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In the wake of Amanda Todd's suicide (RIP), discussion on Social Media

Dude

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By now everyone has heard of this young lady from Coquitlam taking her own life. Bullying has moved from the school yard to Facebook, and it is more frightening than ever.

I have two young children...boy 13, girl 10. SM is a reality. We reluctantly allowed our son to join FB this year, with the argument that he could always set up a fake account on his own behind our backs. We monitor it, and talk w/ him about on-line social responsibility all the time. I've had him remove certain posts and photos. I think he's learning. The alternate would be to completely try and micro manage him and restrict his use 100%. I don't know what is better, I'm just trying to figure things out.

I posted a reply to a friend on FB just now, but want to hear from my TTP friends as to what they think...especially you teachers. Captain, this must be a little more crushing for you, given your involvement in girl's soccer, and daughters this young lady's age.

Problem is Brian, SM is not going away. Like booze and sex for kids under 19...we can't 100% control what happens in our kis lives once they become young adults. Lock-down doesn't work. As parents, we need to adapt, and be involved in our kids lives. You are, I am, I know that. Our wives are. My answer is to talk w/ my son about this whole incident, and continue to have open, honest conversations w/ him about his social responsibilities, and cause / effect. FB scares the shite outta me, BTW.

Discuss, please keep it respectful.
 

Tuna

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This is dreadful and beyond sad. I have a son and a daughter under the age of 3 and I'm already cringing at the prospect of what social media is going to be like in 8-10 years time.

I agree with you Dude, being as open and involved with your son and daughter's access and use of social media is probably the most sensible approach.

Amanda obviously didn't have a network of friends to lean on so it really boils down to parents and teachers taking the bull by the horns and intervening if they were to catch wind of anything happening. Such a complex issue though that we as parents and that teachers seem to be having to learn about as we go.

RIP Amanda
 

Yoda

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Being that my daughter unfortunately reads the front cover of the Province while eating breakfast every morning it was unavoidable.
I waited for her to finish reading it all and waited for questions. None came.
I asked if she understood it all and she said no.
At 9 years old I would expect that most of that stuff is beyond her grasp but I took it as an opportunity to explain what happened and why. She was shocked and didn't understand why she would do it and how bad it was for her everyday at school.

Did I think I'd be having a conversation like this with a 9 year old kid?No
Is it unfortunately a good reason to do it? Yes.

All these conversations need to happen sooner now than we were young. Sex, drugs, bullying, and now, social media.

As I said on FB, it's too bad this outpouring of support didn't find her sooner and the ones that did find her were the hurtful ones.
 

cascadesoccer

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This is horrible stuff, I feel terrible for her, her family and friends and almost more sorry for society as this is what were becoming. I think you restricting and monitoring is a great thing and I may not be a parent, but it seems completely restricting kids these days just results in them rebeling and doing it anyways. I graded in 02 and in the past 10 years social media has sky rocketed, we went from barely having cell phones to being able to access anything, anytime, anywhere. This is a great thing that really helps a lot of people but unfortunately for the kids who have to make themselves feel better by degrading others it makes it all to easy. It is also of no help that when the kids stand up to their bullies they're the ones who are usually punished and nothing happens to the kid or kids who have been tormenting them. I'm not sure if im glad the kids who tormented this poor girl to death have to live with that the rest of their lives or I feel more sorry for the people they're going to become. It's really sad that an event like this has to happen for people to realize the effect bullying has. Is it up to us as society to do something or the schools to have mandatory classes on this, I dunno? That show on tlc that had the bullying classes was really something to watch and it seemed to bring the schools closer together. Sadly society probably won't change and all we can hope for is more 1 on 1 parenting like Dude is doing and parents really teaching there kids life lessons. Lots of parents these days just want to be their kids friend and buddy and not be the "bad guy" so for those of you actually teaching your kids lessons and about life, thank you.
 

johnnybluenose

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Agree Dude. I'm a new(ish) parent with 2 young girls. It's "easy" now with them being Kindergarten and pre-school ages... I shudder to think how the missus and I would deal with them if they were 12 and 15 now...luckily we have a decade to refine our skills before the real hard years get going...

I've seen some crazy things happen to kids who were uber-sheltered and I've seen some uber-sheltered kids come out fine.

Parenting is the absolute hardest/most rewarding thing I've been blessed with in my life. You only get one chance every day to make that everlasting impact on your kid each day.

