The Lazy Generation

The underlying problem with our generation is not the internet. Our problem is the M.O. that the easiest way is the best way. We have been spoiled to a point where we truly believe that not only are we the most important people on earth, but we deserve to get whatever we want... whenever we want it. In school, cheating is assumed. The weirdos are the kids who are unwilling to make cheat sheets and refuse to let others copy off of their tests. Outside of school, work is also a no-no. According to familyeducation.com, the average young person watches 5 hours of TV per day, 7 days a week. Where do we expect these children's lives to go? If unrestrained, an alarming number of teenagers will spend literally every free moment either staring at some sort of electronic screen or sleeping. One of my teammates is literally a social outcast because he is so desperate to play video games. His grades are horrible and very few people know him well at all. When we were in the dorms over Christmas break, he would spend as many as 10 hours per day on his Xbox. According to a huffingtonpost.com survey, 97% of children play video games. It's amazing that they can squeeze in those games while still watching their 5 daily hours of TV. What alarms me the most about the pervasiveness of cheating is the reason behind it. These kids are not buying term papers off the internet because they are incapable of doing the work. The motivation is pure laziness. How can I get by while doing the least possible work? This is the dominant mindset of children today, and unless something is done, the future of our nation will be in jeopardy.

face-to-monitor-to-face communication

I think we can all agree there is obvious danger on the internet. Sexual predators, Nigerian-Princess scams, and pop-up ads lurk around every click of the mouse. Perhaps, more dangerously, is the internet addiction afflicting hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. As stated in the video and reiterated by Mackenzie, most tech-savvy schools conduct internet safety courses in order to protect children from those who would try and hurt them. What the video failed to depict was that it’s really the excess of internet usage that is the trouble. Teens that spend a vast majority of their waking hours online are far more likely to regard the internet as something innocuous.
The video, almost laughably, describes the internet phenomena as if it were some horrible pandemic of disease. Facebook and Myspace, when used appropriately, are excellent social networking tools, rather than some ailment found on "House". However, as explored in the video, discretion seems to be the element we as a demographic lack. I know several people personally that have been targeted by internet “creepers”, but their experience has been because of their own poor judgment rather than because they were sought out. It’s common sense that if someone asks you to take a picture of yourself topless and put it on the internet, you don’t do it. For as many examples of internet misuse that PBS was able to find, there are dozens more counter-examples that disprove their theories.
The internet is not a simple fad. It is used daily by millions worldwide, creating easy commerce and linking people around the globe. What bothers me most is that the internet (as well as cell phones and instant messenger) eliminates the necessity for face-to-face communication. Using this class blog as a standard method of communication makes me wonder if the science-fiction farces in the movies are really all that far off. If our reliance is based on a simple data-transfer system (punctuated by the occasional emoticon if we so choose), we lose the real meaning of relationships. Even the Pope has condemned overuse of these internet networking tools!
It’s sort of funny, really, how quickly we have embraced Facebook and Myspace. For example; in my high school, unless your relationship was “Facebook-Official”, it didn’t exist. If you weren’t friends with a person on the internet, you clearly didn’t socialize with him or her in real life. It seems ridiculous that an internet site would dictate so many social interactions. In a perfect world, everyone would get along in social situations. We wouldn’t be so distracted by our technology. Still, to be perfectly honest, I have Facebook open just behind this blog post. My cell phone is going off on the table right next to me. I’m sitting in the student center with about twenty other kids, all of whom are glued to their monitors. We're all in our separate little internet worlds, though I bet you anything half of them are Facebookchatting each other. I’ve got to take my idealism with a grain of salt, I suppose.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/23/pope-warns-against-obsess_n_160283.html
http://mashable.com/2006/08/25/facebook-profile/

plus, I thought this was funny;
http://www.bittertonic.com/daily-dose/395/i-can-be-your-facebook-stalker/

In the video teens and their use of the internet was constantly given in a negative light. I realize that predators might lurk on social networking sites and kids might even engage in questionable behavior. I believe the worst impact upon teens of the 21st century is that many kids in an attempt to find themselves may lose their chance to find their true identity. The internet as used by most adolescents perverts the good influences that technology provides to the modern age. When immature kids and teenagers are given the power to create a separate identity they often find refuge in their life. Because they control every aspect of their own personal life, they feel in control of who they are, refusing help from parents, teachers, etc. However, when reality strikes outside of their “cyber world” their supposed self-image is crushed. Adolescents find refuge back in their other world, online. However, the pain of being denied outside of their computer might follow them to their supposed secure world. I cannot blame the internet for these often grievous situations. But I do believe that often enough, parents do not play the role entitled to them by God. I ponder where the balance between being completely unaware of their children’s double life and to overly protective of teens lies. Can they be more involved in other matters to alleviate the need of belonging and identity this generation demands? The answer however is not only theirs to find but also ours to give.
www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Teen_Parents_data_memo_Oct2007.pdf
www.christian-education.org/downloads/InternetSafetyParents.pdf
www.oneplaneteducation.com/Internet_Safety_Guide.pdf

Teens and Online Bullying

Today, there are few limits to internet access. Nearly anything and everything can be found or done through digital media. One disturbing trend is cyberbullying. In "Growing Up Online" I felt the most horriffic video was about the 13 year old boy, Ryan Halligan, who committed suicide because he was bullied online. He was harrassed online. This is something that more and more people are becoming aware of, but this still occurs too much. It is not yet possible to prevent all forms of cyberbullying. Because Ryan was bullied online, he wanted to commit suicide. Sadly, he was able to find websites with 'how-to' information on committing suicide.

