The Blogging Police ?

Hello fellow educational bloggers:

All this chat about blogging had me thinking about a big news story that occurred just two weeks ago: the Montreal school shooting that killed one girl. The killer, Kimveer Gill also had his own blog set up through a website dedicated to goth culture (vampirefreaks.com).

First let me say that I believe blogging is a great way to get students motivated about school and language. Students can log on weekly and journal about specific topics or they can have "blog free days" where they have the option of writing whatever is on their mind.

There are certain policing issues with this format to teaching and learning. In his blog, Kimveer Gill, the Dawson College killer wrote: "Work sucks ... School sucks ... Life sucks ..." He made that entry just twenty-four hours before going to the school to begin his rampage. The day after that shooting, I was home watching CBC Newsworld. On the noon hour program, they interviewed the man who runs the vampirefreaks website. He talked about how there are security measures in place. Basically, when people harass other bloggers, their priviledges are cut off. But he didn't speak to what happens when people talk about the weapons they own, or the plans they are making to kill others. In fact, the reporter never put these questions to him - which infuriated me!

So the question is --- as a teacher, I have some control over what is written in a blog that I am marking. But who in the cyberworld is really doing this? If I wrote something racist, or controversial right now on this blog - would the blogger people for blogger.com warn me or anything? What happens if another blogger begins harassing my students about their blog? How would I intervene? There are so many questions in relation to the topic of blogging. I hope to uncover some answers over the coming days.

Anastasia Rioux

Here is a short Toronto Star article about Kimveer Gill and his blog.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&a
mp;cid=1158228129617&call_pageid=1158242920736&col=1158242920757