I finally have a new calling. It’s a doozy, are you ready…I’m ward literacy specialist! I know, how am I going to keep up with it? There’s so much to do, especially in white, middle-class, suburbia. Ok, it’s not that bad, I am supposed to educate the ward members on internet safety. I gave my first presentation tonight to the young women.<\/p>\n
Honestly, I was nervous about the whole thing. I wasn’t sure what angle to take and what would be appropriate for me to talk about with them. I didn’t want them to go home and say, “Sister J told us all about internet porn tonight. She told us not to go to this site, or this site, or this site. Sheesh mom, I’ve never even heard of those sites before tonight. Who knew?”<\/p>\n
I didn’t want to take on “the sky is falling” role either. Remember the firesides they used to have about the dangers of rock and roll? G and I laugh about them now. I didn’t want to give a lecture to the girls that they would giggle over in 15 years.<\/p>\n
In the end I set up a fake profile on MySpace and put a picture of a really cute teenage boy. I lied and said that he was a son of a friend who had just moved here. I then asked if they would befriend him. One of the girls said she would start sending him messages. After I sunk the hook I told them that the boy was really me and that I had lied to them about everything.<\/p>\n
I showed them a picture of a creepy online predator and asked if they thought he was cute because chances are that’s who they were chatting with. I told them how easy it would be for me to figure out who they were and where they lived just by the information they were leaving on the computer and then I went over a New Era article with them on internet safety. Nobody said a word the entire time I talked. They didn’t even whisper to each other. I guess I had their attention.<\/p>\n
I didn’t tell them that I have my own blog where I write a lot of things about my own life. Is that hypocritical?<\/p>\n
[Associated radio.blog song: Green Day – Warning Warning]