Sunday, January 16, 2011

13 year old child is molested by Xbox live friend

Right now, I'm shaking my head at this one. Hard enough to give myself an injury.

A thirteen year old boy was molested by a WOMAN he met through Xbox live. I'm going to let you let that one sink in for a minute.

Female predators, by far, freak me out the worst. But there's another thought I want to put in your head right now, one that you may not have thought of if you are about as un-tech-savvy as I am. You need to watch who your kids are talking to on the Xbox.

We've got one of those. I even had my husband change the settings on the thing, because one of his friends has a curse word in his name (yeah, I'm that mom.) and I didn't want it popping up and down all the time while the kids were watching Barney. It never occurred to me that people could use the thing to target kids. One step ahead of parents who are purchasing gifts they don't understand, the bastards have found another, more innocuous way into our living rooms, into the minds of our children. Right about the age you start feeling you should be letting go a bit, they're moving in.

Well, not in this house. My kids don't really 'play' the Xbox, but they love to play the Wii, which has the some of the same capabilities. And I'm still not sure how to deal with this one, and my husband is not yet home to put my mind at ease. I will tell you, I have every intention of knowing who each and every "friend" is, but do you restrict them to people they know in real life? Is that going too far?

Do you sit in the room and watch as they play each and every time? How do you protect your kids from pedophiles disguised as Call of Duty clan leaders? Ugh. I'm freaked out right now.

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