I hate having to talk about things like this, but it just happens. Sorry... I also hate that there is about a month between every single one of my posts. Most bloggers post ten times a day... I'll be lucky if I post once every ten days... but I digress.
Here's an article about sexual predators. Well... it might be about sexual predators. It could be, because there are men involved.
Wall Street Journal (I found it via ninme)
Basically... it seems that all men these days are seen as potential sexual predators. It's true... every man is certainly a potential sexual predator, but... well, let me give you a situation.
I'm a man. That's a fact. If I were to walk down the sidewalk downtown and pass by a mother and child, it would be a normal everyday situation, and most likely the mother and/or child would ignore me. The small child would probably look at me curiously, as most children often do, but really wouldn't give me a second thought. The mother also might take a glance, but wouldn't think anything of me besides "Oh, it's a guy walking down the sidewalk."
Now, what would happen if I were to smile and wave to the child as I passed by? Would that just be seen as "It's a nice man walking past us"? In some cases, yes. But in today's society, I submit that many mothers would think, "Sally, stay close to me, this guy might be a pedophile." That's the state that our society is in. That's what this article is saying.
Men are not allowed to be close to children anymore. Any man walking with a child better be walking with his own flesh and blood or he's in trouble. Even then, people might suspect something. I realize this sounds a bit extreme... after reading it over again, the little that I've written does sound quite exaggerated. Still, if Virginia's going to be running ads that simply depict a man holding a child's hand and making that out to be something bad, our society has truly taken things too far.
EDIT: Don't forget to read ninme's other post about the subject. :)
For link #2 of today... I give you this:
GOOD(via digg)
First thoughts: "Yeah... and... so what?"
If anyone wants to tell me so what, please do.
With the recent DefCon hacker conference came some amazing drama, and a cool list. For a while, I've considered myself a wannabe hacker. Only wannabe because I don't think I really have the skills or the brain to ever become one. I can still play Uplink, though...
First, DefCon. boing boing first reported on this story last Friday (yeah, I'm a little behind, if you haven't noticed my complete lack of posting the last couple months...). Apparently Dateline NBC wanted some dirt on some of the hackers at the conference, so they slyly place a mole disguising herself as a conference attendee, but was actually Dateline's producer, Michelle Madigan. Not to be outdone, DefCon had its own connections at NBC and knew about the mole beforehand. boing boing quotes Threat Level as saying:
"Before opening the show for business Friday, the DefCon goons announced to the crowd that there was a media mole among them. DefCon has been broadcasting her picture on the screens in conference rooms before each talk.
Saturday, it was reported on boing boing that the mole had fled the scene and had probably not gotten any good scoops for her story. boing boing quotes Threat Level again:
" According to DefCon staff, Madigan had told someone she wanted to out an undercover federal agent at DefCon. That person in turn warned DefCon about Madigan's plans. Federal law enforcement agents from FBI, DoD, United States Postal Inspection Service and other agencies regularly attend DefCon to gather intelligence on the latest techniques of hackers. DefCon holds an annual contest called Spot the Fed, in which attendees out people in the audience they think are undercover federal agents. The contest is good-natured, but the feds who get caught are generally ones who don't mind getting caught.
DefCon staff say that Madigan was asked four times -- two times on the phone and two times at the conference -- if she wanted to obtain press credentials, but she declined."
Some may disagree, but I'd say that Dateline got completely, excuse the phrase, PWNED. Don't forget the video link:
I will admit that some of the hackers comments on her way back to her car were in bad taste, but for some reason I thoroughly enjoyed when the guy yelled out, "Have you ever been on '60 Minutes?'"
CNET also covered the story very well, though I don't think they realized the redundancy of their statement "...Defcon 15, a conference of underground hackers who also happen to be security experts..."
So, in the same spirit, I present The Top Five Best Criminal Computer Hackers of All Time. Kevin Mitnick is number one. No surprise, really... interesting article, though.
It seems there are those that know what's really going on, and those who don't. Those who understand what the Internet really is and what's on it should realize that although safety precautions should be taken, it's not an overly dangerous thing. Example:
The National School Boards Association says that studies show the Internet is not a terrible, frightening, scary place. Sure, there are some seedy operations going on, but if you're not looking for them, they usually won't find you. They even say that social networking sites can be beneficial. boing boing quoted this from the main article:
""Safety policies remain important, as does teaching students about online safety and responsible online expression — but student may learn these lesson better while they're actually using social networking tools."
Social networking may be advantageous to students — and there could already be a double standard at work? 37% of districts say at least 90% of their staff are participating in online communities of their own — related to education — and 59% of districts said that at least half were participating. "These findings indicate that educators find value in social networking," the study notes, "and suggest that many already are comfortable and knowledgeable enough to use social networking for educational purposes with their students."
Seems logical to me. In the UK, however, it seems that there are those who don't know what's going on...
This, of course, has not so much to do with what's on the Internet as just the ignorance of what the heck the Internet is and how it works. Teachers in the UK want YouTube banned from campuses, as well as WI-FI connections. Yeah, those WI-FIs cook kids brains and might kill the teachers. I joke, but in essence, that's what the article reports them as saying. YouTube, of course, has all kinds of dangerous videos on it... though you'd expect as much from a site where anyone in the world can post anything they want. How different is it really from kids' cafeteria banter? If you think it's really that different, you should sit in on a cafeteria conversation once and tell me what you think.
But, that's what the UK gets for trying to bring the educational system into somewhere close to this century. I think The Register says it best:
"So there you have it, the UK’s education system is in a state, but all will be OK if teachers don’t have to use computers, networks, or have to deal with any kids. Alternatively, summer holidays could just be extended to 52 weeks per year.