Quote Originally Posted by Triskeliongirl View Post
Wow, do you guys really do this kind of stuff? Don't you respect your kids privacy? Haven't you raised them to make good decisions on their own? What will they do when they are suddenly living at college if they've had no time to ease into personal responsibility? Are we really that different? We gave our kids the max degree of freedom we thought they could handle, with the expectation that with freedom comes responsibility. In turn they knew they had to bring home good grades, etc.
My son has so much freedom he doesn't even have to go to school. We have a pretty transparent relationship, and we trust each other a lot, which includes honoring each other's privacy. I know his passwords, and he knows the ones of mine that are relevant to him (debit card PIN!). I do check his myspace on occasion, but again, he is so paranoid about seeing something he doesn't want to see (i.e., nudity) I don't worry about him seeking it out too much.

His computer is in his room. It is turned on only about once or twice a week. He's a very active kid so he doesn't sit around online or playing video games (unless it's Wii, which doesn't require a lot of sitting). What I do worry about is other kids who go in his room and want to get into trouble online on his computer. They only want to do that because they are not trusted or free at home, so they act up every chance they can. He's pretty good at re-directing them to other things, because he truly is uncomfortable with nudity. He usually comes down and asks me to be the bad guy and "make" them go outside. I'm happy to help him save face that way.

Before someone says I'm setting myself up or something like that, he's my youngest son, so I've been through all this before. My middle son DID look at porn online when he was 14. He was curious, and I think it is totally natural to be curious. (His little brother just isn't curious, yet.) However, we spent a lot of time researching how pornography damages women, and we created a dialog about it. There was no sense in me banning him from the computer or over-reacting, so long as he knew my point of view and he was willing to respect it. I know he's still a fan at 23, and he knows I don't like it, but he hasn't turned into some slobbering derelict over it, and in fact has a wonderful 4-year relationship with a great young woman. I'm very proud to say that all my sons confide in me nearly every day about things I could never say to my own parents, so I must be doing something right!

Karen