JFBreak in his post yesterday touched on something that I've recently been thinking about. He was talking about charging teens with distributing child pornography to prevent them from sexting each other. While it's true that these pics could have potentially damaging long-term repercussions, I don't see how labeling a mischievous teen a child pornographer wouldn't be as equally bad or worse. They say juvenile records are sealed but I wouldn't put much stock in that in this digital age.
And I wonder too if the people charging them with the "crimes" don't feel a bit hypocritical. From my experience sexting by adults has become almost common place even in my little ultra-conservative spot on the map. I'm not a parent but I do have children in my life that I love and care for. My nephew recently got his first cell phone and I remember when he answered a call from a number no one recognized. A little frisson of panic went up my spine.
When I got my first camera phone I distinctly remember vowing to myself that I would never send naughty pics to anyone. That was laughable and more than a bit naive! That very night showing my phone to my then boyfriend, his exact words were, "Now you can send me pics of your boobs!" A few days later I was confessing to a friend that I did something I told myself I would never do. Now I don't even bat an eye when I get a pic request. (Not that I send pix to just anyone either.)
Now I blog about sex and i'm sure the day will come when I post a naughty pic here. I guess the question I'm fumbling to get out is, to the bloggers I read who are parents, do you feel a bit hypocritical talking to your teens and tweens about internet safety and privacy when you know you posted a hot pic of your wife on her knees in front of you last night (or the top of his head while he was between your thighs)? After all I had to Gibbs-smack myself later after telling my nephew to not answer calls from people that weren't in his contacts knowing full well I'd had phone sex with some random guy I met online the night before.
My kids are older (in their 20's) so when things like this come up, it usually involves something seen in the news. But we do have a nephew who just hit the 8th grade and already, mostly my wife (the primary hypocrite in our family) talks about the dangers of various things. Not in the preachy, "it is bad to send nude photos" way, but in the, "it may seem phone, but you could get in real trouble" way. I'd say we have grown since our kids were that age.
ReplyDeleteI so wish I had had an iPhone when I was 16 or 17. Illegal or not, I would have figured out a way to preserve those wonderful memories of high school sex. And that is the real hypocrisy here. Two consenting 16 year-olds can fuck like rabbits, but heaven forbid a teenager send her boyfriend some spank material in the form of evil boobies.
"it may seem fun" not "phone". And I didn't even send this from my iPhone.
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't feel hypocritical. Because I don't say it's "wrong", or that it makes you a bad/evil/sinful person (those terms don't have any meaning to me.) I just want to impress on them that you have to be *very* careful, because the consequences can be way more than you might initially think. As long as they know what the risks/consequences can be, they can make their own decisions about what they want to do.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, very thought-provoking!
Thx guys for your thoughts! (And for permission to link, JF).
ReplyDeleteI agree w you Max it isn't wrong at all. It takes great parenting skills to make teens see the consequences.. I always thought I was so mature...I knew nothing!
JF...Interesting I was a good girl in HS..thank God for college!! I usually say I'm glad youtube & cell phones didn't exist back then..but recently I regret not having those images on film.
I have two girls one in college and one in high school. I don't worry to much about them doing that. They are not allowed to lock their phones without giving the wife the passcode. She has access to their social media accounts. We also only have one computer that they use. The oldest had a friend who did that in 9th grade and it follows her to this day. The youngest played basketball with a girl who did the same thing in 9th grade it also followed her. At ball games some students of the opposing school chanted slut every time she got the ball. The schools teachers put a stop to it bit it bothered her pretty bad at the time. She was a senior last year and she had kinda got over it and accepted it and moved on, but it took some time. They both learned a lesson from that experience.
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