Nguyen Thi Kim Long Tutorial Class E02 (Odd weeks)

The article Parents want to be their children's Facebook friends, but kids say no on South China Morning Post raised a very common and interesting issue between young people and their parents these days. Not only Facebook but also other social networking tools have recently become increasingly popular among young people as a convenient and essential way to catch up with their friends, and parents, in fervent wish to control and protect children, try to become their friends on Facebook. The close relationship among parents and children seem to be much affected by the information technology shift today and this paper will try to look behind those facades to see how families have changed to fit with those changes. Family provides primary socialization which helps us with basic skills to function in the society (J.Brym & Lie, 2007). However, the power of family socialization has been declined gradually, especially in this fast-changing digital age. Young people, especially teenagers seem to be too busy with school, sports, technology stuffs and other activities. Therefore, the influence of other agents of socialization, namely teachers, friends, mass media and social networks is strengthened. This trend The influence of some socialization agents increased, whereas the influence of other especially family declined (J.Brym & Lie, 2007) is believed to the trend of the 20th century. According to the article, parents insistently want to add as a friend with their children on Facebook, and more than a third of teens who are requested have not agreed to friend their parents. For some children who decided to friend a parent, they are also not very happy: it is the condition of parental approval for their staring a Facebook page. For two-thirds of teens who friended their parents, they are suspected to have created a fake page for parents and a real one to express themselves.

Parents really and truly have a lot of reasons why they insist on being a friend of their child on those kinds of social network services. Online-bullying, trolling, online sex predator, misusing personal information, etc. are some serious risks for teenagers safety. The vision of family as haven in a heartless world has encouraged parents to protect their children by controlling and getting to know what is happening in their life. However, social changes (or in this case, technology changes lead to social changes) have weakened not only parents authority but also some family values such as love and affection, trust and nurturance. For instance, in the article, Kristals dad was upset when she unfriended him and Mary felt her mother sometimes its kind of annoying. Those feelings will surely have influence on relationship between parents and children, and the worst case is that children may not want to share any thoughts or feelings with their parents anymore. In my opinion, it is very understandable for parents to express their caring for children on Facebook. But there is one important thing to take into consideration, that children today are raised not only by their parents but also by teacher, doctors, social workers, and television. (B. Zinn & Eitzen & Wells, 2009). Those agents of socialization more or less will affect the childrens mind, thoughts and behaviors. So parents, instead of being too hot or too cold about online supervision, should use a more effective way to understand their children which is to spend more time together. They may create opportunities to increase their interaction by sharing an evening of movies, cooking a meal together or going on a picnic. Those kinds of activities undoubtedly will make children feel more comfortable than being stalked all day on their Facbook page. In conclusion, many parents nowadays stalk their children on social networking tools with the hope to protect and control them, which may result in decline of family association. And that is also an effect of social change to family.

Bibliography J. Brym, R., & Lie, J. (2007). Agents of socialization. In R. J. Brym, & J. Lie, Sociology Your compass for a new world (p.104). Thomson Wadsworth. B. Zinn, M., & S. Eitzen & B. Wells (2009). The Myth of Separate worlds. In M. B. Zinn, & S. Eitzen, & B. Wells, Diversity in Families (p.11). Pearson.