The Real Problem if Facebook Allows Kids on its Site

Their new proposal to allow children under 13 onto the site will ultimately curtail the parents’ social satisfaction

By Jeremy Greenberg Jun 5, 2012 2:05PM

Facebook is looking at ways to allow children onto the site. Of course, allowing kids onto the Facebook of today is as dangerous as letting them into a combined strip club/gun show. Zuck and the team know that, and are responding by mentioning that they’d basically create a Disneyland version of Facebook. Parents would control who their kids are friends with, who they communicate with, and similar such parental controls. Stop me when it sounds like the kind of fun kids are looking for. Usually kids break away to their friends or social sites to have a moment free from their parents. If anything, having kids on Facebook with tight parental controls is going to give mom and dad rich (if not abusive), Google-esque personal information. And our kids shouldn’t even think about planning any terrorist attacks.

But the real problem for Facebook, if they allow children 13-and-under on the site, is not that they’ll be ruining the experience for kids, but that they’ll be ruining it for parents. Facebook is the only place many busy parents have to gush or brag about their kids. Without Facebook, where would our old high school buddies post meaningless pictures of their kids leaving the grocery store? Or, how about those notes about being so proud of our kids for having finished a school year without becoming addicted to bath salts and eating the teacher’s face? Facebook is where parents talk to other parents about their kids—even if it’s done so indirectly. Can you imagine if your kid were now privy to everything that was posted about him, or saw every image you’ve ever posted of him on Facebook? I’m willing to bet that whatever connections kids were hoping to make online, it wasn’t to have their friends find them tagged in videos in which they dance around in diapers singing Rock You like a Hurricane. Your kid thought that was a private toddler moment. Now he’ll learn their diaper dancing has 172 likes.

The end result will be that parents will back off their posting for fear of embarrassing their kids, and kids won’t want to post on anything that is being sent right to mommy’s inbox. The only people left on Facebook will be college kids and people asking me to “Branch Out.” No thanks. If I want to be that bored, I’ll join LinkedIn.

Should Facebook allow kids?

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202Comments

Best

Jun 5, 2012 5:42PM

Kids should be riding their bikes, playing in the park with their family and friends, swimming in a pool, building a tree house with Dad, not socializing on FB, or the internet for that matter. We are creating a society of Frankenstein monsters lacking any kind of social interacting.

Previous replies

NiftyXmasCat

Jun 5, 2012 4:24PM

EMPHATICALLY NO! Kids don't need FACEBOOK, they should be interacting with their families and friends IN PERSON, not through the computer. Obesity is already on the rise for children, allowing FACEBOOK for kids will only accelerate that.

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20kats

Jun 5, 2012 4:33PM

"Allows kids....," so funny, since there are probably as many kids as adults on FB already. Which shows how much Americans lie on the internet. Children need to be taught how to responsibly use the internet along with how to be responsible in their dating and sexual lives, etc. Sorry parents, but, putting your head in the sand never has worked. Raising kids takes a lot of love, attention, and interference and if you don't have the time, don't have the kids.

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troonsouth

Jun 5, 2012 4:17PM

Problem is there is a lot of parents out there that just don't care. They are not concerned with the child's education, only a way to get the kids out of the house and be baby sat by a teacher. Face Book could be a real problem for a young, unaware, child. Parents are the one's that need to be educated on what Face Book is all about and the problems that Face Book could case.. Parents!!! Wake up..

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no more red111

Jun 5, 2012 3:38PM

Lets move on to a different way of connecting with one and other, or just back to the old way. Are the rewards of facebook worth the trouble?

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colormatcher

Jun 5, 2012 4:01PM

I know several kids already on facebook. One was 11, said she was 18. now she is 14 and cannot change her age. She constantly gets older guys bugging her. The others were 10 and 8, each said they were 18. They all use loose security settings. If you see there friends list all of them are under 13 just lying about there age. You need to fix this problem first.

Are you people really that naive?

Previous replies

R R

Jun 5, 2012 3:48PM

People act like it's up to Facebook whether or not kids can join, like it's the website that makes the decision. Where are the parents? The parents should be the ones deciding and monitoring what websites their kids can and cannot use. It's about time parents started actually being parents again.

Previous replies

spencer807

Jun 5, 2012 4:19PM

Kids under 13 not allowed on facebook?

What a joke. I've got a whole herd of nieces and nephews under 13, and guess what. Every single one has a facebook page.

They only need to be old enough to do the math required to figure out what year to put on their birthday to make them older than 13.