By Josh709
@Josh709 (14)
Canada
November 28, 2012 2:09pm CST
What is an appropriate age to start using facebook? My younger sister of 13 wants a facebook account. My mother and father however, are opposed to it. My sister had an account for a few months, then my mother accessed it and viewed her newsfeed. On this newsfeed one of my sisters GRADE 7 friends had posted a picture about pleasuring one's self with an egg, a screeshot of a question on Yahoo Answers. Obviously, you don't want your kid seeing that and my sister's account was promptly deleted (to the fullest extent that facebook allows) However, as 13 is the age at which Facebook allows you to make an account, should one's parents let the child have an account? There are large amounts of adult material on Facebook, no pornographic photos, but things that a child on the younger range of Facebooks allowance scale should certainly not view. Consequently, we arrive at a fork in the moral road. Should we give children something that they want and have the right to have, whether or not we are sure it is good for them, or should we restrain the child to our rules (obviously what is thought to be better for the child)? We must also remember that children also are people and deserve their rights as people. Also, though children being desensitized to adult material is not good, if a child becomes an adult without any knowledge or adult material, boy are they in for a shock. What is the best way for facebook to deal with this? Major and minor accounts seperate? What about parents?
PLease tell me your opinions,
Josh
1 person likes this
5 responses
@StLouisMetroTutoring (678)
• St. Peters, Missouri
28 Nov 12
If looking at this from a purely legal point of view, if you're talking about rights, the fact is that the parents can be held legally responsible if they fail to control their children or for negligent supervision. This seems to say that it's a parent's responsibility to determine what's appropriate, not Facebook's. They may have the ability to do something at 13, that doesn't make it a right.
From a moral perspective, I do think it's important to treat children as people. However, as children get older, they need to gain freedoms in increments ALONG with the associated responsibilities. No one has freedoms with no responsibilities. So to give a child total freedom to use Facebook as he/she wants with no input from anyone and not also teach the appropriate responsibilities such as appropriate use, is setting that child up for failure in the future.
Facebook could certainly help this situation by having separate accounts, but again it's the parent's responsibility to ensure the child is only exposed to appropriate information, not Facebook's.
1 person likes this
@vidhyaprakash_2 (7116)
• India
29 Nov 12
Hi friend, welcome to mylot. Now a days lot of kids are using fb and gett addicted with this site, there is nothing wrong if they are using this site for good purpose, but unfortunately some persons are using it in a bad way which gives more problemes, since we have the ability to do lot of things in FB, so people is misusing this option for thei needs
@owlwings (43910)
• Cambridge, England
28 Nov 12
I don't know what an 'appropriate' age is. Probably it depends on the child, how many of their friends are on it and whether they are capable of understanding basic security issues and dangers.
Facebook has a lower age limit of 13, so your sister is technically old enough to qualify (with the permission of her parents, of course). Many children far younger than that have accounts, either with or without the knowledge of their parents. Facebook is not particularly good, it seems to me, at detecting violations of its terms.
I think that, since people of the age of your sister are likely to open accounts, whether their parents approve or not, every attempt should be made to educate them about the dangers and ways of avoiding them and to ensure that the child doesn't feel that there is any stigma attached to asking an adult whether content which they may come across is appropriate or not.
In fact, I don't think that it is entirely Facebook's responsibility to provide filtering or monitoring for any particular user. It has always been (and always should be) the parents' responsibility, first and foremost, to educate their child as they think appropriate.
Personally, I would encourage my children (and, in fact, did do so) to ask any question whatsoever about things that they encountered or heard from their peers. I would, I hope, be able to show them what is natural, normal and even good and what is unnatural and undesirable about the topic.
@livewyre (2450)
•
29 Nov 12
Hi Josh
I thought you had to be 12 to have a FB account, so I guess legally 13 is fine. You do find that there are many kids on there who are younger than that, which I believe is a problem as kids are not as street-wise as they think..
I think this has to be a decision based on a few variables, but mostly based on the child's maturity and trustworthiness.
I would allow my child to have a FB account at the proper minimum age if she has not started to be secretive, or has friends that I don't approve of. I would also insist that she accepts me as a 'friend' so that right off, she and her friends know that I can see what they're up to.
There is a danger in restricting a child's freedom, and I would prefer to allow 'freedom' within known and agreed constraints and guidelines.
Generally people only see images that friends have uploaded, so on the whole, I don't think that particular aspect is a massive issue.
There is a problem with establishing a separate type of account for younger folks (other organisations have tried this) because they then become a key target for some very sick individuals...
@mariaperalta (19073)
• Mexico
28 Nov 12
I know facebook says you should be older... but all kids have facebook. here in my internet cafe I get kids 8-9 signing up for facebook. As long as they are talking to other kids. i think its good.
