Nowadays a kid who has a computer at home is able to download anything he/she wants, and, what is even more alarming, hide it somewhere on the hard disc so that the parent's won't know it's there. The material they download or have access to is not rated in any way, and unless a family uses some kind of blocking software, your child is free to plunge into the world of aggression and violence.
How Aggression Can Be Learned On-Line through
Viewing "Hard-Core" Pornography--
Aggression could be taught and encouraged on-line. One of the ways children are exposed to aggression on-line is viewing hard-core pornography. J.V.P. Check and T.H. Guloien did an experiment about attitude toward rape. They had three groups of men; one group was shown 90 minutes of non-violent pornography, the second group 90 minutes of violent pornography, and the third 90 minutes of non-pornographic material. Later, the men were asked about their attitudes towards rape. Twice as many men in both pornography groups as in the non-porn group said they were more likely to commit rape. In light of this study, and considering the fact that young boys and teens are more inexperienced and impressionable than men, they would be even more vulnerable to hard-core porn.
Former Surgeon General, Dr. C. Everett Koop said the following about the influence of hard core pornography on development of violent trends among our kids: "I am certain that pornography that portrays sexual aggression as pleasurable to the victim is at the root of much of the rape that occurs today. Impressionable adolescents see this material and get the impression that women like to be hurt, humiliated, and forced to do things they do not want to do." In short, exposure to hard-core pornography teaches our kids that coercion and violence are acceptable in our society.
How Aggression Can Be Learned On-Line through
Playing Violent Video Games--
Another source of aggression on-line are violent video games that anyone can download and play. These games, like QUAKE and DOOM, are rated, but any child above 6-years-old can easily access them. These are nothing but mere massacre, where the goal is to kill as many subjects as possible. When children play these games, they are once again exposed to excessive amounts of blood and fighting, as if they don't have enough of that on TV. This exposure promotes insensitivity to violence and aggression.
Also see
Violent Behavior on this Web site.
How Can Hatred and Racism be Encountered On-Line?
Another topic that is even more disturbing is the fact that kids can gain access to certain Web sites that would turn them into angry and arrogant individuals. According to the U.S. Government, there are now at least 2,200 Web sites specifically devoted to preaching hatred, racism, and violence. These sites are sponsored by such organizations as KKK, the Aryan Nation, and the Neo-Nazi party, and they are designed to appeal to our youth in order to recruit them into the ranks of these groups.
Many of these sites are designed in such a way that the kids who log on to them don't even realize that they are dealing with racists and murderers. A child could be participating in an innocent discussion in some chat room, without even realizing who the creators of the chat room are and what they want from him/her. These people know how to appeal to a child, they know they could lure them in their trap by pretending to be understanding and making the kids feel respected and comfortable, feel like they "belong" among people who understand them, unlike their parents. And in a while, your brainwashed child might belong to one of those horrific organizations, and it will be too late. Considering the fact that membership in such organizations as KKK, the Aryan Nation, and the Neo-Nazi party is now at an all-time high, it is the parents' responsibility to be cautious and watchful of what their kids do in Cyberspace.
An Example of Violence being Encouraged through the Internet: Columbine Shooting.
On April 20, 1999, two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, walked teacher before committing suicide. Questions "why?" followed, and, sadly enough, it was very obvious that the clues were everywhere, but there was no one to pay attention to the two boys. As it is now explained, the important influences were their obsessions with weapons, war, and death, that were bolstered by violent videos they made, violent essays and poems they wrote in their creative science class, endless rounds of bloody computer games, and their vicious rantings on the Internet, in their Web site. In everyday life Eric looked just like an average boy; on the Internet his veneer of normalcy fell away.
