Two Slashes

Even with the Olympics having come to a close about a week ago, the only name people seem to have stuck in their heads at the moment is Michael Phelps, the Olympian swimmer who walked away with eight gold medals and set numerous world records in his run for those medals.

While Phelps was standing on a podium getting the reward for his efforts, a different kind of Olympic-style test of strength has been brewing here in the United States, a contest with plenty of records lining up to be broken of its own accord.  (And I really need to quit doing *#$&ty post introductions like this one.)

I don’t typically pay attention to politics; I don’t really care who’s President, Senator, Governor, or any one of the tens of other elected positions as long as there isn’t a significant impact to my life.  To me, one candidate is as good as another, especially if things work transparently and their actions (and misactions) don’t change the way I go about my daily business, and I have a reasonable expectation that whoever ends up elected is at least as well-qualified as I am for the office they’ve been elected into.

Take Bush for example; everyone (alright, myself included) has bashed him time and time again for the state of affairs in the Middle East.  I have no idea whether I would pretend nothing was happening or send in the troops, launch a few missiles, and have the entire Armed Forces deployed before lunch, and it’s my inability to make a knowledgeable and fair decision that makes him a better candidate for that office than I am.  If it weren’t for the fact that the media constantly bombards you with claims of his failure as a leader of this country (or the war stuff), he might never have even been seen.

This election year has things playing out a little differently than normal, however.  We have an African-American running for President (having nearly squeezed a nomination over the wife of a previous – and notorious – office-holder), and a female vice-presidential candidate, neither of which (to my knowledge) has ever won their respective seats in government.  (I don’t see any ladies on this list, do you?)

What this sounds like to me is not a vote merely for the sake of “exercising our right as Americans” but a popularity contest in the sense of which candidate you’d rather see being awarded a Guiness World Record and which “invisible barrier” will be broken for future elections, if they all haven’t already been shattered by the current candidates.

I would have taken the time here to analyze the scenarios of what would happen should a woman become President (either by vote or incapacitation), but the concepts of a “Presidentess” or the “First Gentleman” are too humorous for me to discuss seriously.

Don’t take me wrong when I mention that, once again, I don’t have enough information to say that either Obama or McCain is superior to the other, but someone has to have noticed that this is bigger than just a four-year vacation at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, it’s a chance for the prospective record-breakers to get more material for those bestselling autobiographies that are due to be released any day now (and will no doubt become required reading for at least one high school class due to their lessons in perseverance, dedication, or some other related but meaningless literary tripe).

Unless something motivates me to get off my sorry backside and register to vote (and then actually convince me to go to the polls on Election Day), I’m not going to have any more involvement in this election than retaining my right to the occasional rant.  That aside, it’s up to (the registered voters of) America to choose which recordmaker President/Vice-President they want to take office.

And by the way, someone can remove the parentheses from my keyboard now.  I won’t be needing them for a while.

Wow…did I actually just post my fourth thing in five days?  I…why, I think I’m in shock!  Hopefully either I can fall into the habit of posting more often (preferred) or anyone out there doesn’t get into the obsessive habit of checking for new stuff more often…well, at least let the RSS feed do that for you.

I paid $350 or so for my first useful* laptop (I say that with quotes for a reason, see below) during the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of high school, with my first MP3 player just a short while before that.  I’ve only had possession of a personal cellular telephone for a year.  I’ve had an account with AOL since the second grade (which, although I personally refuse to use the AOL client anymore, I still have).  And I’ve been really only establishing my online presence (with forums, websites, and the like) since the end of middle school.

Why do I tell you this, seemingly randomly?  I was perusing through the New York Times website today, and came across an article discussing the recommended ages children should be introduced to the very same technologies I just mentioned.  And obviously there’s some disagreement between what the article suggests and what I believe to be more appropriate, or I wouldn’t be bothered enough to write about it.

