Welcome to Gaia! ::

debate all you want, but this is my only social life outside of work (and my sister in law put a filter from heck that prohibits myspace), and if parents want to debate about whether this is good for their kids to use, maybe they should just nix the computer altogether. there's a minefield of questionable and useless stuff all over the computer. think about it

That's completely true. This is also one of my only places for socializing because I live around idiots. Parents, honestly, you don't know what's good for your kids. What's good for your kids is what makes them happy. But parents, you wouldn't know what those things were because you never ask or care, all you like to do is tell your kids what to do and what not to do. (Not all parents are like this, mind) This is because you think that you're better, smarter than kids because you're older then them. Or you're just very overprotective of them. Children are the most creative and open-minded beings on this Earth and therefore are or have the ability to be expenentially smarter than their adult counterparts.
In my opinion, Gaia is one of the best sites that I have,luckily, found and I don't think it's harmful to children or anyone. If there's something you don't like on the site, don't pay attention to it. Just like on every other site on the internet. And you are absolutely right, there is tons of crap all over the internet,and basically, everywhere else! It's ridiculous when parents think that something is bad for their kids when they don't even know because they won't take the time to figure it out for themselves.
Parents, if you care that much about what's good and bad for your kids then you should put some more effort in learning about what your kids are into and doing instead of automatically assuming that it's bad for them.