http://nation.com.pk/blogs/22-Sep-20...ts-on-facebook

by: Mahboob Mohsin


We may not have a law relating cybercrimes as yet, but there is one in the pipeline. Thereafter a room for discussion on important sensitive subjects may be available. Government may not have been monitoring and regulating our activities on social media too strictly. Hence there is a forum available to us to build our profile around our interests and vent out our emotions.

We can spend hours haranguing and poking our nose here and there. We can build castles in the air. We talk of high-minded ideas. We fantasize. We preach. We explore. We spend too much of our not-so-precious time baiting potential friends from the opposite gender. And movies, showbiz, politics, games, events, videos and what not; all of it is there for you. Tickles one’s fancy. Right?

For personal relevance, a room for liking and following weird-funky pages, joining ultra-modern hippy groups, playing Candy Crush and virtually going to trans-continent cool events is what Facebook would offer. Hail thy cyberspace. Hail thy Facebook. What a blessing, isn’t it?

In short we get to create our own cyber-wonder-land free from domestic discipline strategies of parents. And we have convinced ourselves that we only use that land of free for some bigger and important cause. For all the Pakistani Facebook users, there is always some very serious business going on at Facebook. For example, some hopefuls may be out on a hunt looking for a better rishta. Isn’t it serious enough business already? After all, choosing a life partner is too painstaking and important a cause. And Facebook is the most appropriate place to explore the options. Anyway, we have (or we think we have) our social media space free from any external interventions and constant monitoring.

Reality check: hold your horses there. Parents have made an entry into that hunky-dory wonderland of yours. Parenting expands itself to your imagined free world. Yes you may not be too independent to make any choice as yet and may never be.

In the absence of the cybercrime law, there is a twenty-four-hour censor board right in our homes anyway, now asserting its virtual presence on social media as well. You may want to call it the parental accountability bureau. Yeah you read that right.

The parents today making their appearance on Facebook with a bang is not a dilemma. It is just another development. The dilemma however is when it is none other than you who made them their Facebook account in the first place. You facilitated them. You helped them. And now the parental Facebook oversight, initially facilitated by you, is being used against you yourself. That’s the fun part, right? And how ironic is that? Can you imagine not liking the page of any non-conservative un-Islamic actress now? Your Facebooking has to be fine-tuned influenced by the parameters set by the choices parents make for you. What about the hopefuls who were out on a hunt for the rishta?

Feeling that nobody – at least no parent – is watching us is a good feeling. This usual human psychology applies equally to Facebook monitoring on part of the parents.

Parents are good people. No one denies that. They have good intentions. Yes they do want to take care of their kids. No denying that. However, like Imran Khan of PTI, they may just have good intentions and all but the means employed are equivalent to crossing the line.


On a serious note, too much care on part of the parents (in terms of keeping tabs on their kids) may actually be overwhelming for the “kids” to take. In the process, you may run the risk of creating a rebellious attitude in kids. Invasion of privacy is always a “flashpoint for conflict”. Or in the other case, the kids would be too addicted to your spoon-feeding that they may never be relatively independent and confident enough to make big decisions. Reasonable breathing space should be accorded to the kids while they grow up from “dependence” stage to the “independence” stage of their life.

Dr. Robert Foltz of The Chicago School of Professional Psychology in his paper “Parental Monitoring or Invasion of Privacy?” writes that, “Whether or not they are aware, even adults’ actions—walking into the regular grocery store, talking on the phone, surfing the internet, subscribing to magazines, traveling through toll booths, as well as purchases made on a credit card and channels watched on television—are subject to monitoring without their knowledge.”

Not asking for curtailing civil liberties of parents in absentia, but you’ve got to be very cautious while putting up a Facebook status, checking in at restaurants and uploading a cool selfie with your BFF. Be very cautious when you are going to tell everyone what happiness is. Mind you just staying online at a not-good-time may also be a cause of embarrassment for you at the dining table when the inspection brigade presents its daily charge sheet against you.

So the one free world youngsters had is also being under the watch of too-concerned parents if not the government as yet. Keeping constant tabs on their kids, parents have restricted the space for youngsters. Facebook is just another tool added to their paraphernalia.

Over-parenting and obsession with patronizing the kids all the time may even be harmful. And having confidence and trust in your kids should give them a fair chance to make independent choices for themselves. It helps them express themselves in a better way.

In case you were thinking, there is no truth whatsoever in the ‘collusion between Mark Zuckerberg and my parents’ argument. The situation is not that bad.

Dr. Foltz brings home the point saying that “Whatever the level of monitoring, this has impact on teens, their independence, and the relationship with their parents.”