I will not post a picture today, and soon you will understand why. I was watching TV this evening, and Dateline's weekly segment "To Catch a Predator" came on. If you've never seen this show, here's the basic outline: adults, pretending to be teens, lure sexual predators into chats online. They set up a meeting with the predator using a decoy in a rented house. When the predator arrives, the decoy leaves in a matter of minutes, and in walks the reporter. The most astounding thing is, the predators almost always stay to answer the reporter's questions! Are they too stunned to walk out, or just too stupid? Either way, here's what happens next:
Reporter: "Sir, what are you doing here?"
Predator: "Um, I was just going to hang out."
Reporter: "Hang out?" (Pulls out printed copy of online chat) "Is this an appropriate way for a thirty-year-old man to talk to a thirteen-year-old girl?"
Predator: (Begins crying like a thirteen-year-old girl) "I'm so sorry! This is my first time! I'll never do this again." (Proceeds to run out of house only to be tackled by law enforcement).
Sure, the script varies slightly from guy to guy, but this is generally what happens. In tonight's episode, they busted the same guy twice within eight months. As they hauled him away for the second time, I turned to Tim and said, "Our daughter will be living in a world with these kind of guys." Tim said the only thing a reasonable future parent would, "We just won't have Internet." I agreed.
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2 comments:
I totally agree with you on the paranoia when it comes down to our kids and the internet. good thing our husbands know a lot about the comp to stop stuff like that from happening =)
Fast forward 13 years:
Kid: "Mom, why can't I have Internet in my room? ALL of my friends have it in their's!"
Me: "Wow, when did you have time to find a job? Because you know that's the only way you could afford a computer, put Internet access on it, and with taxes and all that, you must have saved a fortune ..."
No shame in my game.
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