Ignorance damaging the lives of the little ones

Jamie Hinks
September 30, 2011
1 Comment
Kid giving the finger

Let me on Facebook!

As any kid knows – prevention will only make you more determined. This is why it’s a rather worrying development that an Australian school has taken steps to control what certain students can and can’t do when using school laptops. It’s common practice for schools to have a filter placed on laptops that are being used during school hours. I mean you don’t want them surfing for porn during lessons now, do ya!

Geelong College has taken this a step further though. Their Netbox Blue filter technology will restrict access on the laptops of year 7 and 8 children wherever they are. The filter means that social networking won’t be allowed and that’s in addition to sites that include pornography, nudity, hate speech, references to illegal drugs, alcohol, games, entertainment. Oh and of course gambling.

College principal Pauline Turner stated, “The trial is the result of many months of consultation with the parent community and the initial response from the parents of students in years 7 and 8 has been extremely positive.”

What these guys seem pretty blind to is that they’re ultimately setting themselves for quite a fall.

The fact that they’re banning social networking is so ridiculous that we’re not even going to pass comment. A number of the issues they’re attempting to cut out of their kids’ lives are controversial ones and are matters that need correct education – not ignorance. A program of education for any of the issues listed above, including gambling, would teach kids about how to act responsibly when an adult. If they are taught about the gambling industry then they’ll be better prepared to deal with it when the opportunity arises.

At the start of this article we mentioned the point that ignorance causes kids to want something more and you only have to look at a 2008 World Health Organization study cited by Calvin Ayre just last year. It looked at marijuana and found that 20.2% of US under 15s had tried it as opposed to the liberal nation of Holland where only 7% had. The fact that this ban is taking place in a nation that is currently at the forefront of stifling a great swathe of the gambling industry isn’t a surprise and it’s likely to be rolled out to more schools.

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Tags: Article, Australia, gambling education
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  • Ed

    I wonder why they say democracy is practiced there.