Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest one of all

In the fairy tale 'Snow white and the seven little dwarfs' the magic mirror informs the Queen that she is the fairest one of all, until one day the mirrors says otherwise. All of us know what happens afterwards. A similar, but much more powerful, mirror is being created and used today - its the social networking sites like FaceBook.

Increasingly a lot of youngsters are using these sites to interact with their real and virtual friends, many of them are clearly bellow the legal age. Parents often find it cool that their kids have taken to networking. A parent told me proudly that he didn't know his young daughter had an account till he ran into her on the internet.

For over a year now, I am looking at the interaction of youngsters on the social networking sites just out of curiosity. I notice two things that have great implications to the future of our children.

Most often a post from a child gets out-of-proportion praises. U r sooo kool, U look gr8, I wish I could do that, sooo lucky, ooh you saw a ferrari ?. Youngsters get addicted to such feel-good feedback. A student once told me after a bad exam that she doesn't feel bad that she has done poorly, she said she recently reached highest number of friends on the site.

But if you happen to post even mildly disagreeable post,  the reprehensions are quick and violent. It becomes a game - who can insult with the best wise-crack. This sends some children into depression while others retaliate with more verbal violence.

I think psychologists/anthropologists will find great differences in the way ego (or the sense of self) is built in the pre-facebook and post-facebook era. We are going to create even  more self-centred and a less tolerant society on the net. And it will surely reflect in the real physical world.

The magic mirror is no longer telling the whole truth, its selectively distorting your image. Its picking-up things that only you like to hear. If you leave this comfort zone, then you will be damned. Its not a good environment for a child to grow.