“Kick A Ginger Day” Blamed for Beating

South Park is a comedy show often accused of being socially irresponsible.  The show’s creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, endeavor to make fun of everything and everybody and usually the results are harmless and funny.  But one particular episode that first aired in 2005 turned out not to be so funny for some kids.  That episode featured one of the show’s characters creating a new holiday called “Kick a Ginger Day.”  “Ginger” refers to red-haired, pale-skinned, freckled people and the purpose of the fake holiday is to abuse them.   Continue reading »

Here Be Dragons: Where Your Kids are on the Internet

My five-year-old recently used some of her carefully hoarded birthday money to buy herself a Webkinz. She generously bought one for her little sister, too. The girls have spent the past week naming, cuddling and grooming this fluffy stuffed critters. They’ve made collars and bracelets and hats for them, all with matching sparkly beads and ribbon.

Luckily for me, I don’t think either girl has realized yet that there’s a Webkinz website where they can extend their play into the Intertubes. It’s only a matter of time, though. Continue reading »

Teacher Canned for Using “B-Word” on Facebook

A high school English teacher who used the “b-word” on her private Facebook page is out of a job thanks to an anonymous letter sent to school administration.

To top it off - she posted a picture of herself from a European vacation holding a glass of wine. Oh, the horrors. Continue reading »

Woman Finds Long Lost Dad By Googling Herself

Searching for her long lost father became really simple for April Becker-Antoniou - all it took was a Google search.

Up popped an URL named just for her, with a message from her father, Dr. Scott Becker and an e-mail address to contact him. Thirty years had passed, but she did. Continue reading »

Mommy, Can I Make a Facebook Profile? Please!?!?

Mom and Dad delight in rediscovering old chums.  High-schooler James uses it to make plans, publish goofy photos and check out the hotties who are friends of friends.  But now 10-year-old Abigail wants her own Facebook page.  Should you let her?

Both Facebook and MySpace require users to be thirteen, but…come on.  Site administrators may not know that a portion of their users still have American Girl dolls languishing on their beds and, even if they care, will likely not find out.  Is this a bad thing? Opinions from experts fall all over the map, as CNN found out when it recently raised the question.

Continue reading »

Facebook FarmVille a Classroom Obsession

As the Byrds once sang, to everything there is a season, a time to plant, a time to reap.  For about 22 million Facebook users, that time is right now.  According to Zynga, the company who created Facebook’s FarmVille application, that is the number of people who log on at least once a day to till their fake land and harvest their imaginary crops in the online game. Continue reading »

Facebook Post Gets Student Suspended

An 11th grade student in Memphis has learned the hard way that what you say on Facebook doesn’t necessarily stay on Facebook.  Keyshaun Harley, an honor student at Ridgeway High School, says he was trying to discourage some girls from fighting when he posted a comment reading “you’re not gonna bust a grape” on a friend’s Facebook page.

After a parent reported the virtual conversation to the school’s principal, Keyshaun and the other students involved were all suspended for 180 days - that’s the rest of the school year! Continue reading »

Disturbing Kid Cursing Like a Sailor Video - NSFW

There are funny kids cursing video, and then there’s this one. It begins with a little girl whose age I can’t pinpoint, but I’d say six at the absolute oldest, using the word “b–ch” over and over.

Then it gets clearer, and she starts talking about the police sending someone to jail “right motherf—ing now.” Disturbed yet? Continue reading »

A Parenting Segment You’ll Never See on TV

The notion that Facebook and Twitter provide ideal, Webby ways to stalk our kids isn’t exactly a new joke. But the good people at The Onion manage to milk some fresh humor out of it in the video below, which plays almost verbatim like a cheesy segment on the “Today” show.

Well, verbatim, except for all the cursing and the fact that the show’s resident “e-mom” refers to her son’s girlfriend as “trampy” and “a slut.”

Continue reading »

Facebook “Kill Obama” Poll Was Created by a Child

When a Facebook using a third-party application created a poll asking the question “Should Obama be killed?”, Secret Service agents took the implied threat very seriously.

They shut down the application — which included choices like “yes,” “maybe,” and “if he cuts my health care” — removed the poll, and went searching for it’s user.  Their “man” hunt turned up a surprise, though:  The poll creator was a child.

Continue reading »