High school admins reading kids' online journals: invasion of privacy or legitimate business?
My younger sister, Jamie, who is a senior at the high school I graduated from, called me tonight with disturbing news.
The assistant principal at her school (a Catholic school, I must note) called a school assembly of all the female students. She proceeded to tell them that she had been searching for their online journals, most specifically those on myspace.com, and was disturbed at what she saw - pictures of the girls in bikinis, vulgar language, badmouthing of unpopular teachers (which she referred to as slander), and other appalling things.
She told the girls she had been checking their online journals "four times a week." She had started calling parents and letting them know what vulgarities their children were posting on the Internet. She advised the girls whose parents hadn't been called to start deleting their material or they would be next. She said mostly she had stuck to MySpace users, but she had a list of other online journal services, and she would be checking those out soon. (It will, of course, be terribly easy for her to search on LiveJournal with the new "schools" function).
Now who is this woman kidding? Her perfect little Catholic angels in plaid skirts shed the plaid as soon as they get home. They open the fridge, pop open a soda, and sit down at the computer to blow off some steam. I'm young enough to still identify with these kids, and I feel that it is an invasion of privacy for a high school administrator to start snooping into their personal lives. This issue should be dealt with in the home. If a parent sees a kid playing around on the Internet at home, and they really want to know what their kid is doing online, they should make it a point to find out themselves. It's not for an assistant principal to do.
What was even more disturbing was how this woman singled out the girls as being the vulgar ones. Boys post on MySpace and LiveJournal, too, and they talk shit just like the girls do. No, they might not have boobies to post pictures of, but this assistant principal made it seem like the girls at this high school were the instigators of all things inappropriate, and the boys were completely innocent.
Moral of the story - Watch out, kids! Make your journals friends-only while you still can.
The assistant principal at her school (a Catholic school, I must note) called a school assembly of all the female students. She proceeded to tell them that she had been searching for their online journals, most specifically those on myspace.com, and was disturbed at what she saw - pictures of the girls in bikinis, vulgar language, badmouthing of unpopular teachers (which she referred to as slander), and other appalling things.
She told the girls she had been checking their online journals "four times a week." She had started calling parents and letting them know what vulgarities their children were posting on the Internet. She advised the girls whose parents hadn't been called to start deleting their material or they would be next. She said mostly she had stuck to MySpace users, but she had a list of other online journal services, and she would be checking those out soon. (It will, of course, be terribly easy for her to search on LiveJournal with the new "schools" function).
Now who is this woman kidding? Her perfect little Catholic angels in plaid skirts shed the plaid as soon as they get home. They open the fridge, pop open a soda, and sit down at the computer to blow off some steam. I'm young enough to still identify with these kids, and I feel that it is an invasion of privacy for a high school administrator to start snooping into their personal lives. This issue should be dealt with in the home. If a parent sees a kid playing around on the Internet at home, and they really want to know what their kid is doing online, they should make it a point to find out themselves. It's not for an assistant principal to do.
What was even more disturbing was how this woman singled out the girls as being the vulgar ones. Boys post on MySpace and LiveJournal, too, and they talk shit just like the girls do. No, they might not have boobies to post pictures of, but this assistant principal made it seem like the girls at this high school were the instigators of all things inappropriate, and the boys were completely innocent.
Moral of the story - Watch out, kids! Make your journals friends-only while you still can.