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Worried About the Wrong Things: Youth, Risk, and Opportunity in the Digital World
Why media panics about online dangers overlook another urgent concern: creating equitable online opportunities for marginalized youth.
It's a familiar narrative in both real life and fiction, from news reports to television storylines: a young person is bullied online, or targeted by an online predator, or exposed to sexually explicit content. The consequences are bleak; the young person is shunned, suicidal, psychologically ruined. In this book, Jacqueline Ryan Vickery argues that there are other urgent concerns about young people's online experiences besides porn, predators, and peers. We need to turn our attention to inequitable opportunities for participation in a digital culture. Technical and material obstacles prevent low-income and other marginalized young people from the positive, community-building, and creative experiences that are possible online.
Vickery explains that cautionary tales about online risk have shaped the way we think about technology and youth. She analyzes the discourses of risk in popular culture, journalism, and policy, and finds that harm-driven expectations, based on a privileged perception of risk, enact control over technology. Opportunity-driven expectations, on the other hand, based on evidence and lived experience, produce discourses that acknowledge the practices and agency of young people rather than seeing them as passive victims who need to be protected.
Vickery first addresses how the discourses of risk regulate and control technology, then turns to the online practices of youth at a low-income, minority-majority Texas high school. She considers the participation gap and the need for schools to teach digital literacies, privacy, and different online learning ecologies. Finally, she shows that opportunity-driven expectations can guide young people's online experiences in ways that balance protection and agency.
It's a familiar narrative in both real life and fiction, from news reports to television storylines: a young person is bullied online, or targeted by an online predator, or exposed to sexually explicit content. The consequences are bleak; the young person is shunned, suicidal, psychologically ruined. In this book, Jacqueline Ryan Vickery argues that there are other urgent concerns about young people's online experiences besides porn, predators, and peers. We need to turn our attention to inequitable opportunities for participation in a digital culture. Technical and material obstacles prevent low-income and other marginalized young people from the positive, community-building, and creative experiences that are possible online.
Vickery explains that cautionary tales about online risk have shaped the way we think about technology and youth. She analyzes the discourses of risk in popular culture, journalism, and policy, and finds that harm-driven expectations, based on a privileged perception of risk, enact control over technology. Opportunity-driven expectations, on the other hand, based on evidence and lived experience, produce discourses that acknowledge the practices and agency of young people rather than seeing them as passive victims who need to be protected.
Vickery first addresses how the discourses of risk regulate and control technology, then turns to the online practices of youth at a low-income, minority-majority Texas high school. She considers the participation gap and the need for schools to teach digital literacies, privacy, and different online learning ecologies. Finally, she shows that opportunity-driven expectations can guide young people's online experiences in ways that balance protection and agency.
360 pages, Hardcover
Published June 2, 2017
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45 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 15, 2018
In Worried About the Wrong Things: Youth, Risk, and Opportunity in the Digital World, Jacqueline Ryan Vickery argues that the American public is-- you guessed it-- worried about the wrong things when it comes to teens’ digital lives. She frames her argument with three stories about teen risk as relates to technology usage. The first is about a Law and Order SVU episode in which a girl is shamed for sexting. The second is the story of Megan Meier, whose suicide ignited the national conversation around cyberbullying. The third story is that of brothers Marcus and Miguel, two undocumented immigrant youth who used online gaming communities to form connections and relationships but were unable to produce and share their own media due to their limited access to technology.
As you may have noticed, one of these cases is not like the others. The first two stories, Vickery argues, fed into sensationalized harm-based expectations of teen technology use. These stories and others like them positioned middle-class white youth as innocent potential victims in need of protection and sparked a wave of policies that put pressure on schools to protect teens from the perceived risks of digital use. The story of Marcus and Miguel, however, highlights the risk of inequity in access to the opportunities that technology provides. Vickery uses these cases to illustrate the ways in which harm-based expectations of teens’ digital use, fueled by sensationalized stories of cyberbullying and sexting that center the experiences of privileged youth, have disproportionately impacted marginalized youth by restricting their access to online content, collaboration, and creation.
For me, the most compelling part of the book is Vickery’s delineation of the way that sensationalized stories fueled national policy, which in turn directly impeded marginalized youth’s ability to access information. The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) was enacted in 2000 as a result of the public panic about online risks for teenagers. It requires schools that receive federal e-rate funding to filter online content that is “harmful” to children. On the surface, this seems non-controversial. Unfortunately, the word “harmful” is often interpreted broadly, which impedes teens’ access to knowledge they need to make informed decisions about their lives. For instance, Vickery points out that in Texas, it is illegal for public school sex education programs to teach students about contraception or for public schools to portray LGBTQ people in a positive light. This means that students often need to seek this information online, but firewalls that schools employ to allow them to receive government funding also block teens’ access to sites that would provide this vital information. Furthermore, marginalized teens are the most heavily impacted by these policies, as many have inconsistent internet access outside of school. The result of this combination of policies is a large population of teens who are not empowered to make informed decisions about their own sexual health, resulting in a high rate of teen pregnancy and STD’s in Texas.
These examples are illustrative of Vickery’s larger argument, that we need to empower teens to be critical agents, not passive victims, by shifting from harm-based to opportunity-driven expectations for teens’ digital usage. This book is a fascinating, nuanced read for anyone interested in education, public health, or public policy.
