Protecting Kids and Teens from Bullies

Posted on October 11, 2010 at 9:51 am

A tragic series of suicides has put the spotlight on bullying and other forms of peer abuse of kids and teenagers. It has also prompted the It Gets Better project on YouTube from columnist Dan Savage and his partner Terry Miller, who have posted a video telling LGBT teens who are getting picked on that it will get better for them and that support and resources are available. They have invited others to participate and the videos from celebrities like Tim Gunn and Ellen DeGeneres as well as individuals who just want to share their stories and their support are extraordinarily generous, touching, inspiring, and meaningful. The Trevor Project is a hotline for LGBT kids who need someone to talk to. On its website are messages of help and hope from “Glee’s” Chris Colfer and “Harry Potter’s” Daniel Radcliffe.

Today is National Coming Out Day and everyone can participate by coming out for dignity, equality, and rejoicing in the diversity of ideas, perspectives, talents, and beliefs that unite us as humans as much as our shared commitments and experiences.

Vince Vaughn has just agreed to take a gay joke out of the trailer of his new film, “Dilemma.” It is not clear whether it will remain in the film. What’s interesting is that even the the brief clip, the joke is explicitly not related to any person’s sexuality — it is a reference to an electric car. Vaughn’s character makes it clear that he is using “gay” not to mean homosexual but to mean overly careful and concerned about one’s impact on the rest of the world — while in this movie as in others the “bromance” element is more likely to read as gay to the audience. While publications like The Globe and Mail decry Vaughn’s backing down (they might say it is “so gay” to worry about the sensitivity of the audience in making a crude, dumb joke), it seems to me that this is on the contrary a triumph of freedom of speech. After Anderson Cooper and others responded to the trailer with their objections, Vaughn made the decision that the joke was creating more problems than it was worth. I am hoping Vaughn’s experience will help make it clear to impressionable teens that “that’s so gay” and “no homo” references cannot be separated from their bigoted foundation.

I was also very encouraged by the wonderful “no makeup Tuesday” program at a Texas high school, a powerful message of acceptance and the recognition of true beauty. I’d love to see it go nationwide.

I’d love to hear your ideas and experiences to prevent bullying and harassment and build support in your community.

Related Tags:

Commentary Teenagers

Protecting Kids’ Privacy: Common Sense Media

Posted on October 10, 2010 at 8:00 am

Common Sense Media announced a new privacy initiative this week along with the results of their survey showing that 92 percent of parents are concerned about protecting their children’s privacy online.

The Common Sense Privacy Campaign will include the distribution of consumer tips, information, and videos to millions of homes and a new privacy curriculum for teachers and schools around the country. The campaign will challenge technology companies and operators to develop far better policies that make it easier for parents and kids to protect personal information online and will also ensure that parents’ and kids’ voices are being heard in Washington, D.C., through a national awareness and advocacy campaign.

According to a recent study by The Wall Street Journal, 50 of the most popular U.S. websites are placing intrusive tracking technologies on visitors’ computers — in some cases, more than 100 tracking tools at a time. Fifty sites popular with U.S. teens and children placed 4,123 “cookies,” “beacons,” and other tracking technologies on their sites — 30 percent more than similar sites aimed at adults. Tracking technology scans in real time what people are doing on a webpage, then instantly assesses location, income, shopping interests, and even medical conditions. Individuals’ profiles are then bought and sold on stock-market-like exchanges that have sprung up in the past 18 months.

Congress’ primary goal in creating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in 1998 was to help parents control the information that’s collected from and about their children online and to control how that information is used. But today, extraordinary changes in technology and digital media have made it far more difficult for parents and young people to protect their privacy. The Zogby poll finds that more than 60 percent of parents want Congress to update online privacy laws for children and teens, and 70 percent of parents think schools should educate about online privacy.

Common Sense Media head Jim Steyer asked industry to let parents know how information will be used before it’s collected and use short and simple privacy policies instead of confusing and dense policies that take hours to read. He said industry should support ‘Do Not Track Kids’ and should provide parents and kids the opportunity to clear their histories with an “eraser button.”
Their goals:

We challenge industry, educators, policymakers, and parents to
protect kids’ privacy:

1. Do not track kids. No behavioral marketing for kids.

2. Opt in. Kids shouldn’t have to opt out of something to keep third parties — like marketers — from tracking them.

3. Clear & simple statements. Privacy statements should be easy to read and understand.

4. Everyone needs privacy education. Parents, teachers, and kids need to be educated about the risks of loss of privacy and how to control their personal information.

