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They Have Access, But No Perspective: A post about your child and pornography.

apple-desk-office-technology

To continue the conversation started around pornography and sexuality we began with recent post,  “The Talk” Isn’t Enough, I wanted to share with you a few more thoughts.

Here are some reasons we need this conversation:

  • I’ve heard from middle school students who consistently encounter pornography at school through friends and on their own.  We need this conversation because students are truly being educated by the internet and not their parents or trusted sources.
  • I’ve counseled students who consume pornography almost daily, daily, or multiple times daily.  We need this conversation because they have access, but they have no perspective for what they are doing.
  • Recently, in our community we have had issues that I’m willing to wager, trace back to pornography on some level.  We need this conversation because pornography has real life consequences and we aren’t talking enough about those.
  • Recently, my wife and I had to talk about whether or not our elementary age child was exposed to pornography on the bus.  We need this conversation because the average age of first viewing pornography is 11 years old.

This is a real problem with real consequences.  We could spend significant time talking about this issue from a brain development perspective, a healthy sex life (both form and function) perspective, a justice perspective or the societal reasons we should be engaged in this conversation, or from an interpersonal relationship perspective.

This topic was recently the cover of Time magazine.  I still remember the first time I read this Huffington Post article, “What I Wish I Knew Before Watching Porn”  and started exploring the far reaching effects of pornography.  I’m thankful for the work of Fight the New Drug, particularly on the way porn affects society.  Even if you are a parent of young children or an empty nester, there are compelling reasons for us to all be involved in this conversation, though that’s not what today is about.

WHAT THIS IS ABOUT

I can promise you the students engaging with porn on a daily basis have no perspective of how they might be changing their brains or how they might be destroying their ability to sexually perform or how they might be contributing to the enslavement of young girls.  There are other things they don’t know as well.

“They don’t know the language of face to face contact…constant arousal, change, novelty excitement makes them out of sync with the pace of relationships – relationships which build slowly.”

–Psychologist Philip Zimbardo, in article Sex Before Kissing

They have the access to porn, but they have no perspective for what they are dealing with.

However, this isn’t about those things today, (though I encourage you to look into them and educate yourself and educate your son or daughter).

This is about something different.

This is about what we were created for.

It’s about who you are.  It’s about who you are becoming.

This is about hope not fear.

Hope that no matter what darkness we encounter, the light of Jesus exposes and heals and renews and rebuilds.

In scripture, we understand that God created us for connection, intimacy, and relationship.  We see that God created sex and he called it good.  We see that God placed it in a context – “for this reason a man shall leave his family and be united to his wife and the two will become one flesh”.

We understand that we are not just the sum of desires as culture sometimes tells us.  But we also see that we are human beings with sexual bodies even though the church and the family would, at times, like to ignore that fact.

PUT YOURSELF IN THEIR SHOES

Pornography mimics love, connection, intimacy, and relationship – things we were created for.  Porn has the ability to make us feel cared for and loved.  Porn can you give you a sense of control, when life feels uncertain.

They were created for what they might temporarily experience through consuming porn.  Porn is compelling and it is a huge money making industry because of this.

It’s not hard to imagine a students feeling alone, bored, disconnected in a world of social media showing us how we are missing out or not as loved/connected as our peers.

Essentially, they are longing for what they were created for and running to the false alternative.  It actually destroys and does harm, but for the moment they feel better.  It’s hard to say it this way, but if we are honest, porn is being willing to use someone else because we are feeling sad, disconnected, alone…

GIVE PERSPECTIVE

Again, they have access but very limited perspective.  Your role as a parent is to help give perspective.  Educate yourself and educate them on all the harmful effects of pornography, but I’ll warn you – fear doesn’t work.

You must give them something more compelling.

I recently read the story of a pastor who was secretly struggling with pornography for many years.  Here’s his response to how he overcame this secret life:

“The way to fight lust is to feed faith with the knowledge of an irresistibly glorious God.”

Give your students perspective.  Let them know how harmful it is.  Help them locate their feelings and understanding of their self in how we were created by God in the beginning.  But what might even be more compelling, is to help them see an “irresistibly glorious God”.

