That is important, being able to trust your teenager is a great feeling, but it can mislead you. I trust my teens too. I trust them to be teenagers, to follow human nature, and to make mistakes. I trust them to take risks inorder to find their identity. That is what the adolescent lifestage is all about.

You have to remember that most teens don't realize that they are getting into trouble until it is totally surrounding them. Then the problem they face is how to get themselves out of it. I trust my teen to come to me when they get to this point. I hope and pray I will be able to help, but I am human, and there are things that are out of my control. The Internet lends itself to the types of trouble a teen can get into without knowing he/she is getting into trouble, and the trouble that can happen isn't always easily fixed.

One example of this type of trouble, from a parent that I have corresponded with, is STALKING. A 13-year-old boy signs up for a popular "safe" teen chat room, he fills out his profile giving his email address, and goes frequently. He has a lot of fun, enjoys his new friends, and this continues for about 6 months with no problem. One day, a teen in the room is getting nasty, this boy tells the teen to leave the room if they can't be nice. Well, the teen ends up to be a man, and the stalk begins. Spam to the child and his parents, mailbombs, nasty newsgroup postings using their email address, etc. The mother finally had to change Internet service providers. Can this all be avoided? Yes, it can.

One other thing to note here, while you may trust your teen, do you trust everyone else too? Here is a VERY POPULAR search engine, that also is the search engine behind the Netscape Search and AOL NetFind. I trust my teen not to put in words such as "nude pictures" in a search engine. But what if they use the word "teenagers"? Try it, and remember to use your browsers back button to get back to this page.

 

Hello, !

Hello, !