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.

To support Amazon, or not... that is the question.

I've got enough Swagbucks for an Amazon gift card.

And there they sit, off to the right of you, in the swidget. As of this morning, I'm more than a quarter of the way to a second gift card.

This holds no joy for me this moment. Ordinarily, I would order an Amazon card as soon as I hit 451, and tuck it into my account for my future shopping needs. Those gift cards have come in mighty handy. I got my oldest daughter's vampire teeth with them, I've let a sibling use them to purchase a gift for our mother's birthday, my husband got a phone case for his new phone, and the oldest got a bento box to bring her lunch to school in. Considering all I do is occasionally take the poll and use the swag bucks search engine to earn them, an extra ten dollars a month is well worth the time.

I'm still holding animosity towards Amazon. They spent a good twelve hours defending the rights of a pedophile before they took his craptacular how-to guide off the market. It wasn't the disgusting work poured from a deranged mind that forced their hand...in clear violation of their own policies they stood up for the rights of the pedophile.

 Freedom of speech, they said. Freedom from censorship, they cried.

I can't see their point. At all. No one is yanking this guy's personal diary out and putting him in jail for it, although, I would almost feel just fine if they did, considering his thoughts on baby rape. (He thinks babies can consent to sex.)

 Everyone has a right to freedom of speech. That doesn't mean that what you say doesn't have consequences. If I walk up to the VP of my company during one of his visits and tell him he's a pompous ass, I'm going to get fired. (he's not by the way, he's actually pretty cool, it's just an example). Is that a violation of my first amendment rights?

No. It's a consequence for a stupidity leak.

So what about this censorship thing? Amazon's own policies restrict the sale of things that encourage illegal activities. Last time I checked, baby rape was still illegal. And no one is guaranteed a platform for their ramblings. If I start going on about murdering cats, or something heinous like that, blogger will probably yank my blog and send the FBI to my house. Is that censorship? Or an act of kindness for cats everywhere?

Well, Amazon doesn't seem to be big on the moral stand route. In fact, last I checked, they were still selling pedophilia related books. Just not the one that prompted the cries across the blogosphere for a boycott.

Part of me doesn't even want to give them my monopoly money. I spent most of the day last Wednesday writing various news organizations, partners, other bloggers, etc, etc,  in an effort to get that book pulled. Finally, the nationwide efforts paid off, not for the safety of our children, but for the safety of Amazon's bottom line.

 Is this really where I want to spend my money? Even my fake money?

I'm just not sure.