Internet Red Flags
When your daughter prefers to get on the computer late at night and spends hours on it, you want to remember that getting online means she is out in public — unprotected. The people she meets in cyberspace are often not who they pretend to be. So take time to go over, and update, your Internet ground rules with your daughter. Be sure to discuss the following:
Setting a specific time she can use the Internet and for what purposes.
The possibility of her being bullied, harassed, or “hit on” by others, even her classmates, while in a chat room. She must tell you when it happens, so you can help her deal with the problem, which may mean she needs to notify the person in charge of bullying at her school.
Exchanging mean or “flirty” e-messages with her friends, which she should not do, even as a joke. She can never take back what she sends out into cyberspace.
Whether we live in a more dangerous world than other generations or not is hotly debated these days. Some people say we do. Others claim that the dangers have not increased but the opportunities to hear about them have — a thousand-fold. One thing is certain, however: Never before has such a vast arena as cyberspace existed as a meeting place for people who want to take your money, drive you nuts with unwanted advertising, and show you disturbing pictures.
The Worst Risk
The most serious risk your daughter can face deals with the possibility of a stranger hurting her because of some information she posts online or because of whom she meets online, or because she answered a text from a stranger. While the number of teenage girls who are molested, kidnapped, or induced to run away from home is relatively small, when it does happen, the end result can be disastrous.
Alert
In 1984 the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children was established as a private nonprofit organization. It serves as a centralized clearinghouse of information dealing with missing and exploited children. It has a twenty-four-hour toll-free hotline, plus a Cyber Tip-line for anyone with information about missing or exploited children.
Tell your daughter that some websites are first-class, while others are blatantly false, racist, sexist, and violent. Should she encounter one of them, she must shut down the computer immediately and tell you about it.
Computer Credit
The best use of the Internet is as a family tool: to plan vacations, check on prices of items to purchase, print out coupons and credit card information, get the scoop on upcoming movies, and keep up with current events. Also use it to access the latest government suggestions to prepare a family emergency kit. Have your daughter pitch in. Ask her to mark household items and personal possessions of utmost importance with a red sticker — to be saved in case of a natural disaster, or terrorist attack. Decide where to meet outside your home, and where to meet up outside the immediate area. In short, use the best of the Internet and forget the rest.
Choice Parents
In regard to your own use of alcohol, nicotine, illegal drugs, and legal drugs — those prescribed by your doctor — and the Internet and mobile phones, examine your lifestyle. You always want to be the best role model you can be, someone your daughter can be proud of, and someone she wants to play a robust role in her life.
Fact
Study after study shows that children of parents who are deeply involved in their lives, hold ongoing conversations with them via words or texts, attend school events, are active in the parent-teacher organizations, and truly listen to them are less likely to drink, smoke, do drugs, or get into trouble via the Internet.
Your daughter wants you in every phase of her existence, but the older she gets, the more she observes. Girls, even more so than boys, hate hypocrisy with a passion. There is no way you can be a closet drinker, smoker, drug-user, or a visitor to questionable websites without them finding out about it. You can't do wrong and be seen as strong, in her eyes.
Greatest Expectations
As you have the highest expectations of your daughter, she has the highest expectations of you. Do not let her down and she will not let you down. Don't worry that children never listen to you. Worry that they are always watching you, according to author Robert Fulghum. Just keep in mind that raising a girl can transform you, and always for the better. How fortunate you are to have this opportunity to be the best parent and the best person you can be. Raising a girl means you are instilling and reinforcing what is best for her. At the same time, you are bringing out what is best in you.
