Internet as the megaphone, rather than the cause

From apophenia (db's) blog, a great entry regarding the recently released report on Enhancing Child Safety & Online Technologies.

In her entry, her statement that most resonated with me:
"I strongly believe that we need to stop talking about the Internet as the cause and start talking about it as the megaphone. The Internet makes visible how many kids are not ok." [bold, my emphasis]

Yes. YES YES YES. In my own research I have been trying to show how important the offline factors are (than we typically like to acknowledge) when examining online phenomena.

You know, blaming video games for suicide sells newspapers and it's a whole lot easier to witch-hunt the medium of the hour than examine other more complex social reasons. As McLuhan would say though, media are extensions of the self.

More often than not, I come across people who are able to -defer- destructive behaviour because of what technology affords in the way of providing alternative coping strategies. At any rate, if people need more research to believe it, then more research they shall get.

Executive Summary PDF here>>