Welcome to the Wizard101 Message Boards

stanklepoot wrote:

norr4687 wrote:

Everyone has made good points on this. I think that queenlybean or what ever her name is. Might be angry because her point was proven wrong. There isn't really no need to fight about it though. There are bad people out in the world. Wether you want to addmit to this or not.

I hang out in the commons sometimes and watch what goes on.
It's not always just asking for a boy or girl a good bit of time they ask for a boy o friend or girl o friend. In both cases I have said you dont need a boy or girl this isn't a dating site. They will tell me i am just an old person who dont know how to have fun. There are even times when an adult (or claimed to be with open chat and all) would tell me thay are just having fun.

Also I have asked them why they are asking that. They would say because they can or They are bored. When i ask them why not do mission they simply state " I dont want to." I have been reported more then a few times for telling them they need to stop. Although I am not worried about it. Have to actully do something wrong before I can get in trouble.

Anyway I think this can be fixed it would take time but it would work. KI should make it a reportable offence. I know that at first there would be allot of reports on it but slowly it would slow down as people realize that it is no longer acceptable. I dont know weather or not KI will consider this. But to better protect our children it would be a great idea.

I have to disagree on two points. The first is that queeny was proven wrong. She never said that there weren't people doing inappropriate things. She simply said that we don't need to jump to conclusions that all of the kids who said I want a boy or I want a Girl are doing something inappropriate. Some are, and some aren't. Even the ones who are aren't really doing anything dangerous. A little racy chat in a family friendly game, while not ideal, is better than a lot of the alternatives of what kids could be doing online...especially since a lot of computers come with webcams built into them. Personally, I think the only real threat to any kids in the game is giving away real life personal info, and KI does everything it can do to prevent that. Getting back to the boy/girl wanting bit, there is a third option. It doesn't have to be either they simply want someone to quest with or that they're looking for a little cyber loving. I've seen quite a few group of young players that have built their own storyline within the overarching game storyline. They've assembled their groups and ordered them in various ways. Some of these groups refer to each other as if they were members of an army. Others pretend that they're families, complete with a mother and father, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, and boy and girl friends. I'm not saying this is always the case, but that it does account for some of the instances where you see younger players referring to someone as their girl/boy friend.

Secondly, and most importantly, I don't think she was upset because she felt she was proven wrong. I think she understandably got upset because those responding to her comments were rather insulting, whether they meant to be or not. The impression seemed to be that she was somehow a poor parent who had no idea what her kids or their friends were up to. If her response was accurate, then it seems like she's been about as protective and involved as a parent can be. She even went so far as to talk with everyone on her kids friends list and tell him to delete anyone she was unsure of. The response to that? Well, how do you know they are who they said they are? Not, sounds like you're doing a great job with your kid. Not, wow, you've really gone out of your way to keep tabs on your kid. Simply, oh yeah, well how do you know what you're doing matters. Whether or not that was the intent of some of the comments, that's the impression they leave. All of this because she chooses to not assume the absolute worst about everyone she meets. Sounds to me like she's striking an appropriate balance with her parenting. She's not an absentee parent, nor is she bugging her kids room and dusting for prints as soon as he goes to school. That's a good thing, as we all need to realize that, at the end of the day we can only look after kids so much. Eventually, they will have time on their own. We have to try and teach them the difference between right and wrong, and smart and dumb, and hope that they remember these lessons when those on their own times come along.

Thank you for your reply. Although my statement on queenlybean was short. And after that i wasnt even thinking of her. While I typed out the rest of my comment. You compleatly ignored what i had to say. It would seem to me. That if you ignored it maybe others did to. Frankly I dont really care what she was mad about. Now to end that discusion I would like to move on to the point i made before.

I believe that when someone wheather its an adult or child. Who asks for a boy o friend or girl o friend ( thats how they get around the filter) and then deside to go to the dorm as i seen someone state before. Should be reportable. Actully I think just asking that should be reportable. But in reality there really isn't anything we can do about it. I had a protective mother. But i still got into trouble. So when it all boils down to it. It's as you say Teach them right from wrong and hope for the best. (not exact words but its the short version)

I'm not going to post agian though because it seems we are all repeating our selfs. So the best we can really all do is tell them to cut it out and behave. They might not agree but at least they aren't asking for a boy/girl.

Wow having just found this thread, started playing the game with my two kids age 6 and 11 and having recently started to see these types of comments in the Commons my eyes are open a bit more.

While I don't stand around in the Commons I do see masses of players standing in groups and see some of this type of text flying by.

I too wondered why in the world people were saying simply "I need need boy/girl" and assumed it was for a quest that required gender (pretty sure I seen similar quests in other MMO's) but that same time assumed it was something to the effect of making a player a family member or some such as I have seen players also state "I need a brother/sister/daughter/son"

The example the person gave about the player porting to her house with bed situated in the middle of the room and another male avatar already waiting is very disturbing.

I would not be worried about my 6 year old in that situation as he would not have the patience to stand around while people chatted in leet speak trying to get around the filters.

However, I would be concerned about my 11 year old daughter standing there and seeing such text. Obviously the avatars cannot do anything visually construed as untowards but the concepts are not lost on kids her age now days.

Frankly after an example like that (and I did get the point that we need to educate/monitor our kids but who can all the time and why should we have to in a G rated game) I see no reason all why people should not report such chat. After all apparently people were getting so creative with capitalization to get around filters you cannot even chat in proper English anymore only lower case.