Here is an interesting article or poll from my local newspaper The Flint Journal.
http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/index.ssf/2011/05/poll_should_parents_friend_the.html
It asks the question “Should parents ‘friend’ there children on Facebook?” Almost 44% of the respondents (no info on how many have participated in the poll and it is a running poll) said “They should go a step further by knowing childrens’ passwords so they can monitor everything on the site.” Wow! That is pretty controlling. I think if you have a child on Facebook you should friend them but ultimately that is going to depend on each individual child and parent. If you are friends with your child on FB you should give them their space. I have seen parents and children fighting on FB and that is not cool.
My husband and I are friends with my stepson on Facebook but we do not know his password. I think that my stepson would feel like that was a major invasion of his privacy and would be pretty PO’d if we asked for it. We are also not a huge presence on his page either – every now and then we might comment on his page. He is not on Facebook that much anyway and I am sure if he wanted to hide something from us he could/would. I generally don’t think he hides too much from us anyway but a parent can monitor Facebook activity pretty well just by friending them and looking at their posts and checking in on them in person (real conversation) rather than going the whole route of having his password and such. I cannot say I am not nosy (I am terribly nosy!) and I would never spy on my child but it is good to give your child some space especially if they are older and keep out of trouble. Some kids are far too young to be on Facebook without heavy monitoring. If I had a kid that was either really young (I probably wouldn’t let them have a FB) or up to trouble a lot (drugs for example) I would not hesitate to spy on them or heavily monitor them in everything. This topic, as with a lot of topics in life, depends on the person and the situation. There are no easy answers or one size fits all solutions.
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