Star comment: Internet is full to brim of dangers
You get to judge how nasty some people really are if they are given the chance to do something anonymously.
The downside of modern communication and social media is that these opportunities have exploded in scope. There are people who can skulk in these technological shadows and spread misery and sometimes fear too.
They are not just sick and inadequate adults. Some are children, the very people, we often hear, who are our future. It is depressing to think that early 21st century children are already in far too many cases being exploited and sucked in by an unfolding digital age which at its best opens windows but can also be a very dark place.
What does the future hold if there is so much bad about the present in which the young exponents are growing up?
It is the sort of thing which used to be said by concerned parents about the influence of television on young minds and, before that, similar warnings were made about films.
There is though no comparison with what is happening today. Television and movies are the height of regulation and control compared to the internet free-for-all, a Wild West territory where the Marshal is nowhere to be seen, and it is well-nigh impossible for parents to exercise effective supervision because youngsters can get access virtually anywhere, at any time.
There is a sliding scale of quality, from extraordinary educational and entertainment resources, through the moronic, and all the way down to the very lowest you can go, which has to be ensnaring children, grooming them for abuse, encouraging them to take pornographic images of themselves, and circulating disgusting images of that nature.
A youngster who unwisely shares an image that they may have been assured will be private - there is a worrying trend for nude selfies - can become a repeated victim, through blackmail, or through widespread distribution of the picture.
Adults are greatly disadvantaged. Parents may well be among the last people a child would be comfortable to tell. So they suffer in continuing torment. They are disadvantaged too by generational ignorance about what is going on and the potential of the latest technology and devices.
These factors are a major hurdle in effectively combatting the abuse, bullying, and exploitation for which the internet is a vehicle.
Parents can but try to grasp the problem, and do their best.
When Mary Whitehouse used to complain about sex on the television, the retort was: "Turn it off, then."
Are we reaching the stage where we must do the same with the internet?