As it stated in the report, "His Web pages reflect a soul-searing level of hatred, frustration and powerlessness, the invective of a person driven crazy by everyday life." In the Web site, they talked about test-firing pipe bombs, anarchy, death . . . And no one was there to notice it and to try to prevent it while there still was a chance. Eric's and Dylan's friend's mother found out about the Web site and informed the police, but that information never made it to the district attorney's office. We still don't know if Harris' parents knew anything about the Web site. Rabbi Abraham Cooper, who coordinates the Simon Wiesenthal Center's study of hate groups, said: "Picking the dangerous needle out of the haystack of the Web is getting harder all the time." Last year his center tracked 1,400 hate sites. In April 1995 they had identified only one.
DOOM, Harris and Klebold's favorite game, appeared in late 1993 and took interactive, 3-D action to a new level. The concept, one of DOOM's creators has said, came down to this: "Kill everything and get out alive." One episode is called, "All Hell Breaks Loose." Another: "Knee-deep in the Dead." One of the game's slogans: "DOOM -- where the sanest place is behind a trigger." Players can hunt and kill together -- or each other -- from their own home computers across the street or across the world. And there are millions of players: More than 17 million copies of DOOM and its sequel have been downloaded worldwide.
"Violence in movies, on TV, and in video games heightens aggression for some people some of the time," former FBI profiler Gregg McCrary said. "But they don't cause the crime. It is how people react to them that matters . . ." Clearly, violence on-line affected Eric and Dylan a great deal. Add to this the fact that they were both isolated, home alone, and had unlimited and unsupervised access to the Internet, where they found a lot of information to satisfy their desire for violence and to find what they needed, and once again the dangers of unsupervised access to the Internet become evident. In addition, it is apparent that there are thousands more Web sites like Harris,' that are made by "average" kids and, what's worse, can be accessed by our children, and God knows what else might happen.
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold used the Internet not only to show the world what they have but also to gain access to certain information. Dozens of Web sites offer instructions on how to build bombs and make drugs. Many things that minors cannot get in the real world can be purchased on-line, with no age verification. Cigarettes, alcohol, guns, drugs, and materials needed to make bombs are available, and the anonymity of the Internet allows for a lot of these illegal activities to pass unnoticed by the authorities.
What Else Can Your Kids See On-Line that
Talks About Death and Violence?
As an example, in one of the middle schools of Maryland, middle school children found a recipe on how to make pipe bombs on-line, and brought one to their school. Everyone had to be evacuated and, fortunately, nobody was hurt. Internet can also be the source of other death-related material. Information about suicide and instructions on how to commit one led a 15-year-old California boy named Michael to run in front of an oncoming train and place his head on the tracks . . . Other death-related information includes videos and photos of real-life suicides, murders, executions, dismemberments.
One can also find information on how to poison people, make bombs (Timothy McVeigh used instructions he got on-line to make a bomb he used in the infamous Oklahoma City bombing), and other means of killing people. Here is an example of a recipe on how to make a letter bomb from an actual site (of course, some information is omitted, it is in brackets):
Letter Bombs by [the author]
You will first have to make a mild version of [a chemical]. Use my recipe, but substitute iron fillings for rust.
--Mix the iron with [metal] fillings in a ratio of 75% [metal] to 25% iron. This mixture will burn violently in a closed space (such as an envelope). This brings us to our next ingredient . . .
--Go to the post office and buy an insulated (padded) envelope. You know, the type that is double layered... Separate the layers and place the mild [chemical] in the main section, where the letter would go. Then place [chemical] powder in the outer layer. There is your bomb!!
--Now to light it... this is the tricky part and hard to explain. Just keep experimenting until you get something that works. The fuse is just that touch explosive I have told you about in another one of my anarchy files. You might want to wrap it like a long cigarette and then place it at the top of the envelope in the outer layer (on top of the powdered [chemical]). When the touch explosive is torn or even squeezed hard it will ignite the powdered [chemical] (sort of a flashlight) and then it will burn the mild [chemical]. If the [chemical] didn't blow up, it would at least burn the [expletive] out of your enemy (it does wonders on human flesh!).
Scary, isn't it? Parents, do everything possible to make sure your child doesn't fall victim to one of these sites, because it might turn out to be a tragedy for a lot of people.
