What yo mama didn’t know when she was growing up...

Our generation simply does not know boundaries. We’ve pushed the envelope so far we’ve ripped it to shreds. We’re not our parents’ generation — that’s for sure. When our parents were young, there was no such thing as “blogging.” They didn’t vent their frustrations, gloat about achievements or rant about every single thing they did that day to the outside world.

If they did keep a journal, it most likely had a lock on it and was stuffed under a mattress, lest one other person finds it and reads about who they wanted to hold hands with — a far cry from the Internet audience blogging craves. Rule of thumb: Only write about what you would be OK with everyone on the Internet seeing.

Our parents did not have cell phones, and therefore could not text or, even worse, “sext.” The dangers of having a naked picture of them passed on from one person to another until the entire school, state, country and eventually Barack Obama saw it were simply void from their imagination. Rule of thumb: If it has been considered child porn in some circumstances, it’s probably best not to go there. If you just can’t help yourself though, make sure you trust whoever is on the receiving end really well.

YouTube certainly did not exist. If they were lucky, they had some sort of old-fashioned camera that was good at recording homemade horror films full of fake blood and cheesy lines. Getting a few of their friends to watch it was considered a victory. It’s so mind-bogglingly easy to put up a cover of you playing “Pour Some Sugar on Me” on the mandolin and get a few hundred people to watch it nowadays that it’s terrifying. Rule of thumb: Use YouTube to show off talents, not your body.

Although many of our parents have Facebook now, they didn’t when they were little.

Posting pictures of themselves online to the world was something none of them knew about. Back then, pictures were placed in a leather-bound album and then embarrassingly looked over by the extended family during holidays. Rule of thumb: Either make pictures private or de-tag ones where you’re doing anything that could cause you to get fired or miss out on a job opportunity. Come on, do you really need anything other than the economy hurting your job prospects?

While we’re on the Facebook topic, it’s also important to think about how you advertise your blog, if you decide to blog. One problem we all know about is when your privacy settings are kept open to the public or people in your networks who aren’t your friends. As of Sunday, there are 197,600 people in the Rochester, N.Y. network alone. That’s a lot of people who now know that you’ve decided to switch birth control brands or that you passed out after drinking too much vodka. Rule of thumb: Make sure your profile is private so only your friends have a link to your blog, but remember, blogs can easily be accessed by search engines. Even e-mail was not an option back then. Horror stories about writing a kinky e-mail to your spouse and accidentally sending it to someone else, such as your ex, didn’t exist. Rule of thumb: Double check and then triple check to make sure you’re sending the message to the person it’s intended to go to. And then check again. Twitter did not exist either. Checking your Twitter account multiple times a day to see what your best friends were up to — back then “listening to the Allman Brothers on the 8 Track!” wasn’t available. Rule of thumb: Don’t use your real name when signing up and refrain from overly suggestive twits and tweets.

Our generation watches reality shows about other people when our lack of boundaries becomes boring. Even though this phenomenon can be traced back to the 1960s with the British “Seven Up” series, where ordinary kids were interviewed on television every seven years to see how their lives had changed, the first all-encompassing reality show that we grabbed onto was “The Real World,” back in 1992. “RealiTV” has now expanded to shows such as “The Hills,” “Rock of Love,” “Table for 12” and “Jon and Kate Plus Eight.” Rule of thumb: Watch profusely, but never let anyone know.

We neglect boundaries in perfect exhibitionist style. I’ve stumbled upon countless blog entries that seem like cries for help, in the way people flaunt their self-esteem issues to the world, rather than to a psychologist behind a closed door. Twisted? Just a tad.

YouTube videos where you have to think “wait, someone agreed to put this online?” also exist in countless numbers. How will it feel when you’re 40 and one of your child’s friends says to little Johnny, “Hey, I found a video of your mom on YouTube from 25 years ago dancing around in a thong!”

Surely, we all know the issues associated with a lack of boundaries, but there’s a bigger risk involved. Do we even know what privacy is anymore? How many pictures have you seen on Facebook of one of your friends sitting drunkenly on a toilet? My point exactly — and no offense, but that was only cute when you were 3.

Kraus is a member of the class of 2009.