[eskori]

I completely empathize with you on this:

> I spent shitload of time online as a kid looking for friends

Plus I also agree in how harmful doomscrolling can be, specially for the young. Can't compare that with pedophiles though, sorry.

I don't know your age, but I think we can both agree in the fact that the Internet has changed a lot in a short period of time, and still does. I met some of my best friends online: games, forums, group chats.

However, as well as we could go out and play in the street without much concern some years ago and now the streets are for cars that can injure/kill you + other stuff, the Internet is no longer the same either.

Not only that, but now parents are also people who grew up with the Internet and no longer see it as something new or weird, so they are not as afraid as previous parents were. That means that children are raised without or with much less fear to online dangers.

Of course we are talking about a large-scale issue and we can't just use personal experience to justify anything. But I wanted to point out that using "Nothing bad ever happened to me" is specially dangerous here because we are not even talking about the same scenario.

[Hizonner]

> I don't know your age, but I think we can both agree in the fact that the Internet has changed a lot in a short period of time, and still does. I met some of my best friends online: games, forums, group chats.

It changes. Hasn't gotten materially less "safe" on the whole, though. And it doesn't change that much.

> However, as well as we could go out and play in the street without much concern some years ago and now the streets are for cars that can injure/kill you + other stuff,

You are out of your mind. Streets in general, in most of the world, are safer for pedestrians than they were "some years ago". And they are a whole lot safer than they were when I was a kid, which was rather more years ago than you seem to be talking about. What's changed is people's perceptions and tolerances about risk. And not entirely for the better.

Unless "some years" is somewhere over 100, you're just making up obvious nonsense here.

> Not only that, but now parents are also people who grew up with the Internet and no longer see it as something new or weird, so they are not as afraid as previous parents were. That means that children are raised without or with much less fear to online dangers.

Parents were not, in general, terrified of the Internet in the 1990s. Whereas there's a vast wave of paranoia right now. Again, what you're saying is just flat out factually false.

[anal_reactor]

> However, as well as we could go out and play in the street without much concern some years ago and now the streets are for cars that can injure/kill you + other stuff

Tell this to teenagers regularly standing on the street corner in front of my house and being loud.

> the Internet is no longer the same either

Yes, but again, the real danger is having your brain turned into mush by algorithms, not pEdOpHiLeS. And the current social trend is to have even more walled gardens with algorithms.

> but now parents are also people who grew up with the Internet and no longer see it as something new or weird, so they are not as afraid as previous parents were. That means that children are raised without or with much less fear to online dangers.

The opposite. When I was a kid parents had zero knowledge about how computer works and what the internet is, I could browse shady or straight-up illegal websites all I wanted and nobody cared. Nowadays there's huge panic "my child saw a picture of a titty!" because parents are at least somewhat aware that there's shit on the internet. Otherwise we wouldn't be having this discussion in the first place.

> But I wanted to point out that using "Nothing bad ever happened to me" is specially dangerous here because we are not even talking about the same scenario.

Okay. Can you point me to some statistics that fear-mongering is beneficial to the society at large? Because news usually paint a picture of the world getting more and more dangerous despite crime in general falling in most developed countries.

[eskori]

> Tell this to teenagers regularly standing on the street corner in front of my house and being loud.

I also have those, specially at night, but at least where I live they are a minority. I used to think the same but it's easy to forget about those who we don't hear about (literally).

> Yes, but again, the real danger is having your brain turned into mush by algorithms, not pEdOpHiLeS. And the current social trend is to have even more walled gardens with algorithms.

As much as I hate seeing how pedophiles are used as an excuse for absolutely horrendous technical and legal decisions (when in the first place I straight up don't believe them), I am aware that they are an actual danger. And when you are affected (also meaning your kid or whatever related) it sucks. It's a different type of harm compared to algorithms, "brainrot" and its consequences (which doesn't mean they they are less dangerous).

I completely agree in how terrible the possibility of "having our brains turned into mush by algorithms", and not only for the younger (even though they are specially vulnerable). It infuriates me even more when I see parents letting their 2yo get stuck with videos automatically recommended by some algorithm designed as if it was a mental weapon to completely lobotomize them, but then "I don't understand why do they behave like this". Also agree in the trend to have even more walled gardens with algorithms and how that sucks.

> When I was a kid parents had zero knowledge about how computer works and what the internet is, I could browse shady or straight-up illegal websites all I wanted and nobody cared. Nowadays there's huge panic "my child saw a picture of a titty!" because parents are at least somewhat aware that there's shit on the internet.

As with the first point, this is highly subjective, since different families grew and grow up in different environments (regional, cultural, legal, etc.) Where I live and with all the parents that I have discussed this topic (pretty frequent in my case), I found out that most of them understand up to some degree that the Internet has its bad stuff, but see that as inherent and inevitable, so they don't care that much. Maybe they already saw that stuff, but since they are OK they don't perceive a danger. You always find a couple of "Karens" in the other opposite, that's a worldwide species, but here a minority. I would love having actual data in how parents position with this in different areas and generations, I am really interested in this topic. Since I don't I work with that I have locally, but I know I can't just extrapolate that to the rest of the world.

> Can you point me to some statistics that fear-mongering is beneficial to the society at large? Because news usually paint a picture of the world getting more and more dangerous despite crime in general falling in most developed countries.

Unfortunately not, but the think is that I also agree here, panicking is hardly a good choice. However, that's not the same as ignoring the danger. If we are getting lower crime rates and safer environments it's because we are more aware (and take consequent actions) than ever of different types of dangers. That's my whole point: ignoring that the Internet has dangers because we happened to grow up in it and without issues isn't ok. There are dangers, we should be aware of them, and we should have mechanisms to avoid them or at least mitigate their impact (Virus? Antivirus. Pedophiles? Don't engage with certain interactions/requests, or idk, I don't have the answer to be honest). About the news... a hole other topic, but yeah, they live of sensationalism and I could argue how harmful and stupid that is for hours.