Unlimited Sexting: What to Do About Teens and Their Dumb Naked Photos of Themselves

[Cynosure]

What to do about teens and their dumb naked photos of themselves

By Dahlia LithwickPosted Saturday, Feb. 14, 2009, at 6:54 AM ET

Say you're a middle school principal who has just confiscated a cell phone from a 14-year-old boy, only to discover it contains a nude photo of his 13-year-old girlfriend. Do you: a) call the boy's parents in despair, b) call the girl's parents in despair, or c) call the police? More and more, the answer is d) all of the above. Which could result in criminal charges for both of your students and their eventual designation as sex offenders.

Sexting is the clever new name for the act of sending, receiving, or forwarding naked photos via your cell phone. I wasn't fully persuaded that America was facing a sexting epidemic, as opposed to a journalists-writing-about-sexting epidemic, until I saw a new survey done by the National Campaign To Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. The survey has one teen in five reporting he or she has sent or posted naked photos of himself or herself. Whether all this reflects a new child porn epidemic or just a new iteration of the old shortsighted teen narcissism epidemic remains unclear.

Last month, three girls (ages 14 or 15) in Greensburg, Pa., were charged with disseminating child pornography for sexting their boyfriends. The boys who received the images were charged with possession. A teenager in Indiana faces felony obscenity charges for sending a picture of his genitals to female classmates. A 15-year-old girl in Ohio and a 14-year-old girl in Michigan were charged with felonies for sending along nude images of themselves to classmates. Some of these teens have pleaded guilty to lesser charges; others have not. If convicted, these young people may have to register as sex offenders, in some cases for a decade or two. Similar charges have been filed in cases in Alabama, Connecticut, Florida, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Utah, and Wisconsin.

One quick clue that the criminal justice system is probably not the best venue for addressing the sexting crisis? A survey of the charges brought in the cases reflects that—depending on the jurisdiction—prosecutors have charged the senders of smutty photos, the recipients of smutty photos, those who save the smutty photos, and the hapless forwarders of smutty photos with the same crime: child pornography. Who is the victim here and who is the perpetrator? Everybody and nobody.

There may be an argument for police intervention in cases that involve a genuine threat or cyber-bullying, such as a recent Massachusetts incident in which the picture of a naked 14-year-old girl was allegedly sent to more than 100 cell phones, or a New York case involving a group of boys who turned a nude photo of a 15-year-old girl into crude animations and PowerPoint presentations. But are such cases really the same as the cases in which tipsy teen girls send their boyfriends naughty Valentine's Day pictures?

The argument for hammering every such case seems to be that allowing nude images of yourself to go public may have serious consequences, so let's nip it in the bud by charging kids with felonies, which will assuredly have serious consequences. In the Pennsylvania case, for instance, a police captain explained that the charges were brought because "it's very dangerous. Once it's on a cell phone, that cell phone can be put on the Internet where everyone in the world can get access to that juvenile picture." The argument that we must prosecute kids as the producers and purveyors of kiddie porn because they are too dumb to understand that their seemingly innocent acts can hurt them goes beyond paternalism. Child pornography laws intended to protect children should not be used to prosecute and then label children as sex offenders.

Consider the way in which school districts have reacted to the uptick in sexting. Have they cracked down on the epidemic? Confiscated cell phones? Launched widespread Lolita dragnets? No, many now simply prohibit students from bringing cell phones to school. This doesn't stop students from sexting. It just stops them from being caught. How bad can sexting really be if schools are enacting what amounts to a don't-ask-don't-tell policy?

[continued... ]

Parents can forget that their kids may be as tech-savvy as Bill Gates but as gullible as Bambi. At some level, teens understand that once their image reaches someone else's cell phone, what happened in Vegas is unlikely to stay there. The National Campaign To Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy survey suggests 25 percent of teen girls and 33 percent of teen boys report seeing naked images originally sent to someone else. Yet even in the age of the Internet, young people fail to appreciate that their naked pictures want to roam free.

The same survey showed that teens can be staggeringly naive in another way: Twenty percent have posted a naked photo of themselves despite the fact that 71 percent of those asked understand that doing so can have serious negative consequences. Understanding the consequences of risky behavior but engaging in it anyhow? Smells like teen spirit to me.