I'd like to think I'll try to raise my kids the way my wife and I were raised: With tolerance, guidance, forgiveness and mentoring. I'm not trying to be my kids friend. I'm trying to raise them up to be a respectful and productive member of society. If we can be friends once they are older and out of my house: Great, and that's what I'll strive for. But I'm not going to let me kid(s) do whatever the fcuk they want just so they "like" me.

My kids certainly won't be able to do SM till they're old enough and demonstrate that they're mature enough to handle it, and like you've said: Superivision and Coaching is the way to go.

We do what we do because we've seen it before. Atrocities like bullying etc is a learned/mob behaviour. Either Bullies have been bullied or they've seen it in action. I honestly don't think it's a natural human behaviour. It comes from many things, but chief among them is poor self esteem.

Parents, I'm new at this but I have learned one thing: Loving your kids and telling them this as much as possible is the most important way to foster self esteem and self worth in your kid. If a kid goes to School, Dance, Hockey, Soccer, the skatepark WHEREVER outside the confines of "home" feeling like crap about themselves they'll go where they feel like they can be loved. There will be some kids victims of abuse/poor parenting/bullying etc there and they tend to gravitate to each other and the 7/11 parking lot is not a place kids learn how to be productive and respectful members of society and their community.

This conversation doesn't need to be limited to just social media, as this was only the vehicle for more systemic problems with society as it relates to Miss Amanda Todd (RIP) :(
 

swampdonkey

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Dude, good thread! I have two daughters 16 and 18, both of which are on multiple social media sites, I insisted if they were to be on such sites they would need to friend me or follow me....I like you monitored and commented over the first few years in an attempt to influence and guide them. I think its incredibly sad that this young girl felt her only option was to take her life. I for years have been telling my daugthers that life is tough and you need to have a thick skin that bullying is alive and well, and often subtle, and extends beyond school age, we are surrounded by bullying on television (TMZ, The Soup, reality tv, Chelsey Handler) so it's important to realize that you cant please everyone all of the time and that some people will simply not like you and that's okay. I think the big difference is when you are school age you're captive, you can't decide who you associate with or what you see and for those kids out there who may be predisposed to mental health issues, confidence issues, social anxieties, etc...it makes for a disastorous recipe. I'd venture to say many of these kids also deal with a lack of support at home in many instances. I think as parents we need to continue to talk to our kids even when they don't want to ( 16 and 18 year old girls), try to get a pulse, ask about their friends and draw inference from their situations and always let our kids know they are supported and loved by their family.

My wife and I were just talking about how different it is for kids now, always plugged in, eyes on a screen. It wasn't that way when I was a kid I could escape the bombardment and temptations that litter their lives today.

It's no easy task to instill empathy and a sense of community into teenagers when they rarely see anything that's not right in front of their face but no doubt we need to keep at it and tragedies like Amanda Todd shine a bright light.
 

akslop

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This incident hit close to home for us as one of my staff members daughter grew up with Amanda. You are never going to stop bullying in school or online. I speak for most when saying i have been on both ends of the spectrum. The education curriculam (sp) needs to adapt and quickly get up to speed with social media. Yeah i mean scrap the cooking and sewing electives and start classes teaching kids at the elementary level to prepare for the new world of communication we live in. As adults we are just learning and can only teach what we know, But we are also ignorant and guilty for not wanting to learn. We need more Leaders and less Followers in society today. Children are the future. As for Law and legislation we need to figure out a method of accountability for those who push one to the edge. Wether its through public shame or criminal charges, I dont know but their has to be some method minimize this.

If you watched that video and your eyes didn't fill with water u have no heart.

Only learning about this after left me feeling helpless but immediatley wanting to make a difference.

And To The guy who took the picture of this young girls chest and posted them on social media for the purpose of being a bottom feeder of society . Karma will catch up to u and when it does i hope you feel pain 100x more than the pain you have caused Amanda and her family.

RIP young lady.
 

swampdonkey

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Akslop, you're bang on about cooking and sewing being backfilled with a social media / social ethics course. School counsellors should be a better utilized resource as well.
 

akslop

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Akslop, you're bang on about cooking and sewing being backfilled with a social media / social ethics course. School counsellors should be a better utilized resource as well.

agree 100% SD.