As you may have noticed, one of these cases is not like the others. The first two stories, Vickery argues, fed into sensationalized harm-based expectations of teen technology use. These stories and others like them positioned middle-class white youth as innocent potential victims in need of protection and sparked a wave of policies that put pressure on schools to protect teens from the perceived risks of digital use. The story of Marcus and Miguel, however, highlights the risk of inequity in access to the opportunities that technology provides. Vickery uses these cases to illustrate the ways in which harm-based expectations of teens’ digital use, fueled by sensationalized stories of cyberbullying and sexting that center the experiences of privileged youth, have disproportionately impacted marginalized youth by restricting their access to online content, collaboration, and creation.
For me, the most compelling part of the book is Vickery’s delineation of the way that sensationalized stories fueled national policy, which in turn directly impeded marginalized youth’s ability to access information. The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) was enacted in 2000 as a result of the public panic about online risks for teenagers. It requires schools that receive federal e-rate funding to filter online content that is “harmful” to children. On the surface, this seems non-controversial. Unfortunately, the word “harmful” is often interpreted broadly, which impedes teens’ access to knowledge they need to make informed decisions about their lives. For instance, Vickery points out that in Texas, it is illegal for public school sex education programs to teach students about contraception or for public schools to portray LGBTQ people in a positive light. This means that students often need to seek this information online, but firewalls that schools employ to allow them to receive government funding also block teens’ access to sites that would provide this vital information. Furthermore, marginalized teens are the most heavily impacted by these policies, as many have inconsistent internet access outside of school. The result of this combination of policies is a large population of teens who are not empowered to make informed decisions about their own sexual health, resulting in a high rate of teen pregnancy and STD’s in Texas.
These examples are illustrative of Vickery’s larger argument, that we need to empower teens to be critical agents, not passive victims, by shifting from harm-based to opportunity-driven expectations for teens’ digital usage. This book is a fascinating, nuanced read for anyone interested in education, public health, or public policy.
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February 4, 2021From Follett: Why media panics about online dangers overlook another urgent concern: creating equitable online opportunities for marginalized youth. It's a familiar narrative in both real life and fiction, from news reports to television storylines: a young person is bullied online, or targeted by an online predator, or exposed to sexually explicit content. The consequences are bleak; the young person is shunned, suicidal, psychologically ruined. In this book, Jacqueline Ryan Vickery argues that there are other urgent concerns about young people's online experiences besides porn, predators, and peers. We need to turn our attention to inequitable opportunities for participation in a digital culture. Technical and material obstacles prevent low-income and other marginalized young people from the positive, community-building, and creative experiences that are possible online. Vickery explains that cautionary tales about online risk have shaped the way we think about technology and youth. She analyzes the discourses of risk in popular culture, journalism, and policy, and finds that harm-driven expectations, based on a privileged perception of risk, enact control over technology. Opportunity-driven expectations, on the other hand, based on evidence and lived experience, produce discourses that acknowledge the practices and agency of young people rather than seeing them as passive victims who need to be protected. Vickery first addresses how the discourses of risk regulate and control technology, then turns to the online practices of youth at a low-income, minority-majority Texas high school. She considers the participation gap and the need for schools to teach digital literacies, privacy, and different online learning ecologies. Finally, she shows that opportunity-driven expectations can guide young people's online experiences in ways that balance protection and agency.
October 2, 2022
Review
For those who work or plan to work with teens in an educational or information science field, this book is a must-read. Backed up by research and a close study of a diverse high school in the U.S., Vickery takes a look at how contradictory policies in place, like encouraging skills of advanced information literacy but withholding opportunities to access information, affect how well-equipped students are in entering adulthood; by restricting access to social media at school, teachers cannot give guidance to marketing themselves and developing confidence in sharing creative output. I would highly recommend this book to help debunk the myths surrounding teens and tech.
Summary
Teens in the eyes of adults have always been what Vickery calls “at risk” and “as risk.” Both innocent and needing to be protected and susceptible to getting in trouble, and in need of strict rules and over-supervision. Vickery questions what happens when we create policies and practices as adults that affect youth, in a way that expects risks but not opportunity? She poses that with restrictive rules and policies, young people, especially marginalized youth, will be deeply behind as adults, not knowing well key research, self-marketing, and information skills. Also, with the expectation of risk, adults are not taking into account the opportunities and development skills that occur during this time, like personal and peer skills for their future or connecting with diverse youth around the world. By giving teens agency in navigating technology, it allows them to gain confidence in the digital landscape, prepare them for future employment and take control of their own education and learning.
For those who work or plan to work with teens in an educational or information science field, this book is a must-read. Backed up by research and a close study of a diverse high school in the U.S., Vickery takes a look at how contradictory policies in place, like encouraging skills of advanced information literacy but withholding opportunities to access information, affect how well-equipped students are in entering adulthood; by restricting access to social media at school, teachers cannot give guidance to marketing themselves and developing confidence in sharing creative output. I would highly recommend this book to help debunk the myths surrounding teens and tech.
Summary
Teens in the eyes of adults have always been what Vickery calls “at risk” and “as risk.” Both innocent and needing to be protected and susceptible to getting in trouble, and in need of strict rules and over-supervision. Vickery questions what happens when we create policies and practices as adults that affect youth, in a way that expects risks but not opportunity? She poses that with restrictive rules and policies, young people, especially marginalized youth, will be deeply behind as adults, not knowing well key research, self-marketing, and information skills. Also, with the expectation of risk, adults are not taking into account the opportunities and development skills that occur during this time, like personal and peer skills for their future or connecting with diverse youth around the world. By giving teens agency in navigating technology, it allows them to gain confidence in the digital landscape, prepare them for future employment and take control of their own education and learning.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews