Myspace

Puritanistic - new word by me, much prefer the regular old word 'puritanical'.

In case of confusion, I was commenting to Noddy on my last post.

The article says, "The photos, which were posted on Flickr.com by her partner".

Flickr is not particularly a teenagers site. It's just the best known, most used photo site of the moment, where tons of amateur photographers upload their work. Good stuff too, browsing around I've been really impressed by some of the photos up there. Its a pretty obvious first stop for a photo-artist with an online interest to publish things on. And its wholly unremarkable to post a semi-nude on there too.

OK, so then you could ask, was it wise for the teacher's partner to link to the Flickr site from MySpace? But jeez. I just dont think its up to a school to determine where a teacher's partner can advertise her work.

I agree nimh.

I didnt read the article enough though.
I thought she posted them DIRECTLY to myspace.
next time I will read more.


Yes , flickr is popularI'm shameless . I know of it too.. hehe

And yes, I agree.. why does the school have any say so in where she or her partner posts pictures?

The internet is free public space.

It wasnt like she posted to the schools website.

And , as someone else said, if the parents were worried about what their kids were looking at, then they need to step in and monitor more.

I dunno.. Im sort of hung on the whole subject.

I am with her when it comes to her right to post what she wants.
But I feel a bit wierd that a teacher has her nudes posted close to things that kiddos use.
Imagine if... she was posted on a billboard a few miles away from the school, one exit from a popular teenage hang out..


thats kinda how I see this whole " its on flickr" idea.

The teacher, her partner, Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all have a right to post whatever they choose in MySpace or anywhere else on the net.

"Take what you want," says God. "Then pay."



If you're topless at a topless beach--or a nude beach--fine. If you're topless on a family beach you are going to arouse a certain amount of ire among the "puritans".

Part of being a good--even an adequate--teacher is knowing and respecting the world your students inhabit as a part of knowing and respecting your students.

This teacher and her partner love art. I'm sure this teacher and her partner have convinced at least one puritan parent that majoring in art leads to posing bare-breasted on the Internet.

Public schools are funded by the taxpayers and community values--even conservative community values--should be honored.

For me the issue isn't the bared breasts--it is the poor judgement and the lack of respect for parental opinion.

Sites like flickr include photos with a degree of nudity. No surprise there. Its no porn site or anything, its just a site where people who make photos can upload them, and so there's semi-nudes too. They only represent a small percentage, but it's not like a "family beach", where any show of, say, breasts, would be considered an outrage if not outright illegal.

If conservative parents therefore feel they should keep their teens from Flickr, then thats their right. But again, the teacher did not go topless on the equivalent of "a family beach", let alone of "the corner of Main and Market Street at High Noon" - her partner posted 100s of photos, of which a few were semi-nude, on a site that features semi-nudes.


I dont think being a teacher should involve living your life exclusively in ways that all your students' parents would approve of. If you apply that logic, a teacher should also not, say, go to a pub that parents would disapprove of, be topless on a topless beach if parents considered such beaches immoral, have a drink in their free time if parents are teetotallers, etc.

Its hard enough to find people willing to take on that heavy and underrewarded job anyway. Teachers do an impressive enough job already without facing their private life being "owned" by the school and parents as well.

Nimh--

We'll have to agree to disagree.

I feel the Internet is a public place--the corner of Main and Market Streets. What consenting adults do behind closed doors is their business. Internet displays take place in public and become matters of community interest.

Last month a teenage driver lost control of his car coming home from a drunken party. His two passengers were killed. His level of intoxication was documented not only in the paperwork from the blood lab, but by photographs on MySpace.

He's facing Homicide by Vehicle charges.

There has been a certain amount of outrage among his peer group that "they" (meaning, I think, "authority") can't invade MySpace that way.

MySpace is public. Self-incrimination doesn't apply.

What fools indeed! Very sad...................

I again fail to see the analogy. And not just because of the massive dissonance in scope (you're talking a criminal case here, and one that involves deaths, at that).

"Self-incrimination" refers to cases where the "accused" would otherwise have denied having done something in the first place. That is not an issue here. The teacher is not claiming not to have been featured semi-nude in art photos.

What is at stake here is not, as in your example, whether the authorities have the right to find information about someone's private life on MySpace or Flickr. Everybody can. It is about whether what they found is reasonable cause for firing her.


The major problem I have with this logic is easily illustrated by an analogy of my own.

The art teacher and her partner are also lesbians. They are, moreso - obviously - openly lesbians, not just "behind closed doors".

I am sure that in many places in Texas, "parental opinion" would disapprove of that, too. In fact, it would likely be against "community values", in particular "conservative community values".

But does the fact that public schools are funded by taxpayers mean that the school or parents can require the teachers to "honor community values" in this respect? To "know and respect the world their students inhabit" well enough to know to keep their lesbianism behind closed doors?

I think that if she is a good and capable teacher, which the district itself acknowledged, it's not in their purview to demand her to live according to the community's conservative values in her free time.

So yes, we definitely have to agree to disagree there.


The Internet is a public space, indeed -- but not every public place is the corner of Main and Market Streets. Just check the Relationships & Marriage forum on Able2Know.

I meant "might" rather than "would" here, of course - it certainly wouldnt be considered an outrage on a Dutch family beach, for example. I was empathising with local context ;-)

(Lucky thing Austin doesnt have a beach... )

Yikes! Guys.....I am asking a question to parents. I don't give a flip about her, she is an adult. It is not about her...it is about rearing children. Standards.........Public education.....Everyone crys out for "parent involvement", then when parents take notice, they are shot down.

Public education is in trouble. The current administration wants to give it over to private schools (business). This attitude supports private education.

Think about it...................

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/06/20myspace.html

Gotta love it.

Be irresponsible with your kids, and then sue someone else.

pffffffffft

Beth,
You can not be more wrong on this on. I monitor my son's use of the internet.
He was & has been threatened on myspace. I can not get in to see the blog because she posts herself as "14".
This is about the children not companies.

I believe strongly it's about the parenting, or in too many cases, the lack of interest therein.

Sue the parents, not the company.

Then again, it is America, where thoughts of litigation dance like sugarplums.

EhBeth--

Happy Birthday.

I agree with you--mama wasn't keeping an eye out for trouble and now she wants to be compensated for her neglect.

People!

Government is there to serve us ....we the people. For example: 1 out of 3 children that entered Kindergarden will get Diabetes 2. This is a diet problem that can be cured. Yes, parents can be blamed. So government (with pressure) took the wheel. ALL ISD's must have this in place or loss federal fending. (we got fat kids)
http://www.schoolnutrition.org/Index.aspx?id=1079Wellness Policies
There are so many many issues involved. You can't just say "parent's fault". You want to pay the court expenses? Medical?
How many times in the last year have you "voiced" your opinion to your state school board rep? Do you even know who that person is?



Government must take the wheel in protecting our children as well. It is all about companies & money.

Myspace..McDonalds.....crap. Yes, parents need to wake up, but in the mean time thank the parents like me that are involved and try to make changes.

Sorry....venting alittle...and Happy Birthday Beth, my birthday was the 18th,

Hi everyone,
I became aware of myspace.com when Oprah talked about it on her show. I had heard my daughters (ages 12 & 14) speak amongst themselves about it but I hadn't paid much attention. After watching that episode on Oprah I got on my PC & checked it out. I found it confusing at first, but I went ahead & created my own page & became my daughters "friend" as a way of keeping track of what's going on. Also, I down loaded a free program off the internet called "Chat Checker". Now I'm alerted (without their knowledge) of every word both sent & received. So far I haven't found them doing anything dangerous or inappropriate, but it's nice to know anyway, just in case. Also the people that monitor myspace will gladly help you take down your childs site if you ask them. My daughters have their profiles set to "private" so the only people who can view their page are the "friends" they accept. Below, I've pasted the "Tips for parents" from the myspace FAQ's page. I hope this helps!!
For teens, MySpace is a popular online hangout because the site makes it easy for them to express themselves and keep in touch with their friends.

As a parent, please consider the following guidelines to help your children make safe decisions about using online communities.

* Talk to your kids about why they use MySpace, how they communicate with others and how they represent themselves on MySpace.
* Kids shouldn't lie about how old they are. MySpace members must be 14 years of age or older. We take extra precautions to protect our younger members and we are not able to do so if they do not identify themselves as such. MySpace will delete users whom we find to be younger than 14, or those misrepresenting their age.
* MySpace is a public space. Members shouldn't post anything they wouldn't want the world to know (e.g., phone number, address, IM screen name, or specific whereabouts). Tell your children they should avoid posting anything that would make it easy for a stranger to find them, such as their local hangouts.
* Remind them not to post anything that could embarrass them later or expose them to danger. Although MySpace is public, teens sometimes think that adults can't see what they post. Tell them that they shouldn't post photos or info they wouldn't want adults to see.
* People aren't always who they say they are. Ask your children to be careful about adding strangers to their friends list. It's fun to connect with new MySpace friends from all over the world, but members should be cautious when communicating with people they don't know. They should talk to you if they want to meet an online friend in person, and if you think it's safe, any meeting should take place in public and with friends or a trusted adult present.
* Harassment, hate speech and inappropriate content should be reported. If your kids encounter inappropriate behavior, let them know that they can let you know, or they should report it to MySpace or the authorities.
* Don't get hooked by a phishing scam. Phishing is a method used by fraudsters to try to get your personal information, such as your username and password, by pretending to be a site you trust. Click here to learn more.

Click Here to remove your child's profile from MySpace

For more information on Monitoring software, please visit:

* Software4parents.com
* k9webprotection.com

To learn more please visit these other resources:

* OnGuard Online: FTC safety tips for parents
* Netsmartz.org
* WiredSafety.org
* The Child Safety Network
* GetNetWise.org
* SafeTeens.com
* BlogSafety.Com
* Common Sense Media

You can also check out the new book by Larry Magid and Anne Collier:

bookcoverlittle.jpg MySpace Unraveled: What It Is and How to Use It Safely

Jeez louise.

Having kids set their profiles to "private", so the only people who can view their page are the "friends" they accept, sounds very sensible, and could avoid a bunch of trouble.

All those MySpace FAQ recommendations are sound sense too.

Downloading software to secretly spy on every word your own kid says sound like a vote of distrust between parent and child. THats completely creepy to me.

Chat Checker? Something I need to look into. Good news, for me......me son has deleted his account. No time for it now that he is in college.

Where are the parents?