AT WAR WITH BARBIE.COM -- by Steve Nadis
At the risk of sounding like a hypocrite, I'll start out by saying I'm not a big fan of having kids play games on the computer. That said (and this is the part where I might start sounding like a hypocrite), my 4-and-a-half-year-old daughter has spent a little bit of time at the Barbie.com site, of late, checking out the various amusements to be had there. But here's my gripe: When she signs in--and she has a lovely name--Barbie.com denies her access, saying something like: "You just used a naughty word. Wouldn't you like to try again and use your real name?" But there's nothing wrong with her name and it's not close --phonetically or spellingly -- to anything I can think of that sounds "naughty." Which has left me furious, impugning my young daughter's good name like that, almost to the point of wanting to file some kind of grievance. But against whom (Barbie.com? the webmaster? Mattel?) and for what (calling my daugher's name "naughty"? libel? harrassment?). Well, I guess you can see the quandary I'm in, which is partly of my own doing. For if I'd stuck to my guns and kept the kids away from sites like Barbie.com & PBSkids, none of this would have happened.
