A Horror Story for Parents

A parent told me this story.  It should horrify you. 

It involves the social media website ask.fm.com, which lets people say anything they want to while remaining anonymous and untraceable.  

The problem with that is that it allows adult perverts to say anything they like to your children without any chance they’ll ever be identified and caught.

It also allows teen-aged bullies to verbally batter their peers anonymously.  And  that can be just as bad.  Nine teen suicides have been linked to the site in the last year alone, and it’s because they’re hit with anonymous messages like...

“Why don’t you just die?”

“No one likes you.”

“Fucking die, why don’t you?”

“I dream of you at night and what I want to do to you while you are on top of me.”

“Do you like c*m in your mouth?”

As a veteran of 30 years in newspaper work, I know that people who write things like that anonymously are cowards.  Newspapers get letters like that all the time, but rarely if ever does the perp show his face.  They’re just harmless cowards.

But to teen-agers, they are fearful. 

The good news is that there is something you can do about it. 

Look on your child’s iphone or itouch and go to their Instagram page, and from there to their bio.  If they are involved with ask.fm.com, you’ll see a little blue link.  If there is no link, breathe a sigh of relief. 

You also might consider not allowing snapchat and kik, which bullies also like to use.

For more, Google ask.fm and teen suicides.

And please, pass this on to other parents.

Thank you.

-Skip