Hey, Little Girl, Would You Like Some Cybercandy?NEW STUDY SHOWS HUGE INCREASE IN ARRESTS OF ONLINE PREDATORS!!!!! I guarantee that is the headline you are about to hear on TV and read in the papers. And, terrified for your children, you will keep watching or reading, which serves the media darn well. They have lured you in and are holding you captive. Sort of like … online predators! But the folks who actually DID the study would like to clear things up. David Finkelhor, director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center, took a look at the number of arrests of online predators from 2000 to 2006. The number of guys caught soliciting undercover cops posing as minors grew from 644 to 3,100 — a big leap, indeed, but mostly attributed to more cops assigned to cybertart impersonation. Meanwhile, the number of guys soliciting actual youths grew, too. To 615. Look, no one wants these predators to exist at all. Be gone, you jerks! But all told, we are talking about fewer than 4,000 perps, compared with tens of millions of minors online. In fact, during the same years studied, Internet use among minors leapt from 73 to 93 percent. So now all but 7 percent of all American "juveniles" are online, and 615 guys were picked up for propositioning them (odds of 39,000-1). Still, it rankles to think of some creep luring a 10-year-old to the playground with the promise of Hannah Montana tickets, right? Of course it does. But that is not what's happening. "The facts do not suggest that the Internet is facilitating an epidemic of sex crimes against youth," the report said point-blank. First of all, the majority of the folks arrested were chasing those cop decoys. And those cops "act far more enthusiastic when the proposition comes down than most teens are likely to act," Finkelhor says. We're not talking entrapment here — per se. But if a youth isn't actively appearing psyched for sex with strangers, his/her chances of being stalked are microscopic. Moreover, the creeps thought they were soliciting adolescents, not little kids (and not — duh — cops). Many of the perps were ages 18-25. Not to let them off the hook, but a 19-year-old propositioning a 17-year-old just isn't as disturbing as a middle-aged guy promising some kid a Game Boy in exchange for a "cuddle." Finally — and I know it sounds as if I'm from the Internet Predator Defense Society, but bear with me — the study also found that most of the offenders were "open about their sexual motives in their online communications with youth." So they were upfront about their goals. Let me be equally upfront about mine. I am not pro-predator. Hard to find someone who is. But I am not pro-hysteria, either. And any report about online predator arrests increasing is going to generate even more fear among parents already convinced their children are in mortal peril from the moment they wake up (if they haven't gotten their heads stuck in crib slats) to the moment they go to bed (if they haven't been abducted on their way home from Mandarin). I'm sure that soon we'll be seeing more stuff we can buy to keep our kids "safe" from this newest overblown danger. And more books and articles pleading with parents to " please watch your children at all times!" The fact is we live in the safest times ever for children. Until we accept that happy fact, we will fret and spend and drive everyone crazy, including those surprisingly resilient people: our kids. Yes, the ones barely looking up from their screens. Lenore Skenazy is a columnist at Advertising Age. She is the founder of FreeRangeKids.com and the author of the upcoming book "Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry." To find out more about Lenore Skenazy (lskenazy@yahoo.com) and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
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