Today, I was shocked to see a 9-year old on twitter. Well, you might say that this is normal, or that you’ve come across a 5-year old on twitter.
When I think about a child, aged between 5 and 12 going online, I picture the following:
- A cute looking kid, staring at the computer screen without even blinking
- A kid that knows a lot about Google and e-mail than the history of his/her family / forefathers
- A kid that can type his/her name even before you could pronounce that aloud
- A kid that learns rhymes by clicking next, instead of flipping the pages and taking in the aroma of the rhymes book
- A kid that wears spectacles, with a power that matches a 22-year old
- A kid that is mentally mature but physically frail
- A kid that knows SMS English
- A kid that can make e-friends, but has very little neighborhood friends
I’m really saddened by the way these kids are being brought up. They may become child prodigies or the world’s youngest certified professionals, but I think that they are wasting the best part of their lives just staring at computer screens.
Anyways, when they grow up and get a job, they will end up spending a better portion of their lives with the computer. Why should they start this right from when they’re 5 or 9? Humans are not born to spend their lives in front of a computer. Period!
Even though it’s called social networking, there’s nothing that could better a face-to-face group meeting. Social networking may be good for online businesses, but one shouldn’t get his personal life jinxed with this catchy term – that too at such a young age.
So, the parents are solely responsible if their kids end up spending too much time on the computer without getting a life outside. They must know the smell of fresh grass, the colors in a dew drop (oh, not from Flickr!), chirping of the birds (’m not talking about twitter), and so on.
Come on baby, just step out, wave your hands, and play! Computers are of no good to you at this age..not yet.
Social networking is the last thing the society would need when the social structure itself deteriorates. What say you?
Tags: awareness, child, computer, flickr, friends, kid, social, social networking, twitter
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I wish I’d had the resources the net offers now when I was a kid. So many of my friends moved, or changed schools, and I lost track of them. I’m really not seeing what’s wrong with kids using social networking. Maybe some sort of factual research, or something, but "when I think of computers and kids, I think of awkward, frail, outcast children" is a pretty weak argument.
This comment was originally posted on Reddit
Its true(and i appluad that you have raised a such a relevant issue on your site…which i have noticed you like to
)just last night i came across a blog by a 15 yr old!and i said!wow!what was i doing when i was that young?ok 15 is still fine..(not to me..)but 9 yr old tweeting is too much!i still myself dont understand twitter properly..ok jokes apart..i think if the 9 yr old kid has an acsess to twitter then the same child must be knowing a few other sites..(and you know what i mean..)It gives me a scare where is our infancy heading(forget youth)..nice post Ubi..
That kid has great chances of becoming a Internet Marketer.That is a cool thing.Is the child in the photo the actual person you saw while surfing twitter?