Lindsay Beyerstein links to an Ad Council ad that's apparently trying to encourage kids to be careful what they post online. You can see it for yourself here, but to save you time, Lindsay's description will do:

The ad shows a girl called Sarah silently enduring public harassment from a series of progressively older and creepier strangers who have been reading her webpage.

Lindsay thinks the ad is a bad idea:

Unfortunately, this ad does nothing to empower kids to stay safe. Instead, it sends the message that girls who are being harassed by adults brought their misfortune on themselves.

I see what Lindsay's getting at. Women who are attacked by men are sometimes accused of leading them on, perhaps by wearing sexy clothing or some naughty flirting. Some people blame the victim.

But it's not always blaming the victim to point out someone else's risky behavior. Suppose I pay my bill at a bar by pulling out a large wad of cash and peeling off a few bills, then when I leave the bar someone follows me out, beats me up, and takes my money. The following statements are both true:

• The guy who took my money committed a crime.
• I was foolish to flash that much cash.

It's the same if, say, a woman spends every weekend going to nightclubs, getting drunk, and meeting strange men. If one of those men rapes her, we can make two observations:

• The guy committed a violent crime.
• She engaged in high-risk behavior.

Admittedly, some people would use her risky behavior as a way of blaming the victim, but there are also plenty of good reasons for pointing out her risky behavior, such as instructing her how to reduce the risk, or instructing others how to evaluate the risks inherent in their own behavior.

Predictably, the Ad Council's message is "Think before you post, little girl." Just once I'd like to see a campaign called "Think before you stalk, dude." Or: "Just because a minor posted this doesn't give you the right to throw it in her face, creepy adult."

Guys who harass young girls are a lot less likely to be affected by a public service announcement than the girls they're harassing. To illustrate what I mean, let's take away the sex and gender politics. Suppose we want to craft a public service announcement to fight the Nigerian scam email problem. Which message would be more effective?

1. Nigerians asking for help getting money out of their country are just trying to scam you.
2. Hey Nigerians, stop trying to scam people!

Sometimes it's a lot easier to educate potential victims rather than to try to change the behavior of predatory criminals.

I'm especially disturbed by the scene where the school coach yells "Loved your tattoo, Sarah" as the main character walks by football practice. In real life, such a coach would be fired for harassment.

Really? I don't have good sense of what constitutes harassment at the high school level, but are tattoos considered sexual? Is it because he apparently doesn't know her? Are coaches at high schools not supposed to look at student web pages? Are male employees at schools simply not supposed to comment on the appearance of female students? Where do they draw the line? "Nice breasts" is obviously wrong, but how about "Nice hair"? Seriously, the coach's comment does strike me as a little odd, but is it really that bad?

Besides, the point of this spot is that stuff you post might be seen by people like your teachers.

Why is the AC making it seem as if clear-cut sexual harassment is a natural "consequence" of posting personal info online?

This campaign is obviously supposed to help minors avoid adult sex predators. It's irresponsible for the AC to present the image of a student suffering in silence as men catcall and harass her.

First of all, what "clear-cut sexual harassment"? Here's what happens in the video:

1. A cute guy she doesn't know says "Hey, Sarah."
2. The coach says "Love the new tattoo, Sarah."
3. Sarah overhears two guys on the mall escalator talking about her.
4. Ticket taker at the movie theater says "Hey Sarah, what color underwear today?"
5. Guy cleaning tables in the food court says "Hey Sarah, so when you gonna post something new?"

Yes, the guy who asks her about her underwear is going too far, but what's so sexual about the other comments?

Second, the reason Sarah suffers in silence is that the video makers wanted to present all these strange encounters without revealing how these people knew so much about Sarah. If she asked the coach how he knew about her tattoo, it would reveal the point of the message too early.

The take home message is straight out of Ann Althouse: If the internet becomes your scarlet letter, it's your own damned fault.

No, the point is that if strangers find out stuff about you because you posted it on the internet, it's your own damned fault. Because it is.

It's the chance I take by running a blog, and it's the chance everyone on MySpace takes by posting a profile. That's the whole point of the public service message.

The irony is that this message is probably supposed to be aimed at boys and girls--but it's backfiring because it's sending kids, especially boys, the message that it's okay victimize people who are indiscreet.

Now I'm just totally mystified. If I email you a photo of my naked ass, and you reply "Nice ass!" you have not victimized me. And if I post a photo of my naked ass on my blog and you run into me tomorrow and say "Nice ass!" you still have not victimized me.

I really don't understand how people can post something on the frackin' World Wide Web and then complain when somebody says something to them about it. It's like Britney Spears posing naked and pregnant for a magazine cover and then whining to the press that she has no privacy.

Yet I've seen a number of people who post stuff on livejournal.com and and then are shocked—shocked!—when strangers comment on it.

I had my own run-in with that attitude when someone instant messaged me and told me she liked my photography. I thanked her, and then out of curiosity I decided to check for some kind of AIM profile. I double-clicked on her screen name, and that led to a search box which lead to her MySpace page. It turned out she was only 17, but since making contact was her idea, I invited her to be one of my MySpace friends.

She said it was creepy for me to do that. I think it was a little naive of her not to realize that the contents of her public MySpace page is...public. The Interweb is not a well-kept secret.

Later on, in a comment, Lindsay says this:

We're meant to infer that the coach has been reading this girl's MySpace page without her knowledge. That would make him at best a skeeve and at worst a consumer of child pornography.

Reading her MySpace page without her knowledge? What the heck is that supposed to mean? Are we supposed to let people know when we read their web page? My MySpace profile has been viewed just over 2300 times since I posted it, and less than 1% of those people have let me know they were viewing it. That's how MySpace works. That's how the World Wide Web works.

On the internet, everyone can hear you scream...or see what your tattoo looks like.