2006 and 2007 Internet Trends
October 24, 2008
Optenet (an global IT security company) just released its research on paticular 2006-2007 internet trends. I put a summary of what they found below, or you can click here to go straight to the document.
“Optenet, a leading global IT security company and a provider of intelligent, integrated
content security solutions, today announced the results of a report showing that adult
content on the Internet – including pro-anorexia and bulimia, racism, violence and
child pornography – has significantly increased since the end of 2006.
The report utilizes Optenet’s unique traffic analysis and classification engine, which
combines artificial intelligence with traditional content filtering technology to categorize
Web site content. The report tracks Internet content trends since the end of 2006,
based on a random sampling of nearly three million Web sites from around the world.
Key findings include:
• Pro-anorexia and bulimia Web sites have increased by 470 percent;
• Pages associated with violent content increased 125 percent;
• Web sites promoting racism experienced a 70 percent increase;
• Pro-drug Web sites increased by 62 percent; and
• Content related to child pornography increased 18 percent.
The Optenet study showed that although pornography as a total percentage of
Internet content has actually decreased slightly since 2006, it still is by far the largest
category of content on the Internet, representing 35 percent of all Web sites. Online
shopping represents the second biggest category (10.5 percent), followed by travel (7
percent), advertising sites (6 percent) and sports (4.5 percent).
Originally launched 10 years ago as an Internet service provider dedicated to creating
a safer Web experience for minors, Optenet transformed into a Web content security
vendor that provides products and technology to service providers and enterprises.”
Understanding Adolescents
October 23, 2008
Below is a summary of a chapter I read in Deep Ministry in a Shallow World by Chap Clark and Kara Powell. This book has become an instruction manual of sorts and has given me some great categories to think in about youth ministry and youth culture. The chapter I read provided some great insights to me about understanding the attitudes and beliefs that affect our teens. You can read below.
To be able to communicate effectively to adolescents, we need to be able to thoroughly understand three attitudes of adolescents and think about how that affects our actions. First, adolescents live their life in the form of “multiple selves,” meaning that teenagers show themselves in different ways to different people in different environments. It is very hard to see the real soul beneath because of how chameleon-like adolescents can be, even to their closest friends and family. Second, adolescents are continually aware of the possibility of getting their feelings hurt, and because of that they are continually trying to guard themselves from experiencing that pain. If we want to truly connect with them, we have to find ways to overcome their instincutal fear of getting hurt. Third, anytime adolescents perceive themselves to be in a potentially hostile environment (which is anywhere!), they are expecting to be criticized or evaluated to some degree.
Communicating effectively with adolescents means we have to work hard at creating safe relationships where adolescents feel they can let their walls down and dismantle their defense mechanisms. Most students don’t listen to us because they either don’t have any reason to be interested in what we have to say, or they are afraid that what we have to say is going to seriously go against whatever values they hold dear. When we want to move closer in our relationships with students and create those safe environments, we need to know that we can’t try to move them all at once. We have to know that it takes lots of time for them to be open to the truth we have to offer. It takes lots of chunks of time over an extended period of time for them to lower their walls and be persuaded by the God we know. Youth workers need to be able to be patient beacuse this is a process that can’t be rushed.
No Fusion This Weekend
October 22, 2008
The Halloween Bash is this weekend (details at www.shoalcreek.org) and the timing conflicts with Fusion. So, we’re not going to have Fusion this Sunday night and instead ask that high school students who’d normally come to Fusion please sign up to volunteer for the Halloween Bash, since the Halloween Bash is such a volunteer intensive event. The Bash officially starts at 4:00pm and ends at 7:00pm, but volunteer times may vary within or around that time frame. Please contact Michelle Backs at <!– var prefix = \’ma\’ + \’il\’ + \’to\’; var path = \’hr\’ + \’ef\’ + \’=\’; var addy81532 = \’backsfam5\’ + \’@\’; addy81532 = addy81532 + \’sbcglobal\’ + \’.\’ + \’net\’; document.write( \’\’ ); document.write( addy81532 ); document.write( \’\’ ); //–>\n backsfam5@sbcglobal.net <!– document.write( \’\’ ); //–> This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it <!– document.write( \’\’ ); //–> or 781-2578 with your questions about volunteering.
Also, Elevate is going to cancel Buya Plunge for Sunday 11/2. This also has to do with the fact that the Halloween Bash is such an intensive volunteer event, and so many of you families are going to be dedicating much of your time this weekend to pull it off. We want to try and give you a rest weekend next week for the work you put in this week. So the only Plunge in November will be 11/16. Because of the Christmas season, we’ll also only have one Plunge in December on 12/7.
Halloween Bash/Brown Bag Revolution Volunteer Day this Saturday 8:00-12:00 at Shoal Creek. The Buya Servant Team is scheduled to finish the haunted hallway this Saturday from 8:00am-12:00pm (contact Eric Haynes for details: hteam@sbcglobal.net). We also need any available body to help put together the materials we are planning for our “Brown Bag Revolution,” our first Northland Food Drive.
