The Second Life Teen Grid: A Bad Idea

Over on New World Notes, "BadMove" comments on discussion about merging the Teen Grid and adult Second Life. He thinks it's a bad move -- there'll be no way to protect kids from adult content, adults will have to watch out who they speak to, and the whole thing will erupt into a scandal.

BadMove is dead wrong on this issue.

Minors can already get access to the adult grid. All they have to do is tell a little fib and say they're an adult. This is no obstacle to a healthy teen-age boy from getting at porn. When I was a teen-ager back in the 70s, porn came in magazine form. We got older kids to buy us porn, we went through our fathers's stashes, we even occasionally shoplifted. Kids today can get porn on the Internet -- without even leaving the house! All they have to do is lie about their age.

The best way for a parent to keep their kids out of trouble -- or anywhere -- is to participate in activities together with their children. And the Teen Grid prevents that, adults are forbidden from logging on. In the name of protecting children from adult content and predators, Linden Lab has taken away the best safeguard protecting kids from harm.

Not that I blame Linden Lab for this. LL is an American company, and my fellow Americans are completely and utterly hysterical and crazy on the subjects of child molesting and child pornography. They go around taking measures in the name of protecting children that, at best, do nothing, and at worst, put children in even greater danger.

"Stranger danger" to children is exaggerated. The biggest danger to kids comes from adult family members, friends, and trusted authority figures. Not people the kids met online, but people they know in real life.

The biggest danger to kids online isn't sex predators, it's cyberbullying. One great protection against cyberbullying is the presence of community-minded, nurturing adults, to tell bullying kids to knock it off. You know, like the kind of adults likely to use Second Life.

danah boyd has done extensive research into the subject of child behavior online. One of her most disturbing conclusions: Children who are preyed on online by adults aren't lured into trouble -- they seek it out. They aren't tricked into having sex with adults, they want it. The problem with these kids isn't the evil Internet -- it's their horrible home lives. And the Teen Grid will do nothing to stop these kids from getting into trouble, these are the kids with the fewest qualms about lying about their age and going on the main grid to look for trouble.

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