The real problem with criminalizing teen sexting as a form of child pornography is that the great majority of these kids are not predators and have no intention of producing or purveying kiddie porn. They think they're being brash and sexy, in the manner of brash, sexy Americans everywhere: by being undressed. And while some of the reaction to the sexting epidemic reflects legitimate concerns about children as sex objects, some highlights pernicious legal stereotypes and fallacies. A recent New York Times article about online harassment, for instance, quotes the Family Violence Prevention Fund, a nonprofit domestic violence awareness group, saying that the sending of nude pictures, even if done voluntarily, constitutes "digital dating violence." But is one in five teens truly participating in an act of violence?
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Many other experts insist the sexting trend hurts teen girls more than boys, fretting that they feel "pressured" to take and send naked photos. Yet the girls in the Pennsylvania case were charged with "manufacturing, disseminating or possessing child pornography" while the boys were merely charged with possession. This disparity seems increasingly common. If we are worried about the poor girls pressured into exposing themselves, why are we treating them more harshly than the boys?

In a thoughtful essay in the American Prospect Online, Judith Levine, author of Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex examines the dangers lurking online for children and concludes that the harms of old-fashioned online bullying—the sort of teasing and ostracism that led Megan Meier to kill herself after being tormented on MySpace—far outweigh the dangers of online sexual material. Judging from the sexting prosecutions in Pennsylvania and Ohio last year, it's clear the criminal justice system is too blunt an instrument to resolve a problem that reflects more about the volatile combination of teens and technology than some national cyber-crime spree. Parents need to remind their teens that a dumb moment can last a lifetime in cyberspace. Judges and prosecutors need to understand that a lifetime of cyber-humiliation shouldn't be grounds for a very real and possibly lifelong criminal record.

(A version of this article also appears in this week's issue of Newsweek.)

What to do about teens and their dumb naked photos of themselves. - By Dahlia Lithwick - Slate Magazine

[snowy]

There is a school I know of where this occurred, but with one minor complication--the male student who received the pictures was over 18. Kids were unaware of the implications of "sexting" and the consequences. While it's a harsh consequence to be labeled as a sex offender, there ought to be a harsh consequence, though I'm not this consequence is the right one. We ought to figure out a better way to deal with these cases, and we ought to start talking about it so that kids do know the consequences of such actions.

It's a clear example of cultural lag--the laws haven't yet caught up with the technology.

[telekinetic]

If it's even available in 13 years, my daughter's cell will have the camera either not present or disabled.

[braisler]

Mosaic makes a good point. Kids questionably need cell phones at all, but they certainly don't need ones with a f'ing camera. Parents need to be responsible and think ahead before giving their kids a phone.

To the original issue, I don't think that labeling as sex offenders is the right course of action. I don't know what is, but sex offender status is already a problem in this country. You get on the same list with pedophile rapists if you take a piss outside at Mardi Gras.

[kutulu]

One problem with 'sexting' is that people don't have a lot of control over who sends you what. The act of receiving a file shouldn't be a crime. Instead, it should be based on what you did with the file after receiving it that is the deciding factor in whether or not a crime was committed.

The "appropriate" action would be to delete it and inform the sender that what they sent was not appropriate and not to do it again.

[telekinetic]

Originally Posted by braisler

Mosaic makes a good point. Kids questionably need cell phones at all, but they certainly don't need ones with a f'ing camera. Parents need to be responsible and think ahead before giving their kids a phone.

To the original issue, I don't think that labeling as sex offenders is the right course of action. I don't know what is, but sex offender status is already a problem in this country. You get on the same list with pedophile rapists if you take a piss outside at Mardi Gras.

Don't get me started on the retardedness of the Sex Offender Registry and how ass backwards some of these crimes are, all (even these child prosecutions) in the name of "protecting the children."

Sex offender registry is retarded because if these people are still dangerous enough to need to alert society, why are they out of jail?

[Cynosure]

Consider how this article begins: "Say you're a middle school principal who has just confiscated a cell phone from a 14-year-old boy, only to discover it contains a nude photo of his 13-year-old girlfriend."

See the root of the problem, here?