From Nov. 2nd to Nov. 22nd, our goal is to create a grassroots/social networking campaign to collect 100,000 lbs, which equals about 5,000 brown grocery bags, hence the name “Brown Bag Revolution!” I’m picking up 5,000 Hy-Vee grocery bags Friday afternoon, and from 8:00-12:00 on Saturday morning, we’ll need people to stick the promotional flyer to the grocery bag.
If you’re a parent or sibling dropping off your Buya student in the morning, would you consider staying at the building and helping us accomplish this goal, perhaps even bringing your family or a friend to help us get these bags ready for distribution? We want to flood the Northland with these bags, but we’ve got to get them put together first.
Distributing Bags = Feeding Northland Families – Would you also consider becoming one of our Brown Bag “Revolutionaries” by accepting our student ministry challenge of distributing 25 bags to 25 of your friends, families, or coworkers? Justin Talley is creating a list of people that are willing to take responsibility for distributing these bags in their schools and neighborhoods or any other social network. The key is to fill one bag yourself, then ask a personal relationship you have to fill a bag too! Let Justin know how many bags you want to distribute (10, 25, 50, 100, whatever!) by emailing him at justin.talley@shoalcreek.org. Also, post a comment on this post to let others see that you’re personally contributing to the feeding and serving of Northland families. Let’s see this list grow!
Weekly Update
October 17, 2008
Buya Servant Team – the BST will be having some definite serving opportunities as they have adopted the Halloween Bash’s “Haunted Hallway.” The Haunted Hallway is the part of the Halloween Bash that the kids get to walk through and see ghoulish things and has consistently been one of the most enjoyable parts of the Halloween Bash each year.
If your Buya student would like to help, please contact Eric Haynes (hteam@sbcglobal.net) and let him know you’re coming. Here are the available opportunites to get involved:
Saturday, Oct 18th, 8am – 9:30am Working with Candy Moran to find materials
around campus to be used and moved to the “haunted hallway” area.
Sunday, Oct 19th, 2pm – 6pm Decorating the hallway and planning out
schedule of volunteers for event. This includes our regular BST meeting
time.
Saturday, Oct 25th, if necessary, 8am – 12am Finalize decorating of hallway
Sunday, Oct 26th, Halloween Bash starts at 4pm
Buya Plunge – This Sunday night from 6:00-8:00pm Buya students can come to the Shoal Creek Auditorium for Plunge, with is our twice a month worship night for middle school students. It’s like New Community, only for the students. Students get the chance to create space in their hearts and connect with God.
Crash Event – Anberlin Concert Monday – Crash students can join Justin Talley and the other Crash leaders for an all-ages show at the Beaumont Club in Westport. Anberlin is the headlining band, with three other opening acts. Get your tickets at www.anberlin.com. Meet in the front of the building at 5:30 Monday evening. Contact Justin for questions (510-3859).
“The Lockbox Theory”
October 7, 2008
I just read an article released today by the Fuller Youth Institute that discusses the faith of college students and how that actually plays out in the life of those students.
There’s a widely held theory that a college environment is an environment that attacks the faith that students graduate high school with and multiplies the number of students that leave their faith in college. Not really the case, says the article.
Another common thought also proves untrue. College students have been sometimes labeled as “spiritual” individuals, using the freedom of a college environment to explore different avenues of life. This isn’t really the case either.
What emerges is something called the “Lockbox Theory,” and in short, it describes typical college beharvior as locking up and storing away beliefs in a seemingly “safe place,” where they can be accessed later in life when those spiritual genes really do kick in. Students typically see whatever faith they do have (whether that be deep or aetheistic) and see religion as factor that generally limits their assimilation into mainstream American culture. Becoming too involved in spiritual things can become negative to a college student trying to fit into American culture, so they just kind of sit on what they believe and stow it until spiritual thinking becomes more acceptable (i.e. when they start a family it becomes more ok to go to church to get some good morals for your family, but not while you’re single and in school and trying to have a good time).
Quotes:
“If collegians are neither abandoning their faith because of a hostile college environment, nor deeply interested in spirituality, what are they experiencing? College students seem to be following a third path of storing their religious beliefs, practices, and convictions in a sort of “identity lockbox” as they develop other parts of their identity (e.g., vocational identity, relational identity). Clydesdale explains that the lockbox “protects religious identities, along with political, racial, gender, and civic identities, from tampering that might affect their holders’ future entry into the American cultural mainstream.”4
In other words, while there are parts of students’ identity that are indeed free to develop, most of their identity is locked away. Those aspects that are developing are limited to the ones that fit into the American cultural mainstream. In general, their religious identity doesn’t fit in that mainstream and is therefore stowed away.”
I don’t think that this “Lockbox Theory” is limited to just college-aged student, however. I think it plays out in smaller levels in the lives or younger students, students aged 11-18. Talking about your faith or spirituality in the your schools can be a”dangerous” thing to your image as a student. The most important values to students are acceptance, so anything, like say, being seen as a religious nut, is going to make it harder for a student to find acceptance.
That can translate into students being extremely involved and active with their faith in “safe” environments like church activities or at home, but when it comes to go time at school, that faith can easily be “locked” away so that it doesn’t affect a student’s personal image.