#and to assume that it's just the result of “lazy and unwise parenting” feels ignorant

[m0thlegs]

I feel like people who brag about not letting their children (who aren't literal toddlers) on the internet at ALL and teach abstinence-only internet safety are just as dangerous as parents who let their kids have completely unrestricted and unmonitored internet access.

I mean... Yeah, in an ideal world, you might want to keep your kids off the internet. But we don't live in an ideal world, we live in a world where everything - and I mean EVERYTHING, is dependent on technology nowadays. By barring your child from the wisdom of how to navigate that world safely and knowledgably, you're barring them from a HUGE portion of opportunities and life skills that they'd need today.

Furthermore, if you start fearmongering and telling them that everyone you meet online is a scary dangerous pedophile, they're obviously not going to believe you, and then they WILL encounter an actual scary dangerous pedophile, because your idea of a "warning" was a skewed overexaggeration of reality that no child over the age of 11 or 12 would wholeheartedly believe.

I'm not saying that internet safety isn't important, or that you should let your kids roam free-range on the wide web, or that it's okay to turn your children into iPad kids, but THIS IS NOT INTERNET SAFTEY EDUCATION! YOU'RE SETTING YOUR CHILD UP FOR FAILURE! If you raise them like this without introducing them to any of the skills they'll need to navigate the online world, they're going to be taken advantage of as soon as they find a way to unlock the family computer and browse the web.

Part of the reason as to why internet safety education is so bad nowadays is also because of these kinds of parents, not just the neglectful iPad kid ones.