When I first wrote this post early in 2009 the term sexting was a very new term, now sexting has become part of the finalists in the 2009 Word of the Year according to the Oxford American Dictionary.
With all the great advancements in technology and the wonders, it can do for our lives we need to remember and more importantly teach our children the positive and negatives of responsible use.
Like anything in life great things can also cause the demise of our future and it’s the parent’s responsibility to not only monitor everything your child is doing when it comes to our quickly advancing technology but teach them to understand like anything else that comes with maturity for use like driving a vehicle, owning a firearm or owning a credit card, these things can be also ruin their future if not handled with care.
I read today a very disturbing commentary on CNN crime page discussing a new ‘fad’ called sexting. What is this, exactly what it sounds like but instead of sex texting messages to your spouse or significant other that you may be able to trust as one adult to another, sexting has become the new rage of teen girls sending half or fully naked pictures of themselves to their boyfriends, with the age range of 13-19 years old to be the largest group for this behaviour. This behaviour is not only ruining a girls reputation and possibly their future if or when it shows up over the internet somewhere as jolted boyfriends act out their revenge, these boys receiving the sexting are being convicted for possessing child pornography as young as 13, then being registered as a sex offender losing friends, family and a future.
When the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned pregnancy teamed up with Cosmogirl.com for a study this was some of their findings.
“According to their study, 39 percent of teens (that’s ages 13-19) are sending or posting sexually suggestive messages over IM, text or e-mail and around the same number of teens are receiving such messages. Half of those teens, 20 percent, are sending or posting nude or semi-nude pictures of themselves. That’s frightening.” Source
As a parent these are very disturbing studies, it leaves concerned parents asking what can we do to prevent this behavior; it is difficult to control teens when they are not in your presence. Should we turn our backs and allow young boys to be thrown in jail for viewing what a girl willingly sends to them, should we be concentrating on educating our girls more on morals, bad behavior practices and life altering experiences that one day will come back to bite them in the butt? Would these things really do any good as most teens let advice go in one ear and out the other?
Is it time cell phones become strictly regulated or have strict parental controls somehow programmed in to have text messages sent to a parents email to monitor what their child is doing when they hand these devices so carelessly over to their young immature child’s mind? Will teens go into an uproar claiming this is an invasion of their privacy if their text messages are monitored by their parents? I’m sure they would, but is it invasion of privacy when crimes are being committed by young teens that could potentially ruin their lives forever?
Maybe it’s time to hold the parents responsible when these teens are caught abusing their ‘privileges’ instead of punishing them for sex crimes that are so easily committed today with just a send of a button. Remember teen minds are not mature minds; they are impressionable minds trying to find their way in this very confusing life of easy access to all. It’s time parents and many companies take responsibility, put controls or start placing laws on who can own a phone that takes pictures or sends messages. You can still purchase basic cell phones without these added features, so if this is why you give your child a cell phone for ‘emergency’ use, do they really need all the extra features that seem to be getting them into a heap of trouble?
This post was originally written in April/09, here are some more horror stories of how sexting has become a new wave of crime parents, educators and young adults need to worry about.
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