When I was 18, back in the '80s, I was having sex with my 17-year-old girlfriend; and, yes, we once exchanged Polaroid photos of our individual selves nude, with each other. (Note, however, there was nothing "innocent" about it.) But, hey, at least we were old enough to know that we needed to keep those photos as hidden and safe as possible. (For example, we did not show them to our friends, nor did we keep them lying around for other people to find them, like stuck in between the pages of a school textbook or something like that.)

But nowadays, it's teenagers ages 13-15 engaging in this sort of thing; and, well, there's worlds of difference in maturity and common sense between teenagers ages 13-15 and teenagers ages 17-19.

[dippin]

I get going after the kids who disseminate the pictures, spreading them beyond the initial intended audience.

But I don't get charging the sender of the picture, or even the recipient if the recipient didnt spread it around. I mean, isn't the whole basis of child pornography laws the idea that even if the teen or child consents to something, they are too young and naive to make that decision? So these kids are being charged with felonies because apparently they are old enough to know better, but not old enough to consent?

I get the need to be thorough, otherwise real child pornographers could use that as a loophole and basically use what looks like self portraits as a cover. But when that clearly is not the case, I think it is a perversion of the system to treat the 14 year old girl who sent a shot of herself topless to a boyfriend the same way as the 35 year old who likes to take pictures of naked 11 year olds...

[Halx]

None of this should be criminal. We should, however, educate.

Also, that article needs pics.

[vanblah]

I think one major problem is context. Is the kid in question an otherwise "good" kid that made a questionable judgment call? Is the kid a "bad" kid on the road to worse problems? Was the kid exploited?

We lump all these people into one category and expect the "law" to deal with it. What we end up doing is creating more people who are ashamed and repressed. We end up creating victims and predators. These kids don't need any kind of legal intervention (unless they were exploited in some way). If the kid is not aware of the possible outcome of this kind of behavior (self-made nude photographs) then there is something wrong. The parents did not do their job.

Do I think that teenagers should be photographing themselves nude? No. However, what's the difference between a 13-15 year-old taking nude photos of themselves and an 18+ year-old? Really ... when it gets down to it ... nothing. They are doing it for the same reasons: attention and "kicks." Unless there is an adult taking the photographs there's really no difference. Maturity? I'm pretty sure that a teenager taking nude photographs is well aware of the possible outcome ... possibly MORESO than an adult--especially, if their parents have been honest with them about sexuality. There is more to the "sex talk" than just the penis and vagina relationship. The sex talk needs to include broken hearts and angry ex-lovers and jealousy. It needs to include love and commitment and devotion. Choices.

Some people will say that the pictures might fall into the wrong hands or be spread all over the internet by "immature" friends or jilted lovers.

Wait a minute ... there are ENTIRE websites devoted to just that sort of thing (for photographs of adults). There are websites devoted to adults being "exploited" not just jilted lovers posting nude photos of their ex-lovers (even non-consensual photographs). I don't think it has much to do with maturity.

Teenagers are sexual beings ... hell, my daughter is 7 and she's starting to explore (and has been for a few years now). They are going to do whatever they can to experiment with that sexuality.

This latest media generated craze (sexting) is just another diversion in a long line of diversions. It has more to do with protecting parents from having to deal with their rapidly maturing children than protecting the children themselves.

Again, I'm at work so my thoughts might seem a little random as I keep getting interrupted. I apologize.

[Lucifer]

So the principal who confiscates the phone and sees the pics of the 13 year old girl, can he be then charged with viewing child pornography?

[filtherton]

Originally Posted by Lucifer

So the principal who confiscates the phone and sees the pics of the 13 year old girl, can he be then charged with viewing child pornography?

If the kids get charged, then I hope so. Why is the principal looking at the kid's pics?

[genuinegirly]

I'm pretty sure that checking a cell phone's pictures would be considered an invasion of privacy.

[PonyPotato]

Some people are dumb enough to make a nude photo the screensaver/background on their phone or computer.

Just saying.

[Zeraph]

It's stupid. Our bodies are natural and while I wouldn't want my imaginary kid doing it, it ain't right to punish it like that. Sickos are out there, they always will be, but pictures of kids don't create them.

[Daniel_]

Originally Posted by PonyPotato

Some people are dumb enough to make a nude photo the screensaver/background on their phone or computer.