For ages 0-2, I can generally agree with the author.  I don’t see a reason your kid should be messing with anything electronic with more complication than making noise or blinking lights.  They’re way too young to understand cause-effect scenarios, and I certainly don’t foresee anybody’s newborn being able to “Press Enter to Continue…”

Sure, maybe all the fake toddler-toys are probably 1/4 as mind-stimulating as they’re advertised to be, but are they really ready to play online games?  No offense, but it seems to me like they want to train the next generation of WoW addicts from an early age; they’ll be more tolerant to the obsessive clicking and typing and random key-pressing it takes, and their vision will already be so screwed over from staring at the screen that they’ll have a 6000-strength glasses prescription by the time they’re eight.  Pardon me, but how about giving them their Playskool MP3 boombox thingy and sending them out to the sandbox?  And suggesting a Wii as a console for kids still trying to figure out why the cat doesn’t go in the washing machine, and that Hot Wheels are more collectible when the wheels aren’t on the other side of the room?  I really don’t need any more bologna-in-the-CD-tray service calls, thank you very much, so I’ll just say “That’s stupid” and continue on my merry way.

Moving towards the second half of the article, I really disagree more with their thinking.  For starters, explain to me why six-year-olds are eligible to be playing games that require interaction with people you don’t know but are connected to instantly?  I fail to see one instance where they won’t be talking to strangers at some point.  (And even if the parents are paying attention, can you really be certain that crazyboy2834 isn’t this guy (potentially NSFW)?  Your son/daughter claiming that it’s the friend from down the street doesn’t count.)  I have a brother that fits this age bracket, and I’ve watched him play similar games.  If someone sends him a friend request, his instant reaction is to accept it…no questions asked.  “But wait, that’s not Kyle?”  Stranger danger, indeed.  What happened to responsible parenting?

I can see maybe a shimmer of reasoning behind giving a twelve-year-old a cell phone…but only a shimmer.  Why, even my high-school-age siblings failed to understand why text messaging wasn’t included in their plan (it is now) and managed to rack up a rather exorbitant bill.  The point is, if you give them something that has the ability to do more than you pay for, it’s going to come back to bite you.  If you really need to give them the phone, get the blasted unlimited messaging plan…$30 per month is a lot more reasonable than $600 (trust me).  Perhaps towards high school would make better sense here.

High school would also be a prime time for these kids to get laptops and other “considered-essential” devices, not as they’re herded off like cattle to college.  Not only does this free the family computer from constant use by the IM- and MySpace-crazed teen, but it gives parents (as if they needed it) yet another thing to take away for groundings.  And has the benefit of teaching them about how to take care of more expensive equipment earlier on.

And I scoff at this comment:

In fact, cellphones are now more or less mandatory for children at this age. Besides providing a social advantage, phones can reduce parental stress in a crowded mall, get children in touch for homework help, serve as a call to dinner — and be withheld as punishment that really works.

Parenting skills for this age include reading phone bills. Lori McCoughey of Mahwah, N.J., a mother of two, saved $200 a month by switching to Verizon’s friends and family plan. There are also pay-as-you-go plans like those from Tracfone (www.tracfone.com). For $50, you get a working LG 225 camera phone, preloaded with 100 minutes. A meter counts down the remaining time.

If parenting skills require reading bills, why must you suggest a pay-as-you go plan on a cell phone, which defeats the entire purpose of reading bills?  It might reinforce and encourage the idea of having your child budget their usage (especially if you add a specific amount per month, and refuse to add any more until the next) in preparation for giving them access to your “big-person”, post-pay plan, but really I can’t see a prepaid phone as being anything more than a cash-cow and waste of time otherwise.  But “serving as a call to dinner?”  Although I’m pretty sure I can see through the poor language there, how is ringing your offspring anywhere near a reinforcement of the “personal nature” of dinner?  (Yes, I realize this is America, where ‘dinner’ is another word for vegging out in front of a television with McDonald’s, but cut me some slack.)

Of course, even my recommendations are just that, recommendations.  In reality, the parents should be capable enough to judge whether their kid actually has a need for the technologies of tomorrow, a need that outstretches the desire to “fit in” – because there’s always going to be someone else without it, and a lesson in not getting everything you want is perfect fare.  Nevertheless, any parents who take tips from that article and apply them probably could use a little help as a parent themselves.

Parenting is about guidance and helping a child to prepare themselves for an adult/parental role, not stepping in and going “Here’s a shiny new electronic toy that I bought; go have fun.”

*Useful in this sense refers to the sense that it could be used for more than running Windows 95 or browsers with the rendering support of an 1800s cash register.  My real first laptop was a 486 obtained long ago from one of my father’s co-workers, with a failed battery and a garbage-picker’s heaven of data left on it.  As most people know, I particularly enjoy older/restored computing equipment and so I keep this machine around for occasional use.