Just as much as we need to answer the question, “How do I protect my child?”, we should seek to answer the question, “How do I feed their faith and point them towards an irresistibly glorious God?”

If I might be so bold to guess, God would invite you to spend your energies in hopes and dreams as opposed to shrinking in fear.  My hope for today, is this conversation opens up the possibilities as opposed to creating fear.

Do not be afraid.

It’s scary stuff, but I have full confidence in an irresistibly glorious God.

Since we’ve been discussing this topic with the students in our group, many students have on their own challenged each other to go 40 days being porn free.  They are keeping themselves accountable, challenging each other, and seeking to live in the light.

Porn mimics love, but it doesn’t stand a chance against the real thing.

Friends, do not be afraid.  We have reason to hope.

 

 

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Parenting Technology: Why Fairness Doesn’t Matter

As a parent of young kids, I realize that I will be part of a new frontier of parenting – mainly, from the moment my kids can go online they will begin to build a digital footprint specific to them.  I need to help them understand this from a very young age.  This next generation and the current one need to be incredibly thoughtful about how they help their kids navigate this ever-changing and ever-challenging world of technology.

If you haven’t thought about your child’s usage of technology or how to put helpful parameters up to protect and created strategies to help grow them to maturity around this issue, I highly encourage you to stop now and consider it.  (If you need some help, you can go here:  Raising Kids in the Digital Age and Get Off Your Phone! A Few Tips for Restricting the Use of Technology)

I ran across a great post by Kara Powell, “Why Technology is the One Area of Our Family that’s Not Fair.”  She shares this about her family’s practice –

We try to keep things “fair” among our kids. At least sort of.

Nathan started making his own lunch in second grade. When Krista and Jessica entered second grade, we expected the same of them.

Krista got her ears pierced when she was ten. When Jessica turns ten, she will have that same opportunity.

We’re not always perfect. Far from it. But we don’t want our kids to think we play favorites.

But we’ve told all our kids that technology won’t be fair.

Just because Nathan was allowed to set up a Facebook account when he turned 13 doesn’t mean the girls will get the same social media access.

Even though Nathan got a smart phone when he turned 14 (he was one of the last kids in his grade to get one), Krista shouldn’t assume one will head her way when she hits that age. Nor should Jessica.

When it comes to technology, we’ve told our kids that they need to show us they are responsible.

There are two types of responsibility.

 
The first is taking care of your devices.
And for our child who left their “dumb phone” (as they call it) in their shorts and it went through our washing machine, you lost some responsibility points that day. (And yes, that child had to spend their own money to replace that phone, which luckily for them, wasn’t all that expensive).

But that’s the easier type of responsibility. It’s pretty clear-cut for everyone.

The second type of responsibility—showing us you make good choices in how you use technology and digital media—is much tougher. For our kids. And for us.

Some of the questions we’re discerning as we assess their progress in that type of responsibility are:

  • Do you obey the guidelines that our family has agreed upon in terms of when, how, and where you can use your devices?
  • Do you have a history of making good decisions when new temptations or opportunities arise that we don’t have rules about?
  • Is your technology helping or hindering your relationships with our family? I love it when my two older kids text me. I hate it when I’m trying to talk to my kids and I can tell they are distracted by the presence of their devices (even if they aren’t on their devices, if those devices are nearby, they still have a strong gravitational pull).
  • Is the way you use technology affecting your homework or chores? One of our children had been skyping with friends while doing homework. Social life benefitted, but grades suffered. So the rule with that child is now “no skyping until homework is done.” We haven’t set up that rule with the other two. They haven’t seemed to need it. So far.

Parents, be fair in other areas. But you do not need to be fair with your child’s exposure to technology and digital media. The stakes are too high. Know each child and create the best support and boundaries for them individually.

What else do you do to try to assess if your kid’s ready for the social media portal or device they are begging for?

– See more at: https://fulleryouthinstitute.org/blog/why-technology-is-the-one-area?utm_source=E-Journal+%2F+Parent+Update&utm_campaign=0645f9ae22-FYI+E-Journal+June+11+2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e88a54a953-0645f9ae22-312799030#sthash.FbyiVxNh.dpuf

I’m curious, how have you handled this in your family?  Do you agree that when it comes to technology -“one size doesn’t fit all”?  What parameters have you set in place for your child to protect them and to grow them in regards to technology?