Just saying.

A guy at work does this (he's over age, but still proves how people think). He has a naked shot of his GF as his phone wallpaper.

I've not met her, but when I do, I'm wondering if I should mention that she's got a cute vagina.

And teens are stupider than 20-somethings, generally.

[Xerxys]

WTF!!! America, please stop labelling kids as "sex offenders." DO you know what a sex offender is?!?!?! Really one may not be able to get a job because he has the same status as a paedophille or rapist?! It's just not the same.

[snowy]

Originally Posted by filtherton

If the kids get charged, then I hope so. Why is the principal looking at the kid's pics?

Typically what happens in these kinds of cases is that girl sends boy nude pic on his cell phone, sometime later they break up, and then boy flashes said pic of nude girl around school. THAT is when the principal typically ends up looking at pictures on a phone, and they're fully justified in doing so.

And just so you know, "privacy" as adults enjoy it does not exist in public school.

[World's King]

Snowy... That still doesn't give anyone the right to go through the kid's phones.

[telekinetic]

Originally Posted by World's King

Snowy... That still doesn't give anyone who isn't the kid's parents the right to go through the kid's phones.

FTFY...and the problem suddenly solves itself!

[Xerxys]

I see why kids should not have their "privacy". That's just stupid. I dont know why y'all don't cane their asses!! I also dont see whty they have cell f'kn phones!! Also stupid, I do see the method of judgement and punishment is over it!! Kids should be punished for this kind of behaviour, .....but not like this, not like this for the love of god!!

[World's King]

Originally Posted by twistedmosaic

FTFY...and the problem suddenly solves itself!

Not even the parents have the right.



Isn't anything allowed to be private.

[snowy]

Originally Posted by World's King

Snowy... That still doesn't give anyone the right to go through the kid's phones.

No, it doesn't, but that's the way it is. The standards are different. The Supreme Court says that public schools can search and seize so long as there is "reasonable suspicion", not probable cause. Again, there is cultural lag here--searching cell phones has yet to be legally challenged, and so it is presumed that the standard for other searches (lockers, backpacks, etc) applies.

My general advice to kids is to leave the phone at home. Most schools won't allow a cell phone anyways, so why take it on campus? At the school I work at, so much as seeing a cell phone out during school hours is grounds for confiscation. By leaving it at home, kids can protect their privacy, keep it from getting stolen, and keep it from being a distraction during the school day. Unfortunately, students tend to see cell phones as their "lifeline."

[PonyPotato]

Originally Posted by World's King

Not even the parents have the right.
Isn't anything allowed to be private.

If parents can be held responsible for their children's actions/debts (and they CAN), then they have the right to go through their kid's stuff (probably bought by parents anyway) to ensure that their children are not participating in illegal activities.

Period.

[MSD]

Protecting kids from predatory adults is one thing, but kids sending nude pics to each other is "playing doctor" for the 21st century. There's little to no harm in consensual sexual experimentation between adolescents. Kids need to learn that actions have consequences, and they need to be educated rather than branded for it.

[World's King]

Originally Posted by PonyPotato

If parents can be held responsible for their children's actions/debts (and they CAN), then they have the right to go through their kid's stuff (probably bought by parents anyway) to ensure that their children are not participating in illegal activities.

Period.

If the kids are participating in something illegal then the parents have already failed...

[shakran]

Originally Posted by World's King

If the kids are participating in something illegal then the parents have already failed...

So what you are suggesting is that the parents are not allowed to monitor their childrens' activities due to privacy concerns, but it's still mom and dad's fault when the kids do something that the parents don't know about. . .

[World's King]

No. It's up to the parents to teach their children the difference from right and wrong. If the child is raised properly there will never be an occasion where the parents would have to violate the child's privacy.

[inBOIL]

Children make mistakes. Sometimes the only way to discover those mistakes is to violate their privacy. No child is going to get everything right the first time; parenting isn't about preventing kids from making mistakes, it's about correcting them when the inevitable mistakes occur.

A mistake like sending naked pictures of yourself is best corrected by parents, not the schools or courts.

[Zeraph]

I dunno, I think parents have the right to violate their kid's privacy, but no one else.

[vanblah]

Originally Posted by Zeraph

I dunno, I think parents have the right to violate their kid's privacy, but no one else.

