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15 votes
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Stop talking to each other and start buying things: Three decades of survival in the desert of social media
17 votes -
The personal brand is dead
6 votes -
'There's no such thing as a lone wolf.' The online movement that spawned the Buffalo shooting
9 votes -
Inside the online movement to end work
12 votes -
The great offline - The concept of “offline” is built on the earlier concept of “wilderness,” inheriting its flaws and hazards
8 votes -
Birds aren't real, or are they? Inside a Gen Z conspiracy movement
17 votes -
Modern Luddism and the battle for your soul
11 votes -
How to make friends over the internet
5 votes -
How did you find niche stuff before the Internet?
Over in the topic on the perceptions of teenage boys, it was asked, “How did you find niche stuff before the internet?” I thought this was an interesting question and wanted to open it up to hear...
Over in the topic on the perceptions of teenage boys, it was asked, “How did you find niche stuff before the internet?” I thought this was an interesting question and wanted to open it up to hear others’ memories about this.
Edit: Somewhat related, I saw this post today: The most unbelievable things about life before smartphones
21 votes -
Nearly a decade after becoming an advice animal, "10 guy" Connor Sinclair reveals his identity and gives full account of his image
10 votes -
What Internet memes get wrong about Breezewood, Pennsylvania
6 votes -
The things we do and do not say - Notes on the impossibility of talking online and rise of disinterpretation
19 votes -
Nineteen weird things you can watch drop online if you stay home for New Year’s
7 votes -
Online, no one gets to be young
17 votes -
Thirteen virtual festivals and events this summer
5 votes -
The coronavirus is making us all camgirls: For millions of newly remote workers, doing your job now involves looking the part, figuring out your angles, and performing for the camera
7 votes -
What does it mean to be a ‘Karen’? Karens explain: As the meme has become more prominent online, its meaning has become confused – with real-life Karens caught in the crosshairs
13 votes -
Virtual sex parties offer escape from isolation — if organizers can find a home
6 votes -
Internet 'is not working for women and girls', says Tim Berners-Lee
17 votes -
When we give in to manufactured internet wars
7 votes -
Alienated, alone and angry: What the digital revolution really did to us
15 votes -
Those people we tried to cancel? They’re all hanging out together
17 votes -
In Norilsk, Russia's most isolated major city, the arrival of high-speed internet gave residents a new window onto the world
9 votes -
Is it possible to stop a mass shooting before it happens?: Somewhere in America, an investigator known as the Savant is infiltrating online hate groups to take down the most violent men in the country
16 votes -
Do you know who your ‘friends’ are?: Making digital conversations humane will require defining our online relationships
5 votes -
How Finland is coping with an ageing population – online lunch clubs are the start of a remote care revolution
9 votes -
The internet has spent three years taking care of this guy’s plants: The subreddit r/takecareofmyplant has 11,300 members, all dedicated to, well, taking care of a plant
17 votes -
'If not I, then who?’: Armed with the internet, Russia’s young people want to remake their world
10 votes -
The boring intimacy of the all-day group chat
8 votes -
The loneliness epidemic
15 votes -
Blind people can struggle to understand memes, so they made their own
11 votes -
Mountain of tongues: Can a nationalist movement from the internet save the world's most scattered people?
5 votes -
Meet Gavin, the eight-year-old with a face shared more than 1bn times
9 votes -
I was a cable guy. I saw the worst of America
42 votes -
Alienation is the most powerful online brand
10 votes -
Living with Slenderman
7 votes -
Parents: have your kids been affected by age-inappropriate content?
I was having a conversation with one of my coworkers who mentioned that her child showed a fascination with scary, Halloween-type stuff starting around age 6. She and her husband had a hard time...
I was having a conversation with one of my coworkers who mentioned that her child showed a fascination with scary, Halloween-type stuff starting around age 6. She and her husband had a hard time with whether they should let him enjoy it or limit it. They weren't sure whether to let him read scary books or watch spooky stuff on YouTube, particularly because it's the type of content that can very easily be age-inappropriate--especially for a 6 year old. Nevertheless, it was relatively easy for them to keep it to stuff like Jack-o-Lanterns and black cats since he was so young.
The boy is now older but has retained his interest, and the parents are still struggling with decisions about allowable content, especially because he is starting to age into books and movies that deal with much darker stuff, particularly ideas about death/violence.
I'm not a parent, but I am a teacher, and I have to admit that I'm uncomfortable with some of the stuff my students are exposed to. Over the years I've heard students as young as twelve discuss horror movies like the Saw series or The Human Centipede. I've had middle school students bring books like Gone Girl and 50 Shades of Gray to class. On one hand, I think kids are resilient, and I think a lot of the more difficult or disturbing stuff doesn't quite land for them because they don't really have a context into which to put it yet. I also believe that fictional media is a mostly safe way for us to explore troubling or disturbing ideas.
On the other hand, I think the internet has caused our children to grow up a lot faster than they used to, as they are exposed to mature content (whether intentionally or accidentally) from a very early age. When I was growing up the worst I could do was check out a slightly-risqué book from the school library and hope my parents never found it in my backpack. Now kids are watching violent (often real-world) and pornographic content starting as young as elementary school. Nothing can make your heart sink quite like sixth graders talking excitedly over lunch about a video of a real person getting crushed to death.
What I genuinely don't know is if this has any negative developmental effect. Am I just clutching my pearls here? I'd love to hear some parents talk about how they've handled the decision of what's right for their kids and whether they've had fallout from their kids consuming content that's not appropriate for them.
26 votes -
Why the alt-right thinks porn is a Jewish conspiracy
12 votes