Some teens go online to better express themselves. Some teens go online to escape reality.
However, some teens have their troubles follow them, even to their computer or cell phone. They can't escape the cruel remarks made in peson or online. Cyberbullying can take place through e-mail, text messages, instant messages, or any other form of digital communication. At school, students are protected from bullies. Teachers are on the lookout for bullies, and virtually every form of web communication is blocked at school. However, when teens come home and are alone in their rooms, there is no one there to protect them. Thankfully, this is beginning to change.

After Ryan's suicide, Vermont (his home state) began to propose ideas for laws that could prohibit all forms of cyberbullying. These new laws would place the school system in the middle of an bullying incident that might occur away from school grounds. The passing of such laws would determine if students can be punished for communication that goes on outside of school. To some, this may be an invasion of privacy. I believe that one child's suicide is more than enough, and laws or rules should be set to prevent this from happening again in the future.

http://www.vineland.org/tech/fight_bullies.pdf

One part of the PBS documentary "Growing up Online" particularly resonated with me. I felt that the woman who was the PTA president and mother of four teenagers was the epitome of what we would term these days as a "helicopter parent." Most teenagers, including myself, would have no sympathy for parents who feel the need to monitor every move their children make. However, watching this documentary made me realize that if a teenager is willing to put personal information about him- or herself on the internet for anyone in the world to see, he or she has no right to get mad at his or her parents for attempting to see that same information. Although this does not change the fact that I personally would never give my parents the passwords to my Facebook or MySpace accounts, I cannot deny them the right to see information I put on the internet in places where it is accessible to the public. When both of my parents got Facebook accounts, I had the option and the right to deny their friend requests just like I do with any other person.
As the documentary also states, however, parents generally have no cause for worry when it comes to internet predators. Because our generation is so internet-oriented, schools have recently begun to conduct more education regarding internet safety. One study shows that 82% of teenagers' instant message partners are close friends from school.1 Adolescents and teenagers generally know how to practice safe internet usage, and if a parent is concerned about his or her child's internet safety knowledge, he or she can talk to the child to share this information.

1http://www.cdmc.ucla.edu/downloads/Adolescent%20Internet%20usepdf.pdf <http://www.cdmc.ucla.edu/downloads/Adolescent%20Internet%20usepdf.pdf>

The Assimilation of the Offline Generation

Perhaps the question that the “Growing Up Online” documentary didn’t cover is how the availability and popularity of the Internet, and perhaps more so the social networking sites (OSN for short), are effecting the previous generation. Since the documentary came out in early 2008, I’ve noticed a proliferation of adults on Facebook.

Some I’m sure are there in order to keep track of their children, as called spying by those who are being “kept track of”. Some adults though are now becoming fully integrated into the world of online social networking. They are finding old friends and making new ones and even using the plethora of applications available to them on the site. The Borg like spread of OSN has gotten to point that an Australian court has allowed sending a message on Facebook to be considered a way of serving legally binding documents¹. Many companies are even going to Facebook and MySpace in order to research job applicants, and many of them are not liking what they find².  

Because of this generation’s interconnectedness with the Internet and technology as a whole, previous generations are being forced to learn things like what being “poked” means or how to type in texting jargon. Will the previous generations be able to keep up with this technology infused generation? How will that affect the “Online Generation”? Or will they simply, in the words of a fellow student’s Facebook status update, “realize that they will never understand Facebook”?

 

1)  see http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2008-12-16-australia-facebook_N.htm

2) see http://www.zdnetasia.com/techjobs/career-resources/0,3800009355,62050688,00.htm

    And http://www.news-herald.com/articles/2009/02/06/news/nh453376.txt

The Online Generation

The PBS Video Special “Growing up Online” was a very intriguing social analysis, but one must not overlook its biases. PBS does not have a historical reputation of being in-tune with adolescent culture, and this truth was rather apparent in the approach it took toward the “Online Generation.” Though the video contained a large amount of valid, often disturbing information about the manner in which online communication is molding the current generation, it assumed a somewhat patronizing view toward these “internet-addicted” teens—having them confess their deepest cyber-secrets and then including the opinion of the tragically deceived parents. The video did an excellent job of conveying the dangers that lurk in the unexplored frontiers of internet communication but failed to provide an adequately rounded assessment. In particular, PBS showed a clear cynicism on the nature of Facebook, which is now regarded by members of every generation as an indispensable communication tool.

According to Jamie Efaw’s article “Social Networking Services: the New Influence Frontier” which appeared in the academic journal American Diplomacy, Facebook (and social networking in general) is a great triumph for the Western world in what she calls “the War of Ideas”. Efaw asserts that the social mobility and minimal restriction of ideas, creativity, and communication manifest in applications like Facebook give the West a decisive advantage in both time and economic efficiency, two invaluable assets to an increasingly interconnected world. That brings us to this question: do the benefits we reap by the products of “Growing up Online” enumerated in Efaw’s article outweigh the potential social detriment PBS warns us of? Or is this cost-benefit approach not a proper way to evaluate the emerging dilemma?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/22/AR2008022202630.html