The Winston-Salem Journal’s Ken Otterbourg wrote a blog post about how reporters are using personal blogs and journals on sites like myspace.com and facebook.com to build profiles of people in addition to or in lieu of personal interviews.  One of the stories he highlights is that of the suicide of James Dungy, the son of Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy.  Reporters used his comments on myspace.com to get a sense of the young man that even his parents and friends didn’t have before his death.

Reading this got me to thinking about my own kids. Kids have always had, and always will have an altnernative persona to that which they show at home.  To me that’s healthy, but it’s also scary.  Does their alternate persona put them in danger (hanging out with gang-bangers, unprotected sex, buying drugs, etc.) or is it simply a matter of different language, dress, etc?  I’ll do anything I can to make sure I know the answer to that question.

As far as I know my kids’ only online activity right now is playing Runescape, but honestly I’m not sure. When and if they do start to blog or set up a page on myspace or whatever I’m going to be their most avid reader. They’ll probably know this and they’ll probably try to set up a secret, anonymous presence somewhere, but if and when they do I’ll do my damndest to make sure I find it. Let’s put it this way: I’m thinking of putting something on their computer to track their activity.

Is this "warrantless spying"?  Yep.  Is it wrong?  Nope, because I’m not a public servant. I’m a father and I want to make sure I know what’s going on with my kids.  Now if I’m stupid I’ll find out their doing something I don’t like, say listening to rap and IMing nasty comments to friends, and then ride their case about it.  That would totally defeat the whole purpose.  I’m keeping an eye on them to make sure they aren’t hurting themselves.  If I call them on every little thing I’ll just alienate them and alert them that I’m watching them like a hawk.  On the other hand if I take the attitude that kids will be kids (silly, crude, arrogant, petty, etc.) and reserve intervention for serious matters (secret liaisons with 19 year-old college students, drug buys, etc.) then I’ll be doing what a father should be doing: acting in the best interest of his kids.

Now you might argue that this is the equivalent of reading my kids’ diaries.  First, diaries are truly private.  Posting something on myspace is the equivalent of taping a diary page to the outside of your bedroom door and if you do that I’m going to read it.  Second, if I think something serious is going on with one of my kids I have no problem with cracking their diary to see if I can find out what’s going on.  Not to catch them at something, but to prevent them from getting hurt.  If I don’t find anything like "Yesterday I met Mr. XXX my gym teacher in his office and he kissed me" I’ll put it away and try not to ever let them know I was there.

To put this succinctly I’ll say this: My kids have the right to a perception of privacy, but until they turn 18 they have no rights to real privacy whatsoever. I’ll be polite and knock on their door before I enter their room, but if they say "Go away, I’m busy", I’ll kick the damn thing in without a second thought if I want to.  When you come down to it kids are not-yet-fully-formed human beings.  They can be incredibly naive and it never seems to occur to them that bad things can actually happen to them.  As a parent it’s my job to help them survive long enough to become fully-formed human beings (I’m 39 and I’m still working on it) and I’ll use whatever tools I can to do the job.