5. Innovate to protect. Industry must focus on creating better privacy protections.

6. Privacy for the 21st century. Government needs to update privacy policies to keep up with the times.

CSM has resources every parents should look at, including “10 Ways You’re Not as Private As You Think” and Staying Safe and Secure in a Digital World. Too many families have learned that “stranger danger” and bullying can come into their homes and into their children’s lives through the internet. Larry Magid’s SafeKids.com has some thoughts on the survey and proposals and GetNetWise, a cooperative project of public interest groups and industry, has some good guidelines for kids of all ages that families should discuss.

Related Tags:

The Different Kinds of Scary — Movie Mom Minute

Posted on October 3, 2010 at 8:00 am

Many
thanks to Jennifer Kachler, Adam Donald, Daniel Sheppard, Brian Gonzalez, my homegirl
Laine Kaplowitz, and everyone at the fabulous Bethesda Row Theatre.

Related Tags:

Parenting

Violence in Movies Shown on Airplanes

Posted on October 1, 2010 at 7:32 am

The only truly captive audience for movies is airline passengers. You do not have to put on the headset, but if you are disturbed or offended by what is on screen there is no way to turn it off. Airlines will edit the films for language or nudity and sex, but (other than plane crash scenes) they keep in the violence and parents with small children have no way to protect them from those images. A group called Kids Safe Films is calling on the airlines to do better.

On a 2006 US Airways flight, the in-flight airline movie screen dropped down from the overhead and began showing images of incredible violence. A drive-by shooting, a child crushed to death by a car, kids swapping guns. And that was in the first five minutes of the film. What’s crazy is that children on the flight were watching these images regardless of whether or not their parents purchased headsets. All because the screens were positioned so that everyone could see them. On other more recent flights, parents have struggled to protect their kids from images of murder, torture, melting faces and death – all shown on publicly viewable screens.

The American Medical Association reports numerous studies which prove that exposure to violent images is harmful to children.

And yet, here in America, in the only situation in which parents are unable to walk away from a TV screen, change the channel or even turn the TV off, their kids are force fed images of horrific violence – against their will, against the recommendation of the Medical Experts and against the guidelines set by Hollywood as put forth by the MPAA.

Their concerns are measured and their goals are modest. They applaud the airlines that either do not show movies or have 100% individual screens. They are not asking airlines to show children’s movies, they are not suing anyone (how refreshing!), and they are not raising money (even more refreshing). They are urging the airlines and movie studios to act on their own, but support legislation if that does not happen. They are gathering signatures on a petition and I support their efforts.

Babies

Posted on September 27, 2010 at 8:00 am

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	All Ages
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for cultural and maternal nudity throughout
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	None
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	May 7, 2010
Date Released to DVD:	September 28, 2010
Amazon.com ASIN:	B002ZG974M

Don’t forget to enter the contest for a Blu-Ray/DVD or Babies carseat!

Until they make a movie entirely consisting of raindrops on roses, whiskers on kittens, Hallmark cards, and puppies in the window, this will hold the record as the most awwwwwww-inspiring movie ever made.

Director Thomas Balmes and his crew take us into the lives of four brand-new people and their families, babies in Tokyo, Mongolia, Namibia, and San Francisco. And that’s it. Babies sleeping, babies getting dirty, babies getting clean, babies crying, babies being comforted, babies smiling, babies playing, babies learning, learning, learning — and babies teaching everyone around them, too, to the narration-free accompaniment of a wistful score from “Coraline’s” Bruno Coulais.

Each of the stories is touching. The deepest part of our nature as humans wonders at and cares for these magical creatures, who zoom from newborns to people who can walk and talk and have views in a matter of months. The connections between these babies and their families are a powerful reminder of all we share, but the contrasts are a powerful and sometimes disturbing reminder of the distance between us. American parents who carefully strap our babies in car seats and boil their pacifiers every time they fall on the floor will find it unsettling to see all four members of the Mongolian family climb on a motorcycle and the Namibian baby sucking on a bone she dug out of the dirt. And they may wince at the casual plenty of the American baby’s books and toys or the casual smugness of the music class where the parents and their babies sing a Native American song in some reach for the kind of authenticity the African baby comes by naturally — and pays for with limited opportunities for health care and education. The credit sequence gives us a glimpse of the babies today (age 4). Our greatest wish for these babies may be that before they are old enough to be rocking their own children to sleep we find a way to do more to protect the health and safety of all of the world’s children.