Wake Up! Internet Alarm!
[by Yedidya Meir, Besheva, translated by Hillel Fendel]
It's a bit awkward for me to write
about the dangers of the internet, but I have no choice.
1. I so much don't feel like writing about this. Why
should I get myself involved in this dirt? Isn't it something for teachers and
rabbis to talk about, privately? Who am I to preach? I would much rather write
nice snuggle pieces about Gush Etzion, or about Avigdor Lieberman's
ridiculousness in simultaneously attacking the hareidim who don't enlist and
the religious officers who are taking over the IDF.
But the truth is: The above points
don't really matter. I seem to be in a position to do this, and many have asked
me why I don't, and Pirkei Avot teaches that where there's no man, overcome
your embarrassment and be a man. So here goes.
2. I don't
have exact numbers, and it could be there actually is no way to ascertain them.
But I can roughly guesstimate that there are thousands – thousands of youths
who are now on summer vacation but who will not return safely to their school
studies when it ends. That is, they will certainly be there in body, having
safely survived the dangers of summer fun – but their heads will be totally not
where they were when the vacation began. They won't be the same children. They
will have great trouble concentrating, learning, paying attention, connecting,
and praying.
And they will be alone. Each of
them will be struggling, alone, with their fear and their shame. They won't
rush to share with anyone else how their innocence left them this vacation,
never to return. Nor will they want to tell of their new addiction. I have so
much pity for them, and for their teachers. I also have some compassion for
their parents, but we will discuss below whether they really deserve any.
Of course, the dangers of
"inappropriate" content exist all year round – but in the summer, with
an increase in both boredom and computer usage, the internet dangers increase
as well – dramatically.
If you think I'm exaggerating,
because your children are "good kids who have no interest in that
stuff" – think again: Your children, among all their friends, might be in
the greatest danger of all, precisely because of their relative lack of choice
until now. Many youths have traveled exactly that path to a world of sickness
and depravity, for which they have no tools to help them deal with it.
3. It's
incredible. The headlines in this week dealt with a sadistic young woman who
cruelly mistreated the babies and toddlers in her care. The hidden-camera footage
was viewed over and over around the country, protests were held, changes in the
Education Ministry's supervision over home nurseries were demanded and enacted,
and people didn't stop emoting about it. Dread and horror overtook the entire
nation. But everyone knows that at least 99.9% of child-care givers are
dedicated, gentle, and certainly not violent. At the same time, in this age of
the internet, millions of children find themselves in concrete danger, every
day – yet no one says a word! And incidentally, I don't even know which is
worse for a child: a hard slap or other physical mistreatment - or addiction to
disgusting content posted by some sicko in Amsterdam or Berlin that will
distort his entire view of life. OK, both are terrible; but the chances of the
first even happening are close to zero, yet it is on everyone's lips – while
regarding the immediate and clear dangers of internet, all are silent.
These dangers apply, of course, to
youth and children of all sectors, religious and secular. Of course, parents
who recite twice daily in Kriat Shma, "Do not stray after your heart and
your eyes" are likely to have a special interest, for themselves and their
children, in living lives of more modesty and less licentiousness. But in truth
this is not just a Halakhic issue, but rather one of sanity and normalcy. Even
the most secular parents want their children to grow up balanced, normal, and
happy – everything that the internet can destroy in two seconds or less.
4. How is it
that the religious sector, which speaks so much about dedication and
self-sacrifice, and is always willing to volunteer for society's most
challenging missions, does not raise the gauntlet of this existential struggle?
The strongest initiative in this field was actually started by two secular
mothers from the Sharon area. Naama Giladi and Sigal Rubin effected a real
revolution, one in which the parents in more than 200 (!) elementary schools,
religious and secular, bought for their children only "dumb" phones –
so that their children would remain smart. By agreeing to purchase the phones together,
the parents avoided the problems of peer pressure to buy them a smartphone.
They thus enabled their children another year, or two or three, free of the
social pressures, lethargy, inertia and other problems that accompany a child's
entry into the smartphone internet age.
Let me state this clearly: Parents
of children without filtered internet in their homes are abusive parents. OK,
I'll say it differently: They are primitive. They are stuck in the previous
century, and do not understand what is going on in the world around them and
the difficult issues with which their children are struggling.
For the benefit of these primitive
parents, let me explain just one point. You say, "We know our child, he's
a good kid." Certainly he is, and to see him engage in science and
classical music all day is a great source of happiness for you. But the wicked
people of Google work hard to ensure that when he performs a search for an innocent
topic, he ends up in very different places – both disgusting and addictive. And
the rest is history – internet history that he knows very well how to hide from
you, the adults, so that you won't have a clue as to the dark virtual sites
he's been frequenting.
And then, after a certain amount of
time, you suddenly notice a change in him. For some reason, he seems somewhat
less interested in science and classical music, and more in staying alone in
his room, sleeping less, playing less with his friends. By the time you notice
that "he's just not the same kid," it might be too late. True, there
are many professionals and experts in dealing with children like this – but 1,000
therapists, at hundreds of dollars a shot, will have difficulty in removing
from the unfiltered well the many rocks thrown there by one irresponsible
person. It could be that I bungled up the parable, but you get the idea of who
the "irresponsible person" is…
I don't have a snappy
ending to this column, other than to provide these emergency phone numbers: In
Israel, Rimon (1-800-222-234) and Netiv (074-700-1700) can filter your internet
availability, and for phones, visit www.netsparkmobile.com. In
the U.S., visit this website for content control filter options May you have a healthy summer!