economy, children, and legislation

This week I was told by a legislator, who shall remain nameless, that the priority in the State Legislature this session had to be on the economy and saving money.

Fiscal responsibility is very important, and I wouldn’t deny that. I won't diminish the importance of having a balanced budget, controlled spending, and sufficient reserves. This message is about how all of these issues are tied together.

When the economy takes a down turn, life gets more stressful. Our money has less value, there are fewer employment opportunities and more unemployed, and the cost of life increases. Right now, food banks all over the state are experiencing tremendous difficulty meeting the needs of their community, and many are closing their doors.

Social workers are already over-burdened, the need for their services is going to increase, and there is no funding for the increased need.

Why is the need for their services going to increase? Because when the economy takes a down-turn, crimes against children increase.

In most states in the country - all of them, so far as we know - there is a large amount of reactive legislation to address crimes that have been committed. There is some legislation to address identifying behaviors that indicate that a child has been victimized. There is very little legislation which actually is intended to prevent crimes against children.

Crimes are prevented with awareness and education, which are pennies on the dollar to the costs of prosecution and detention. It is also pennies on the dollar when compared to the costs of economic drain due to self-destructive behaviors, lack of meaningful employment, social welfare programs, and the statistical probability of repeated abuse in the next generation.

Washington will get through this recession in the next few years, and when we do, we'll see the costs of economic strain combined with a non-progressive approach to crime prevention.

Huge props to Senator McAuliffe for working with us to figure out effective and feasible methods of bringing security curricula to Washington's families and communities when our school systems are in a budget crisis. Her dedication and pragmatism have served Washington and her district for a long time, and they are appreciated by Wash-CAP.

Facebook

If you have a Facebook account, you can join the Safe Child Project group.

Social Networking

Social Networking is an interesting thing.

With most social networks, the user is also the product. Social networking sites make money by selling advertising which targets your demographic, based on your member profile and your patterns of use.

In exchange, they provide a free or very cheap way to keep up with family and friends, to network, and to distract yourself with games and memes.

Another side effect of social networking is the increased vulnerability of the user.

When it comes down to it, you have no way of knowing who is really on the other side of that network connection. Is it Susan, or Susan's brother? Is it a handsome techie from Toledo or the cranky older guy that lives a few apartments down from yours?

Kids and teenagers make up a large percentage of social networking users. To protect kids under 13 from inappropriate data collection and marketing, the Feds came up with COPPA. As a result of COPPA, most social networking sites don't 'allow' children under 13 to join.

There is no way, of course, that those sites can effectively stop children from joining. So we have the added side-effect of many children online, and vulnerable to the manipulation of online predators. Without a profound policy shift amongst most social networking organizations, this will continue to be a problem, although it has improved as parents have increasingly prioritized internet safety.

Protecting your kids on the internet is simple.

• Don't send them online alone. Install parental controls [like OneCare] that allow you to restrict internet access when an adult is not in the house, and provide a record of each person they come in contact with online, and each site they visit. This will also allow you to provide access to some sites while restricting others.


• Get comfortable with the internet: POS means parent over shoulder; TTYL means talk to you later. Learn to determine when it's safe to enter ID or banking information, and teach your children. Teach them about phishing scams, ID theft, and fraud. The more they know, and you know, the more they will be empowered against risk.


• Keep the computers in a central location; don't allow your kids to surf the internet from their bedrooms, or while they're alone in the house. It's important to provide them with oversight and boundaries.


• Children should not communicate with anyone online that YOU have not met in real life. Their email contacts should include a parent's name and phone number. You should know all the passwords to all of their accounts. Track the parental control reports to ensure that you know all sites they regularly visit and where they could be meeting people.


• Let your kids know they must NEVER arrange to meet with anyone they know from the internet, or share information about their location with people they know from the internet.


• Everything that happens online has consequences in the real world. It's difficult to remember for many adults, and very challenging for most children. Boundaries and discussion are invaluable as your child, and you, explore the internet.

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Against my own inclination, I created a CAP group at My Space. My thinking is that we can maintain a beacon of internet safety over there, and my gut says, "Bad idea." I entered the information, posted some internet safety guidelines, and saved the data. The profile page presented itself, and in great, huge, bright blue letters across the middle of the screen? An incredibly inappropriate advertising banner. I won't repeat the slogan, but it was laughably ironic.