I think we are probably misusing the word "violate." Parents have a responsibility to their children to follow up and check on their behavior. This must be done with respect though. If you repeatedly violate the trust your child has in you they will find better ways to hide their behavior rather than correct it.

EDIT: In fact, as they get older they'll find better ways to avoid getting into trouble anyway. Hopefully, the parent(s) have done a decent job at teaching the child how to behave ... whatever "behave" actually means within a particular society.

[Cynosure]

Originally Posted by World's King

No. It's up to the parents to teach their children the difference from right and wrong. If the child is raised properly there will never be an occasion where the parents would have to violate the child's privacy.

What, have you never heard of teenage rebellion?



You know, where a teenager goes against what they were taught by their parents, and does their own thing and/or gives into peer/cultural pressure, even if they know (or at least, they were taught) that it's self-destructive.

[World's King]

Originally Posted by Cynosure

What, have you never heard of teenage rebellion?



You know, where a teenager goes against what they were taught by their parents, and does their own thing and/or gives into peer/cultural pressure, even if they know (or at least, were taught) that it's self-destructive.

Actually yes. I was a teenager once. But no. I actually respected my parents.


Yes, I did drugs, drank, fucked, ditched school and did all those things associated with teenage rebellion. But I never gave my parents a reason to spy on me or go through my stuff when I wasn't home. They knew what I was doing.

[Cynosure]

Originally Posted by World's King

Yes, I did drugs, drank, fucked, ditched school and did all those things associated with teenage rebellion. But I never gave my parents a reason to spy on me or go through my stuff when I wasn't home. They knew what I was doing.

So, what, your parents knew about your drinking, drug use, and playing hooky, when you were a teenager, but they overlooked it? Because, why, they trusted you?

[World's King]

Actually... yes.




Now I must tell you that my parents were hippies. And yes, I'm stereotyping.

[Charlatan]

I violate my kid's "privacy" all the time. My 14-year-old son's Facebook, Myspace and internet use is open to my snooping whenever I feel like it. He is also only allowed to use the computer in the living room where we can look over his shoulder at anytime. His mobile phone is subject to the same rules.

As I see it, his actions on the Internet are no different than what he would do if he was hanging out with his friends and you can be sure I would be checking out who he was hanging out with. I have to ask, would you trust your 10 or 12 year old to go hang out at a club unsupervised?

I don't plan on being this way past his 16th or 17th birthday. I think it is important to provide guidelines and expectations and then follow up on them.

I should also add that we talk about online saftey and smarts... just like talking to your kids about street smarts.

I want to give him as much information about things as possible, I want him to be able to look after himself and take responsibility for his actions online the same way I expect him to do this in meatspace.

[World's King]

I understand the point of keeping an eye on your kids and your kid's actions. On and off the internet.


But I don't have kids... So I guess my opinion is pointless.

[Xerxys]

Originally Posted by World's King

.... If the child is raised properly there will never be an occasion where the parents would have to violate the child's privacy.

I LOL'd out loud. You actually think you can raise ANY child properly so as not to ever have to discipline them ever?! I'm a good kid, I work, have a job, get a hair cut ... I attribute all this to discipline. One way or another, they will make mistakes, and you must let them know, one way or another,

"YOU MUST NOT CROSS THE ROAD LIKE THAT EVER, DO YOU HEAR ME!!"

[World's King]

Originally Posted by Xerxys

I LOL'd out loud. You actually think you can raise ANY child properly so as not to ever have to discipline them ever?! I'm a good kid, I work, have a job, get a hair cut ... I attribute all this to discipline. One way or another, they will make mistakes, and you must let them know, one way or another,

"YOU MUST NOT CROSS THE ROAD LIKE THAT EVER, DO YOU HEAR ME!!"

So you laughed out loud... out loud... ? That's impressive.

[Glory's Sun]

Originally Posted by World's King

I understand the point of keeping an eye on your kids and your kid's actions. On and off the internet.


But I don't have kids... So I guess my opinion is pointless.

I wouldn't say pointless.. just different. I remember before I had kids I had this whole list of stuff that I would never do as a parent..

yeah that all changes when you're holding a little person who is dependent on you for survival and training..