"Kids are growing up with public persona's and as anyone 30 or over will tell you, those persona's change drastically over the course of our lives."
This is the ray of hope, I think. As more and more people grow up with the embarrassing details of our adolescence online and public forever, having those embarrassing details public will be less of a big deal than it was in the past.
I don't know the psychology behind this, but it seems to me...
I've certainly changed over my 43 years. But I think that's only to a certain depth. I think that through my life (since I was a teen, at least) I've had a pretty consist underlying philosophy. What has changed is through a process of learning better ways to implement that philosophy. So to the degree that the outward projection reveals that core philosophy, I think that an ongoing record is fair.
That said, I share the same dismay that I have to entirely avoid some behaviors for fear of "leakage". And I'm not necessarily talking about drunken Mario playing, but even simple conversations. There are certain topics that I feel I need to avoid publicly because my opinions might either disappoint or somehow bother others.
huh. since my teens my very basic philosophy has changed quite a lot. especially if you were raised with a philosophy that was unsuitable for who you are and what you want to do, I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect you to have something as complex as your personal philosophy and values figured out before the age of 20.
In my early and mid teens I was reading (and mostly agreeing with) skinner and marx. I actually felt considerable angst as it became clear I was going to spend my life building and/or maintaining computer systems- systems that automate away human jobs. I spent my late teens and early 20s on Rand and the like. Picking up (and even partially living by) some radical ideology is pretty common for teens, I think, and most of us grow out of it. Personally, I can't imagine holding some ridiculous rant one posted as a teenager against an adult; Me, I'd even tend to forgive (some) actual hurtful actions undertaken by those same teens, assuming that it appears that they grew out of it. I mean, testing your own limits and figuring out what sort of person you want to be is what being a teenager is all about.
I find it... unlikely that the average teen will be selective about what they inject into the system. The average teen goes out of his way, sometimes way out of his way to shock parents and society.
Sure, there are a few teens who will try to appear normal and responsible, but I don't think that will matter. the average decides what is acceptable.
This is the ray of hope, I think. As more and more people grow up with the embarrassing details of our adolescence online and public forever, having those embarrassing details public will be less of a big deal than it was in the past.