My daughter is 11 and goes to school in Washington State. They are way a head of us here and actually had a class lesson dedicated to social media. She was telling me as an exercise the kids were given a cue card face down on their desk. Each cue card had a nasty message for another student. The kids had a choice... 1) Take the message on the cue card.. seek out the student and recite what was on the cue card to the other kids face or 2) take that cue card, type it out, print it and send as if it was an email to the other student. Every single kid including my own chose #2.. Lesson at the end which hit hard on alot of kids and was brought home was if you wouldn't say it to their face then you dont type it.. I thought the lesson was absolutley brilliant all though it did stir quite a bit of contraversy until the parents were explained the reasoning behind it.
 

STD

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I was at the play area in Brentwood with my son a few weeks ago and I couldn't believe the way some of the kids were already acting like bullies and the fact that a lot of the parents did nothing to teach their kids it was wrong. I called one parent on it about how his kid should not be pushing the other kids and he looked at me with a blank stare said "oh" and continued to do nothing. Maybe I just interupted the article he was reading in his magazine while he son was being a little prick and he was going to deal with it later. I left there with an ill feeling knowing the difficulties ahead of making sure my son doesn't get bullied but doesn't become a bully himself. Hopefully they get some sort of control over social media before he starts school and for now I'll enjoy the fact that the biggest danger to him at this age is himself.
 

Dude

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Yeah i mean scrap the cooking and sewing electives and start classes teaching kids at the elementary level to prepare for the new world of communication we live in.



Love this, but scrap textiles only. Cooking still has a purpose, and when I was in junior high, it was the best place to meet and get to know girls. Typically 3:1 ratio at least.

All kidding asside, I think one of those deffinitely should be scrapped, and the course made into a mandatory...as in, it must be taken at least once, and maybe there is only one level to it. Seriously, how different is it, really, than communications?

If we are indeed serious about preparig our kids for life after school, this is a major, major area of interest.

Employers out there: how many of you use Facebook to screen new hires? We did. We researched every resume that made the "interview" pile, and for the most part, were able to do some pretty good recon. I'd say 8/10.
 

akslop

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Love this, but scrap textiles only. Cooking still has a purpose, and when I was in junior high, it was the best place to meet and get to know girls. Typically 3:1 ratio at least.

All kidding asside, I think one of those deffinitely should be scrapped, and the course made into a mandatory...as in, it must be taken at least once, and maybe there is only one level to it. Seriously, how different is it, really, than communications?

If we are indeed serious about preparig our kids for life after school, this is a major, major area of interest.

Employers out there: how many of you use Facebook to screen new hires? We did. We researched every resume that made the "interview" pile, and for the most part, were able to do some pretty good recon. I'd say 8/10.

Dude the ratio has changed since we were in school. It's 3 boys for every girl now.
 

Dude

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Dude the ratio has changed since we were in school. It's 3 boys for every girl now.

Haha...wouldn't doubt it.

But, still usefull. Birds love guys that can cook. I have a buddy who is average to look at, but a champ in the kitchen. The Mrs says he gets sexy once he's in his element.

BTW, Brian Picard: call me to arrange the wife swapping.

Also, textiles...what an effing joke that is. My kid is learning the life long usefull lesson of sewing sock puppets right now.

Everyone knows there are only two uses for socks.
 

Reccos

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It is shocking that this can happen like it does. I had this conversation about bullying with our son just last year (his kids are school age) and I was mouthing all the stuff about standing up to bullies like they had to do. His point that I didn't quite grasp until recently was that the internet was the new battleground and this seems to be the worst tool of all now. I get it now.

Schools have to be the front line for identifying issues with kids but parents are equal partners and must take more than the lion share of responsibility.

Looking back I can see that my kids fared okay at school (boys) as they were in both baseball and soccer where I was also a coach or spectator in those years so they had good support at school from other kids. My wife would teach turn the other cheek but that didn't work so I taught push back - it did work.

Kids need support at school from other kids but I see now the game changer is the internet.

I think too we need to look at some of the lessons taught to children about not being a tattle tale. We know in business that whistle blowers for the most part don't fare well in their careers after. Some will point to exceptions but overall my statement is true. When discussing this with others the speculation is that some time it is the whistle blower was not a good person, was disgruntled and negative - but I do think some of it runs deeper and has roots in those early lessons.

That link shows how some kids tattle for power so it is not always a simple issue but somehow we need to get other kids to speak up if they know someone is being victimized.



Tattling, Tattletales, and Tattleboxes | Power Tools
 

akslop

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johnnybluenose

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Hey, I'm all for free speech and all that.. I'm also all for not whinging when the repercussions of your actions come home to roost also! :wa:
 

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