence of a relationship with those parents or knowledge of the nature of those parent-child relationships, it may seem safer and more responsible to take concerns to a counselor at a school.</p>
<p>I'm a student and I have a LiveJournal. I keep it for a variety of reasons, but I am also Friends Only. Only the people I want to see my entries can see them. It is absolutely inappropriate for parents to be sending blurbs from a blog to a school. Even if it's something serious. Would you cut a page out of your daughter's diary and mail it to her teachers? That's basically what it is. (Yes I realize it was another parent, but my point still stands)</p>
<p>If my parents were reading my LiveJournal, or "forced" me to add them to my friends list, I'd simply create a new journal or filter them out. Yes, I can hide my entries from people on my list! You can pick and chose who exactly gets to see what. </p>
<p>I realize what I type will be online forever, but I'm ok with that. At least for now. I am a college student and have been happily blogging (on a variety of sites) for 2 years now.</p>
<p>kewkiekid: Privacy is very important to anyone and it seems that you have taken all the appropriate safeguards for yours. If you trust those reading about your personal feelings than it might be therapeutic. You obviously understand the risks and are OK with them. The Internet is great in so many ways but also seems to be a venue that has little controls or protections. At least it is hard to keep up with since it moves and changes so fast. What children sometimes forget is that their parents (in most cases) are paying for the computer equipment they use and the use of the Internet. To misuse this privilege is to put yourself in personal danger. This happens if these live journals are not protected, which they are often not and in many other circumstances using the Internet. While a child is under the protection of a parent, meaning while they are dependent on them, it is the duty of that parent to make sure that they are healthy and safe. Checking up on their computer use is a new parent responsibility and is necessary with the world we live in today. It is not appropriate to share your deepest and most personal feelings with everyone or anyone. This is a cultural change that I, as an adult find most troubling. If someone writes something, that might be written at a sad or weak moment (which may not represent the individual's true feelings normally), and someone else chooses to share that information with another party, it could really hurt the original person. This was our situation but the fault lies with my son for doing it in the first place. What the other parent did was despicable and very unfair but he would not have had the opportunity if it werent out there in the first place. As I said, my son learned a very hard lesson.</p>
<p>It is a very good idea to explain to kids the possible consequences of posting information on the internet.</p>
<p>And not just kids. Many adults need to be reminded as well. A seemingly innocent email received at work, full of bad (and possibly offensive) jokes forwarded by you to a friend could get you fired. </p>
<p>On another board I saw people complaining about a vendor. That vendor was very unhappy about the complaints and did a little "internet research" of his own. He identified several of the complainers, served them with lawsuits, sent emails to their employers (especially those who spent a lot of time at work posting to a not work-related forum) and posted their names and pictures on his company website with his unflattering narrative attached. Basically made their lives hell. So everyone, be careful out there! (or here...)</p>
<p>Almost the same thing happened to me as to boysmom2's son. I was in a bad mood and wrote an angry, frustrated blog. (Nothing too harsh, it basically said, "I can't believe such and such a person would act this way!" and no swearing or depressive words.) A mom found my post and sent it to several superiors of mine in an internship program. Needless to say, I was rather ticked at the mom for her rudeness (she did not contact my parents first either) and frustrated she put something personal out there for my overseers to read. I have since hidden all the archives on my blog and now only post what I wouldn't mind Dracula, Frankenstein, and Jeffrey Dahmer reading.</p>
<p>"I have since hidden all the archives on my blog and now only post what I wouldn't mind Dracula, Frankenstein, and Jeffrey Dahmer reading."</p>
<p>This is a good idea when one is doing anything on-line, including e-mail. Anything can be made public or may be seen by your worst enemy. Even if one is posting under an assumed name, it is very possible that others will figure out who you are.</p>
<p>My husband, a college prof, once got in the mail a copy of one of his student's e-mails from her internship in another state. He happened to have taught her summer roommate (who did not go to the college where he teaches, but had met my husband through a program the previous summer). The student's summer roommate also worked with the student, and had gotten angry. They had had some heated correspondance on their company's e-mail, and for some reason, the roommate decided to share that with my husband. It included allegations about the student's sex life.</p>
<p>It's important to keep in mind, too, that one can be successfully sued for libel for things that one says in e-mail, blogs, etc. about another person if it exposes the person to shame, hatred or ridicule.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, there are many people who have no idea that their parents, enemies, teachers, employers, etc. are reading their blogs. Even blogs that are supposed to be open to only "friends" probably are accessible to other people. If that's not possible now, given how quickly technology advances, I am sure that the blogs will be accessible in the future.</p>
<p>Accessing old blogs might in the future be something that is routinely done when employers consider hiring staff or when people are candidates for political office.</p>
<p>Here is an excerpt from a blog that answers some of the questions that were posted here. (I do not know the person who wrote it...)</p>
<p>These online journals are such silly things, really. We all write them hoping someone will read them - admit it if you haven't already, okay? If you were really just doing it for the sake of writing, you wouldn't put it on the internet. You are doing it for the sake of it being read - or at least that's one of your reasons.</p>
<p>We also write on here to show off. Look at our fantastic social lives, see how close we are with our friends, don't you wish you had as many cool friends as us. And then we write on here looking for attention. See our tragedy, our misery, come comfort us and show us you love us. What we want most is for someone to leave a comment, an eternal reminder that we have friends, a reminder that the whole world can see, proof that we are not alone and that people love us.</p>
