When Your Mom or Dad Asks to Be Your MySpace Friend

In today's fast-paced computerized world, online friendships are extremely ephemeral. With a simple click, you can add or delete people from your online sphere of friends.

The difference between an online friend and a parent is that parents are a physical connection to the world.

Most minors live with their parents; their parents provide housing, food, security, and a permanent social circle.

However, most parents do not realize what their children are doing online, and to a large extent, their teenage children are exploring the beginning stages of independence and responsibility.

The core issue of this interaction is how accepting parents are of their children's unique identity. In our western society, children are expected to leave the house at age eighteen to create their own families and social structures. But what are today's teens doing? How much do parents trust their children these days? Likewise, how much do children trust their parents?

Admittedly, there are probably plenty of things that a parent does not want to know about their children. Underage drinking, sex, and drug-use exist in America.

The average myspace account is, at best, an obnoxious scrapbook, with pictures and text of various ridiculous exploits. Myspace provides a sense of hyper-reality, the actual reality of a person's life is probably much tamer than a website would suggest. By putting a website into cyberspace, with exposure to an audience, a person creates media and ultimately culture.

Before the internet, and even before mass communication, people only had two forms of media - written and oral history. One can imagine a town in 1800's America, where the children of a family are subject to rumor and speculation in their social circle.

For the concerned parent, who probably wants to know when their child is engaging in dangerous behavior, it is important to keep a watchful eye on their children and I certainly understand their desire to add their children as myspace and facebook friends.

Do you trust your children? Do you view your children as human beings, with foibles and ignorance, and accept that their personalities are independent of your influence? Or do you view your children as dependents, without control of their own futures?

I suppose that the family structure can be viewed only on a case-by-case basis, and that it is up to parents to decide how to raise their children.

(Side note for technophobes and laypeople: I doubt that the majority of parents out there have a full understanding of Web 2.0, but I encourage you to look it up on Google.)

In my own experience, as a twenty-something, I find that I have zero desire to add my parents as myspace friends, nor do they have any desire to add me as a myspace friend.

Reason being: my parents are dorks, it would be an incredible reality check to have them in on my myspace life.

However, I probably would add my mother and father to my myspace friends if they asked. I can just imagine my mother saying something doting, such as "What kind of boy wouldn't add his own mother to his friends!"

My dad would probably be the most innocuous and yet, the most nefarious. I can imagine the exchange, in the comments section.

"Did you see the Red sox game?"

"Yes, Dad."

"What do you that of that Daisuke Matsuzaka?"

"He's great, Dad."

"How do you work this thing?"

"I'll show you, Dad."

"Here's a website about beer and farts!"

"Thanks, Dad. I thought I was urbane and social."

My mom would be even worse. She would lord over my comments section like a hawk.

"Here's you when you were three years old! You just learned your potty-training!"

"Mom! No! Please!"

"When are you going to have kids? I want to be a grandma! Now!"

"Mom, I'm not in a position to have kids right now."

"Who is that girl? She'd make a nice wife."

"That's my lesbian friend from college."

"Don't forget to trim your nails and stand up straight."

"Ok, fine! Love you, mom."

The girls in my social circle would probably laugh and add to my embarrassment. Or, they would fall madly in love with me.

Sometimes, I don't even know how I am related to my parents. Adding them to my myspace friend list would be like taking them to my favorite bar and asking them to dance.

They're just not cool enough - maybe that's the measuring stick. If your parents are cool, definitely add them as myspace friends. If not, skip it.

I certainly love my parents for who they are, but they are from a different generation. They have no concept of Web 2.0. Most of the time they can barely work a computer!

Maybe that embarrassment is a good thing. Maybe it's an ego test, wherein, much like iron become steel, I would emerge unscathed from the experience, shaken, but stronger because of it.

It's not exactly sky-diving, but it is daunting. I think that I'll never be able to escape the fact that my parents will always view me as their wonderful child. I'll never be respected as an equal, even as my parents age into infirmity.

My parents will probably always think of me as their boy.

Come to think of it, my grandparents were much cooler. I'd definitely add them to my friend list.