Contents
The world is changing rapidly. The paradigm of new technologies is changing, and so are we. The movement of technologies is determined by goals and objectives. But the question arises — who puts them? And to whom? Will Big Brother watch over us, or will we put him at our service? Perhaps this is our main choice of tomorrow.
Imagine the situation: a teenager is 15 years old, and you decide to give him a gift — to issue a debit bank card. Happy, together with your child, you go to the nearest branch of a large bank. You are warmly greeted by a manager girl and asks you to provide documents for issuing a card.
She smiles as she enters the data into the computer system, and you look forward to a new stage in the life of your beloved child — touching the mysterious world of finance. Suddenly, the smile disappears from the face of the employee, and she informs in a dry tone that the young financier has been denied a card. How so? Why? Your indignation knows no bounds.
It turns out that your child has a low personal rating. What rating? you ask in amazement. Well, the manager replies, our program shows that he has a low score in school performance, lack of participation in olympiads, and the graph of tolerant behavior has gone into the negative zone. So it turns out the rating is below the level of issuing the card. We can’t help you, and neither can other banks.
Is such a situation possible in reality? The popular science series Black Mirror has an episode called The Dive. It shows a world where all people have an implanted rating app and can rate each other from one to five in real life. A high rating opens up endless possibilities, and a low one closes access to various services and services. Hanging out with high-ranking friends will increase your Personal Rank, while hanging out with «low-level» people will lower it.
He has not yet managed to come home from school, and we already know his grades, missed classes, homework and upcoming olympiads
You say it’s fantasy? In the article “I am a third-class citizen,” Mara Khvistendal and Dina Mingaliyeva write that in 2010, a social credit system was tested in China. Citizens began to be assessed on a number of criteria, including the level of education, behavior on the Internet and compliance with traffic rules. Each resident of the county with a population of 1,1 million people over the age of 14 was assigned a rating of 1000 points, and further points were added or subtracted based on behavior. After the scores were calculated, the citizens were assigned marks A, B, C and D.
An A resident received educational and employment benefits, while D resident was denied a driver’s license and various passes and permits, as well as access to a number of social services.
So what surrounds a teenager today in the modern world of new technologies? An electronic journal for the school, programs that track behavior on the Internet, access control to school, circles and sports sections, a watch with the ability to track the movement of a child using GPS …
Now parents can completely take control of their child with the help of modern digital technologies. And there is no escape for the teenager. He has no personal space.
He has not had time to come home from school yet, and we already know his grades, missed classes, homework and upcoming olympiads. He just left the house, and we take out a smartphone and observe its trajectory through the streets of the city using GPS. And if he went online, we completely control his digital path, blocking harmful sites and contacts.
Well, if this is not enough, you can sew a chip coated with biological glass into his body. Then we can enjoy our own clairvoyance, watching on the monitor the digital DNA of a teenager, describing his behavioral patterns over time.
Is the digital world really as scary as the media make it out to be? Why is the analog generation, brought up by a couple of cuffs and shouting to the whole yard — “Vasya, go home, eat!”, so striving to control its continuation?
Often it is teenagers who act as stalkers-guides of the digital world for their parents, grandparents
They understand the new world better than we do. They are “cyborgs”, whose hand has become an electronic device, and their brain is surfing information on the waves of the network almost without intermediaries.
And the more we corner them, the deeper they go into the Net. Where we’ll never get them. Because this is their world. They are citizens and residents there. And we are aliens and immigrants.
But how is it? you say. The web world is full of dangers. Maniacs, pedophiles, killer groups, terrorists and, finally, these same virtual reality opinion leaders are bloggers who set a bad example for our ideal offspring. How to protect the child from all this? But is total parental control really the only way out? Or is it the path to childhood neurosis?
These six tips from a psychologist and a father, tested in practice, will help you get answers to pressing questions.
#1: Teach Safe Online Communication
Put into the child’s head values and attitudes that block harmful effects. Give him a natural antidote. Teach digital literacy, virtual behavior, security rules, competent communication on the Web. To do this, parents will have to delve into this topic themselves.
#2 Eliminate Double Standards
It is important to set the right example. How can you scold a teenager for living on the Internet and network games if you yourself spend your evenings buried in a tablet? Already now we can state that our children live in a world of double ethical standards. For some reason, we do not run around the streets with an offer to see what we eat, with whom we communicate and how we relax. But we are happy to do it on social networks. Can we forbid a teenager what we do ourselves?
#3 Read and Discuss the Right Books
Answers to many questions can be found in reading and discussing books — science fiction classics have long raised such issues. Strugatsky, Snegov, Azimov, Lem, Wells and others. Unfortunately, these authors are not in the compulsory school curriculum, which is a pity. It was they who first tried to lift the veil of the future. Reading such works will give teenagers the antidote that will allow them to make the right choice. Read them and discuss with your children.
No. 4. Do not prohibit, but negotiate
Forbidden fruit is known to be sweet. You will not be able to limit the use of the Internet. The more we control children, the more secretive and sophisticated they become. Do not read the child’s correspondence with friends, do not pin him to the wall with information from the electronic school magazine. Agree with him the boundaries of parental control, honestly and openly explaining your concerns.
#5 Tell me who your hero is and I’ll tell you who you are
Do you know which of the inhabitants of the Network has become a hero for your child? Who does he consider the leader of opinions? A person reveals himself when he talks about his hero. He wants to be like him in some way. It is especially interesting to watch how teenagers copy the hairstyle, clothing style and other elements of the life of their idols.
Understanding who a child looks up to reveals a lot to us and allows us to build a dialogue with him. It is important to find out and discuss what attracts him in this person, what strengths and weaknesses she has. Many bloggers not only dump a bunch of useless and harmful information on a teenager, but they can also be useful. So, for example, my son began to read the Strugatsky Brothers after they were recommended by a well-known blogger-roofer.
No. 6. Separate the wheat from the chaff
If the digital revolution cannot be prevented, then it can be led. Help your child start a personal blog or social media group. Determine the target audience, content plan, immediate marketing goals, help with contest ideas. Fight together for the number of views and subscribers. Already now, teenagers can earn pocket money with the help of Internet marketing. Do it together. I can say from personal experience that it is very exciting and useful!