Give & Take

Let's Talk (Continued)

Joanne, Susan's Mother

What do you know about what your daughter is doing on blogs of various kinds?

Very, very little. Not as much as I'd like to know.

Why don't you know more about it?

Because she really feels that that's an invasion of her privacy and she knows what she's doing and it's like writing in her diary. You know mothers are not supposed to look at their children's diaries.

Would you look at her personal diary if you had access to it?

I would ask her permission. I would not do it without asking her permission.

One difference between the diary that she might keep in her room and what she's doing on these spaces is that other people - perhaps not you - but other people can look at these. Does that concern you at all?

It concerns me a lot because I think that, being 14 years old, their judgments are not necessarily where they think their judgments are. In other words, she thinks she's very savvy, that she knows street smarts and I think that most 14-year-olds think they do but they don't necessarily know that yet. The fact that she thinks that other people can't see it unless she gives them permission and when people look at it they're not going to use it against her - I think it's very naïve.

If you could give her advice that she would actually take, specifically how would you advise she go about using or not using services like these.

I would specifically say, "Don't use services like these and don't put anything personal on there; especially if it's going to come back and sting you." But until that really stings her she will keep on doing it. It's like most people. You can tell them they need to do something else and they don't do that until they get hurt by somebody else and I think that's when she'll realize it. Something will happen to her and hopefully it's something minor and then she'll realize that she shouldn't be putting stuff out there like that - she doesn't like somebody or that somebody was mean to her, or these things that these girls do to each other. They tend to be very catty. One day she doesn't like Martha and she puts something bad out there and one day Martha sees it and gets very angry at her and hates her but she really didh't mean it, it's just her expression, and it's already done. She couldn't take it back.

Do you know if she puts any information on her site that could possibly identify specifically who she is?

Yes. I think she puts too much. She has her name, her last name, her birth date, the city she's in. Some of the girls put their phone number, but she doesn't do that. Considering that the city she's in there are only two high schools and she puts everything out there. She puts down what she likes, colors she likes, what she likes to eat, what she doesn't like to eat, whether she's single - whatever it is and she has her pictures out there.

Have you had a chance to look at any of her pictures?

Yes I have.

Aside from the fact that they are pictures, is there anything about pictures that concern you?

One thing I do have her do is, I need to see the site anytime I want to. But I don't see what the other people write to her about. I don't see the blogs [posts, which only people on Susan's Friends list can see]. I don't see her expressions on there. I just see her main site. So I don't know what she's communicating to others, but I do make her show me what's on there.

And she's OK with that?

Yes. She'd rather me not and it's very easy to take something off when your mother wants to see it and put it back on as soon as your mother goes, and that I have no idea. If I say no in the house she has access to it at the library, she has access at school, she has access at friends' houses, so there are a tremendous amount of places she can get access to it if I said to her that in the house she couldn't do it. And probably 85% of her friends are online doing this too.