Get Off Your Phone! A Few Tips for Restricting the Use of Technology.

With summer looming and idle time high for many students, we are re-posting this popular series, Raising Kids in the Digital Age.  This is part 3 of 3.  Feel free to check out part 1 here and part 2 here.  

Just to recap, we started this series inviting you to “imagine the end”.  Your child is now out from your house and on their way to adulthood.  You have been raising them all these years for this moment; to help launch them into adulthood.  But before we get into restrictions related to technology we have to go back and remember why we are doing this.  Here’s a great quote to remind us:

“Don’t forget the end game:  As parents of teenagers, we are trying to raise adults.  We’re more interested in wisdom than compliance, more interested in responsibility than in high walls of protection, and more interested in healthy parent/teen communication than maintaining a veneer of good appearances.”

Mark Oestreicher and Adam McLane

The goal is that as our children sit in their college dorm room or venture out into to life on their own, they are ready for the moment.  This isn’t about control, this is about preparation and wisdom.  If we wait to give kids the power to decide and learn from their mistakes until they leave our home, then we have waited way too long.

Of course, life might be easier if we make sure they only make the choices we want them to make, but that is not what we are interested in here.  We want to give them the opportunity to try and fail under our guidance.  If we wait to give them the power to choose when they are 18 and on their own, then the stakes are much higher.
(However – and this is just one man’s opinion – You may choose to stick with the “until your 18 and out of the house, you have to do what I say” approach, but we all know what happens when they turn 18.)

So, now we are on the same page – regulation is about building wisdom and guiding them towards adulthood – so, let’s get into some practical ideas.

Here’s a few words of warning to consider as we begin:

1.  Be careful about confrontation.  As much as possible try to make this a mutual experience.  If they perceive this is about control, most likely they will shut down and continue doing what they are doing in secret.

2.  Secondly, I’m not discussing internet safety here and it would be worth your time to look into that as well.

3.  Finally, know that no perfect parents are needed for this process.  All you need is to be willing to enter into the mix.   It may not be easy, but it’s worth it to be engaged.

FIVE SUGGESTIONS FOR REGULATION:

  • Make Access to Social Media a Rite of Passage.  Set an age for when they can access certain social media and celebrate it.  Work with them to set up their profiles and accounts and use your conversations surrounding it to teach them what you think is important.  If you start this process together, it will be easier to stay engaged.
  • Create a Family Agreement.  Work together on this document and make decisions with your child.  The more this can be mutually shared, the better the results will be.  Remember our survey from part 1 – (how kids thought their parents were just as addicted…) – there might be some rules you create for yourself as a part of this process.  Ultimately, this document should reflect you protecting them as a child and fostering their movement toward adulthood.
  • Require Them to Give You Their Passwords and Periodically Check on Them.  Typically, “the more secretive the practice, the more dangerous the situation.”  This goes for you as well!  Don’t make your checking on them a secret.  You may do this often when they are just getting started and not at all when they are 17/18.
  • Check In Devices at Bedtime.  Kids need sleep and temptation is often worse at night.  I realized in preparing for this that I often spend time on my phone right when I wake up and right before I go to bed.  Since then, I have purchased an alarm clock to get my phone off my nightstand.
  • Consider Regulating Screen Time Alone in Their Rooms.  This falls in line with the other suggestions above, but worth considering on it’s own.  Determine what is allowed and what isn’t and stick to it!
  • BONUS SUGGESTION:  Have a No Tech Hour or Day!  Take a sabbatical together.  Make it a day where you do something out of the ordinary and everyone leaves technology at home.  You too, parents!

Will this be easy…not necessarily, especially if your kids are already immersed in it.  However, it is worth it to be engaged.  Take some time and figure out what you would like this to look like in your home and then get in the game!

 

If you have any great suggestions on this topic, feel free to post them in the comments section.

Raising Kids in the Digital Age part 3 (a)

Raising Kids in the Digital Age part 3 (b)

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