Comments on: Skype, Child Safety & the Worse Case Scenario Mentality

By: nursestaffingpower

nursestaffingpower — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 10:12:27 +0000

Thank you for this post. As a mom it is very helpful for me.

By: nursestaffingpower

nursestaffingpower — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 06:12:27 +0000

Thank you for this post. As a mom it is very helpful for me.

By: MB

MB — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 00:39:06 +0000

Actually we had a classic example of this today, my (6 yr old's) school asked for help from parents on school trips, but have made a rule that parents can't help out on any group that includes their own child. Rationale: "this is in case your little darling falls and then your concentration may waiver [sic] and neglect others in the group"

Apart from the curiously litigious mispelling of 'waver' (maybe they were thinking about 'waivers' to sign while writing) the most disturbing thing here is the huge mental leap from 'a parent might conceivably....' to 'all the parents obviously will....'- it is that leap that branded the poor old author as a potential abuser (he might be so let's just assume he is), and indicates the whole rotteness at the heart of this problem (and in the heart of the bureaucrats who so blithely and openly assume everyone except themselves is either malignant or a fool).

By: MB

MB — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 00:22:36 +0000

MikeRT- I don't accept that viewpoint in this case, this is not a gender thing. I can't be sure, but I strongly suspect that the 'paranoid teacher' would have taken the same exact 'precaution' if the author had been female. It is more a combination of a) a psychology that creates worse and worse situations and motives, and then attributes them to other people (thereby appearing clever, caring and virtuous by comparison with the villains that you have just labelled the rest of the world), b) a creeping fear of litigation if the imaginary 'worst case scenario' does come to pass, and c) a failure to realistically assess risk and probability. A failure to understand probability is why we have the National Lottery and why we have Health and Safety legislation. People go through life really believing that they might win a million, they might have a piece of the space shuttle land on their head, fall down a manhole, or the nice children's book author might abuse their children over the internet. The fact that all these things are millions-to-one against doesn't seem to particularly trouble these people.... and they would say I am irresponsible and have a cavalier attitude to safety because I ignore risks that are more than a few hundred thousand to one against.

By: Links 18/09/2009: Sugar Labs Joins Forces with FSF | Boycott Novell

Links 18/09/2009: Sugar Labs Joins Forces with FSF | Boycott Novell — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 00:47:34 +0000

[...] Skype, Child Safety & the Worse Case Scenario Mentality It’s really quite sad when you think about what kids are missing because of this “worst case scenario” mentality. In this particular case, these kids missed out on the opportunity to potentially hear from an innovative author of popular kids’ puzzle books (Eric Berlin, author of The Puzzling World of Winston Breen.) That’s troubling enough. But just think what other interesting people or topics these and other kids may never get to experience because of this mentality. [...]

By: Roy Schestowitz (schestowitz) 's status on Friday, 18-Sep-09 22:52:27 UTC - Identi.ca

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 22:52:30 +0000

[...] http://techliberation.com/2009/09/18/skype-child-safety-the-worse-case-scenario-mentality/ a few seconds ago from kdemicroblog [...]

By: MikeRT

MikeRT — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 11:04:56 +0000

This is all part of a greater anti-male bigotry that came into our society as feminism became mainstream. The underlying root cause is the belief that male sexuality is dark and predatory, and women are more moral by nature. You see it all the time in this particular type of moral panic with people automatically assuming that a man who has any interaction with kids not related to him just might be a pedophile. Bloggers like Dr. Helen have written volumes about this issue, and this particular post is only one of many symptoms.

By: Glyn Moody (glynmoody) 's status on Friday, 18-Sep-09 08:16:48 UTC - Identi.ca

Glyn Moody (glynmoody) 's status on Friday, 18-Sep-09 08:16:48 UTC - Identi.ca — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 08:16:59 +0000

[...] http://techliberation.com/2009/09/18/skype-child-safety-the-worse-case-scenario-mentality/ a few seconds ago from Gwibber [...]