<p>So we indulge in each others' wishes, leaving comments on other peoples' journals, trading them like currency. That's the thing about text - it can be saved and then displayed, a trophy for each social interaction. We then go read other peoples' journals and compare them to ourselves, and get jealous or get smug. We have arguments because confrontational conversations normally best left to face-to-face contact come out in a "personal" weblog entry, and suddenly everyone is mad at each other, because really, it's a backhanded way to attack someone. Not only have you not had the balls to do it in person, but you've passively yelled at someone in front of the whole world, humiliating and enraging them.</p>
<p>We also like our journals because we try to encapsulate ourselves onto them, we pour ourselves out hoping perhaps to get closer to people. Hoping perhaps that people will see who we really are and love us for it. We take online quizzes and post the results (okay, well, YOU take online quizzes and post the results) to characterize ourselves, categorize ourselves. We all love being summed up - it makes us feel understood and understandable. When we get a reputation - <em>any</em> reputation, really, for any random thing - we're happy because now we know how to act, now we have our little niche, now we have a personality to follow. We have our little things that we <em>love</em> and we <em>hate</em> and really, it's not so much that we actually love or hate those things so much as we like being known as the person who loves or hates those things.</p>
<p>My father (who was a newspaper editor whose newspaper won a Pulitzer Prize for investigative journalism) once said: "Never put anything in writing that you'd mind reading on the front page of your local newspaper."</p>
<p>He died long before the creation of the modern internet, but he would have loved blogs. All that material!</p>
<p>I am glad that other parents are disturbed about blogs. I find it difficult to comprehend why anyone would publicize their most intimate thoughts and feelings for the whole world to read. I have been disgusted at the filthy language some teens use in their blogs and the graphic descriptions of their sex lives that they give online. As others have noted, this may be a source of regret and shame for them eventually, even if they profess not to care right now.</p>
<p>I read the blogs of the students who attend my daughters high school and I am generally impressed by the caring that they show to each other, the humor they express and the passion they have for their various interests.
Some are occasionally crude, but those are the less frequent posters and the crudeness is usually expressed in the icon they select, not in language.
Vulgarity in language can sometimes be explained by a limited vocabulary, I hope that as they increase their vocabulary they will learn the joys of subtlety ;)</p>
<p>This thread brought to mind a discussion on the old forum about kids who were interested in careers that required a security clearance, such as the CIA and NSA. I think the military and some industries (such as defense contractors) and others could be added to that list. I have warned my children that they need to be very judicious in deciding what to post online. A government agency doing a background check (or a potential employer) will be able to find most everything an individual has posted online. I just don't think teenagers are thinking this far ahead, or maybe they're just too innocent about the way things work, but in any case they need to be careful. Here's the thread:</p>
<p>Maybe the parent did not know you well enough to contact you?
Likewise I cannot advise on the prudence of the other parent 'going behind your back' because I have not read the blog.</p>
<p>I've had the same issues with my daughter's blog - her entries and the comments are also well written and entertaining, and also often profane. A good deal of what is said is simply not true -- it is exaggeration or boasting or joking or wishful thinking. I had a huge argument with her a year ago when her brother told her that I had been reading the blog - she insisted that it was private and I should not ever read it. I pointed out that it was on the internet for anyone to read - that it could be easily found by Googling her screenname - that the teachers at her school and even her worst enemies could read it. She told me that it was fine for them to read it, but that I should never read it. She had a second blog that she had created in honor of a favorite teacher - the school counselor found out about it and insisted it be shut down -- so she is well aware that school officials can find the blog. All of her friends have blogs with the same internet site -- I can find and read all the other kid's blogs just by following the links of those who have "subscribed" to hers or left comments. </p>
<p>I honestly don't know what these kids are thinking. I do read the blog - no matter what my daughter says -- precisely because it is public. </p>
<p>I don't have any answers for you. I know to take what I see written in the blogs with a grain of salt -- and even though I read the blog, I never discuss it with my daughter because I know she wants to pretend that I don't see it. Obviously if there was something really disturbing in the blog, I'd confront her -- but instead what I do is if there is something that concerns me, I find a way to bring up the subject a few days later. I mean, basically the blog gives me a window into my daughter's life that I wouldnt have without it. </p>
<p>Of course, everyone else on the planet has the same window -- but I think this generation is growing up with some different views about privacy and communication, shaped by the internet, and I'm not sure there is much that we parents can do about it. You're lucky that your son had the experience which is embarassing him now -- at least he's learned -- I don't think my daughter quite gets it.</p>
<p>Calmom-</p>
<p>I'm curious about why you read the blog. What makes you want to read it since it doesn't seem to relate to reality, in many instances?</p>
<p>In answer to the initial question. I do it. It's not just the kids.
I share way too many personal facts on this forum.It's bad.THat's why I don't give out important personal information.Anyone could track me down if I did.</p>
<p>"Anyone could track me down if I did."</p>
<p>And what do you think would happen if they did? I think many posters are too paranoid.</p>
<p>I read recently in US NEWS AND WORLD REPORT, I think, that people who keep diaries are more apt to be on anti-depressant medication and/or commit suicide. Scary thought. Sometimes its better to let history go and concentrate on a new and brighter day rather than trying to analyze every single day's course of events. just a thought.</p>
<p>I think the correlation in that case would be a link between those who are more introspective (e.g. ones who keep diaries) and depression/suicide. I'm a thoughtful person, and I've learned that sometimes getting out or exercising really lightens my mood when I need it!</p>