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Is it appropriate for a 12-year-old to use Twitter?

Is it appropriate for a 12-year-old to use Twitter?


  • Total voters
    28
I'm asking the question because of this story I found at Newsbusters. As liberal parents we would not have allowed our kids to use if it was available then.

12-Year-Old Black Conservative Receives Twitter Death Threats for Being

Unless you tie your kids up in a room with no electronic gadgets, they're going to do what they do at age 12. It's like when I deemed our house a no video game house, no problem, but I would be a fool to think they weren't playing video games at their friends' houses. So unless they have no cellphone, no access to computerized gadgets of their friends, and every minute of their time online at home is 100% lorded over.... they're going to have a twitter account if they want one. Most 12 year olds are more app savvy than their parents.
 
Twitter? No. I MIGHT consider Facebook at 12 as long as I ensured he used the proper security options and only friended people he knew personally. As far as Twitter or discussion forums like this, I think I would feel more comfortable if they waited until they entered high school.
 
Unless you tie your kids up in a room with no electronic gadgets, they're going to do what they do at age 12. It's like when I deemed our house a no video game house, no problem, but I would be a fool to think they weren't playing video games at their friends' houses. So unless they have no cellphone, no access to computerized gadgets of their friends, and every minute of their time online at home is 100% lorded over.... they're going to have a twitter account if they want one. Most 12 year olds are more app savvy than their parents.

The question isn't what they are going to do, it's is it appropriate?
 
The question isn't what they are going to do, it's is it appropriate?
When reality outranks appropriate, it's a fool's errand to be concerned about the latter and instead should prepare the 12 year old to properly handle the former.
 
Here we go with age standards again, so what should mommy and daddy government make the minimum age to use Twitter?
 
When reality outranks appropriate, it's a fool's errand to be concerned about the latter and instead should prepare the 12 year old to properly handle the former.

Ah, the old "well they're gonna do it anyways" approach. Gee, I have no idea why kids are so out of control these days. :roll:
 
Here we go with age standards again, so what should mommy and daddy government make the minimum age to use Twitter?

How about just, mommy and daddy? ;)
 
When reality outranks appropriate, it's a fool's errand to be concerned about the latter and instead should prepare the 12 year old to properly handle the former.

Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying. When does the words of the parents outrank what the 12 year old wants? How about sex? Drugs? ...
 
Ah, the old "well they're gonna do it anyways" approach. Gee, I have no idea why kids are so out of control these days. :roll:

THESE days? Seriously? Kids have always done behind their parents backs what they wanted to do. So instead of being an ignorant parent, one should make sure that the child has the input to handle the situations as well as possible, as well as discussing how and when "inappropriate" choices are getting out of hand and need adult assistance. If the child is taught only abstinence from what it wants, but as many kids will, chooses to do "it" anyway, then if things go wrong, that child no longer feels safe or assured that going to the parent is the right choice. I never wanted that to be a worry for my kids. Better that they are informed, fairly warned, and ... most important know that if they choose to be stupid, I still would have an open door to discuss any related issues with.

This philosophy worked very well for us. My son's friends all began drinking around age 13, so did he. My son's friends didn't have parental access regarding the issue, mine did... so when they all decided to graduate from booze to meth, my son didn't and left the group, why because he could come to me and be honest and straight forward about what was going on without worried that I had forbade and therefore there'd be punishment for even admitting anything. Isolation from parents caused by parents stubborn refusal to accept realities is bad for kids.
 
Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying. When does the words of the parents outrank what the 12 year old wants? How about sex? Drugs? ...

Unless you're tethered to your kids, parents don't outrank what a 12 year old wants. Finances do, access does, but parents ... not so much.
 
I'm asking the question because of this story I found at Newsbusters. As liberal parents we would not have allowed our kids to use if it was available then.

12-Year-Old Black Conservative Receives Twitter Death Threats for Being

A far, far bigger question is what kind of sick **** sends anyone, let alone a twelve-year-old, death threats.

BTW I believe that online death/rape/other violence/etc. threats are not taken seriously enough by most law enforcement authorities. Malicious trolls know this and thus know that in most cases, they will be free to threaten with impunity.
 
Ah, the old "well they're gonna do it anyways" approach. Gee, I have no idea why kids are so out of control these days. :roll:

On the contrary, it's mostly the children of highly authoritarian anti-reality parents who wind up with these problems. The ones who think abstinence-only should still be pushed despite its complete failure, the ones who think threatening people with years or decades in prison is a sane solution to college kids smoking pot, the ones who think of other people a bit like dogs; they're to be trained, not talked to.

The ones who grew up like that are the ones having children as children, doing drugs, etc, for reasons explained below.

Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying. When does the words of the parents outrank what the 12 year old wants? How about sex? Drugs? ...

The most successful method of keeping children from doing drugs or having sex too young is education and making sure they actually understand the risks, not authoritarianism.

This is the basic principle that underlies fact-based sex ed, which is extremely successful in both delaying sexual debut until the late teens and beyond, and bringing down teen pregnancy and STD rates dramatically.

