Too Soon For Facebook?

Posted on February 2, 2010 
Filed Under Fathering, Parenting, Personal

My brother and I were talking the other day. We get along famously, and I really enjoy our conversations. He asked me about Facebook, as he isn’t a user and wonders about when he should allow his oldest to get an account. Since I just allowed our 15 year-old to have a Facebook account of her own, I told him that 15 is about right.

I think a child needs to be able to deal well with external disciplines for online, social media activity. I also believe our kids need to demonstrate some good internal sensors before having “Facebook freedom” as there is a tendency to waste time, share overtly sensitive information and engage in childish behaviors when online. BTW, just today I’ve had to suspend one of our children’s FB accounts for a while, due to misuse. Nothing really terrible, but unauthorized and thus in violation of the rules we jointly wrote up for its use. I’m not real popular for that action, but my goal isn’t to be a popular parent, it is to help develop my kid’s, their minds, hearts and character, as well as their spiritual well-being.

Maybe I’m being overprotective, but I don’t think so. I’m not an ogre, just doing the “dad thing” – and I wish more parents would join me.

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