The Dangers of Teens and Sexting

Sexting, according to Wikipedia, is texting explicit sexual content either in the form of text or photo. Sexting mostly takes place, but is not limited to cell phones because majority of sexting also takes place online.

Great Schools.org states that "as many as one in five teens have sent sexually suggestive photos of themselves to someone else, and a third have received such images, according to a study by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy."

Sexting between teenagers normally takes place between teens who are in a relationship and send each other sexual texts or photos. One of the biggest problems encountered with this is that upon break up between the couple, the sext is shown to other people and then goes viral.

In some cases sexting leads to bullying and harassment from other peers. In other cases, it has led to suicide. The suicide of Hope Witsell was the second recorded suicide directly connected to sexting. Hope was only 13 and she had sent a nude photo to a boy she liked. The photo ended up all over the middle and high school. She was harassed and called terrible names daily, and after the school found out, she was suspended. In the end, after the counselor found cuts on her legs and made her sign and "no harm contract" she hung herself in her bedroom.

The case of Hope Witsell is horribly sad, but this could be any one of our children. Parents must take a stand to help their teens and end sexting. Harassment and bullying is hard enough for teens to battle without giving their peers ammunition.

Recently, the city of Post Falls, Idaho, has seen a recent spike in teen sexting. They aren't taking this lightly and are asking parents to communicate with their teens about sexting and be involved. The School Resource Officers have teamed with the Post Falls Police Department to try and help the students by teaching classes on the subject.

While this may be a sad thing that our schools have to resort to teaching classes about the dangers of sexting, at least they are doing something, which is certainly better than nothing.

Do you think teaching classes in schools about the dangers of sexting would help in your community?

Teens around the country are even being arrested because a lot of sexting being done violates the child pornography laws. Some of these teens, because they didn't know any better not to, or were pressured or just plain naive, have to register on the national sex offender lists with the molesters and rapists.

It has to end.

Parents play an important roll in stopping the sexting among teenagers. Parents, you pay the bills and they live under your roof, throw privacy to the wind and take control.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexting

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41881099/ns/local_news-spokane_wa/

http://www.greatschools.org/parenting/behavior-discipline/sexting.gs?content=2079

http://www.tampabay.com/news/humaninterest/article1054895.ece