Teenagers are naturally paranoid. Contrary to popular belief, psychological research shows that they tend to over-estimate the risks of what they're doing. But they can only do that if they actually understand the risks. Understanding is why fact-based sex ed works, and authoritarian abstinence-only does not.

12-year-olds don't think like 4-year-olds. They have at least basic cognitive faculties which they will use to question whether your authority is legitimate, and they respond better to conversation than they do to dog training techniques.

Even the most authoritarian parents cannot completely control their children once they start getting towards their teens just by commanding them. Believe me, I know; I was partying with those people's kids. They jumped out of second-floor windows, risked having their entire room emptied to a barren shell, and I suspect possibly an ass beating, to come party with us.

Your children will be exposed to the real world, and if you want to stop them from taking on too much too soon, have a little consideration for their developing minds. They're not dogs. And more importantly, as Summerwind said, establishing yourself as a safe and reasonable person to talk to about the issues they face can save them from a lot of harm.
 
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On the contrary, it's mostly the children of highly authoritarian anti-reality parents who wind up with these problems. The ones who think abstinence-only should still be pushed despite its complete failure, the ones who think threatening people with years or decades in prison is a sane solution to college kids smoking pot, the ones who think of other people a bit like dogs; they're to be trained, not talked to.

The ones who grew up like that are the ones having children as children, doing drugs, etc, for reasons explained below.

Do you have any actual evidence to support this? Because, I'm pretty sure troubled kids come from all walks of life.
 
I'm asking the question because of this story I found at Newsbusters. As liberal parents we would not have allowed our kids to use if it was available then.

12-Year-Old Black Conservative Receives Twitter Death Threats for Being

I'm glad I'm not a parent having to make these social media decisions. But my instinctual response is no, not appropriate. But as a disclaimer, I said no to TVs in bedrooms, pagers, and video games. I said yes to the first cell phone, however, because of post-Columbine school safety concerns.

There is such a rush to grow up, so much pressure, and I think it's okay to be "off-trend." What I'm seeing in young people is that as "connected" as they are, they aren't really connected at all--not in real life, only in real-time.
 
Do you have any actual evidence to support this? Because, I'm pretty sure troubled kids come from all walks of life.

Sure do. Random chance is a bitch.

But if we take overall society as an example, it's pretty clear. Obviously, not all American children will grow up with authoritarian abstinence-only teaching, but it's really only Americans who are ever taught that in the developed world, so we can expect to see the results in the overall numbers. Americans do all live under some of the most authoritarian drug laws in the world, so we can simply take society as a whole.

The sex ed example is easy. Just compare the US to literally anyplace else in the developed world. We have the dubious honor of having the worst teen pregnancy rate of any industrialized nation, and the worst states are the ones that teach abstinence-only the most. They are also some of the poorest, worst-educated states. Abstinence-only has been studied over and over and found to be completely ineffective. If anything, it dramatically increases teen pregnancy.

Americans also smoke dramatically more weed than the Dutch, who live under decriminalization. We smoke more than virtually everyone except Kiwis, actually.
 
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A far, far bigger question is what kind of sick **** sends anyone, let alone a twelve-year-old, death threats.

BTW I believe that online death/rape/other violence/etc. threats are not taken seriously enough by most law enforcement authorities. Malicious trolls know this and thus know that in most cases, they will be free to threaten with impunity.

This is exactly why parents should not allow their kids to use it. They should be told that if they did use social media they might get threats of all sorts.
 
The poor child will say something racist and ruin their career.:p
 
This is exactly why parents should not allow their kids to use it. They should be told that if they did use social media they might get threats of all sorts.

I understand the need to protect our kids, but doesn't this put the onus on the victim?
 
I understand the need to protect our kids, but doesn't this put the onus on the victim?

No, I don't think so, the person who made the threat is at fault and should be punished if caught.
 
The obvious problem here is that the Internet makes cyberbullying far easier, and restricting kids from using social media is a roundabout way to solve that problem. Cyberbullying needs to be curbed and the Internet should not be a place one has to worry about harassment.
 
This is exactly why parents should not allow their kids to use it. They should be told that if they did use social media they might get threats of all sorts.

Uhm, that happens in real life too. And really shouldn't parents instead of trying to protect a kid from reality, teach him how to handle it. I mean good gracious I can't count the number of death threats I've gotten in my life. Some people just don't back down and it pisses other people off, so we get threats. We should learn/teach to handle them, not pretend they don't exist.
 
The obvious problem here is that the Internet makes cyberbullying far easier, and restricting kids from using social media is a roundabout way to solve that problem. Cyberbullying needs to be curbed and the Internet should not be a place one has to worry about harassment.

I don't agree with this, instead except in cases where a life is seriously threatened, we need instead to teach how not to be bully-able. Particularly when it's just words on a screen. And btw, I DO NOT believe that ignoring bullying is a solution, it never works. But there are solutions and they can be taught.

For example, someone calls me a bitch, (I know hard to believe, but it happens all the time), my response is "you say that like it's a bad thing," with a huge cheshire cat smile, and then wink at them. Disarms 'em every time.
 
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