We Worried About Kids and the Internet. We Should Have Been Worried About Adults.

[marmar]

(Slate) “Youngsters Falling Prey to Seducers in Computer Web,” screamed a 1995 headline in the Los Angeles Times. The article by Kim Murphy detailed two instances of runaway teenagers whose parents were sure had been victims of adult predators who groomed them online. The subheading was catchy: “Once candy was the lure. Now strangers are using cyberspace e-mail to attract minors into harm’s way.” Articles like this in major newspapers as well as newsweeklies were part of the discussion of internet dangers that led to congressional action on the topic in the mid-’90s.

But despite our fears over the past few decades, it was not children who were especially vulnerable to the corrupting influences of the internet. It was adults, millions trapped by a collective confabulation spun about pedophilia rings, a stolen election, and a messianic version of Donald Trump.

The internet is not the first new funnel for information that has channeled influence. Over more than a century, Americans have expressed their concerns about each new form of media through fears about children and youth. Younger Americans were supposed to be especially vulnerable to undue influence, influence that would come through direct exposure to cheap publications, movies, radio, television, and the internet. Over multiple generations, Americans tried to guide, control, or censor access to these media under cover of this supposedly greater vulnerability.

But with every new medium, adults are the real suckers.

In the early 20th century, cities attempted to control popular films that were a primary form of entertainment for young working-class women who would crowd into theaters. Concerned about how the cheap nickelodeons showing films with racy plots would influence female sexuality, cities pressured theater owners and filmmakers into the beginnings of a voluntary censorship system. ..............(more)

https://slate.com/technology/2021/02/moral-panics-technology-internet-children-adults.html

[FM123]

1. So true.

What has happened to parents who went off the deep end, has really hurt the kids...
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/children-of-qanon-believers_n_601078e9c5b6c5586aa49077

[OldBaldy1701E]

2. As in so many situations like this

I am always worried about the offspring of those who embrace ignorance, insanity and/or violence as the norm. One has to just hope they make it out in one piece. Until this country realizes the need to address our societal negatives, there isn't a whole lot anyone can do.