Ruth Institute Blog

Marni Soupcoff points out that the main concern about sexting is that kids have gotten the idea to do it in the first place. Here’s my favorite excerpt:

“Sexting is just the silent canary in the coal mine. It’s the sign, not the cause, of the dangerously cavalier attitudes to sex and sexuality that have been building up in teen culture for years now. The only sure-fire cure is a full-blown evacuation — a complete retreat from the mainstream movies, videos, video games and songs of the day that sexualize kids before they’ve even reached puberty (or, in some cases, potty training).”

“Sexting” isn’t a good idea. That’s just common sense. At least it should be — the pitfalls of using a cell phone to send nude photos or sexually suggestive messages speak for themselves. Unless you are a teenager. (Or Tiger Woods, but that’s another column.)

This, I am told, is why the Canadian Centre for Child Protection has launched a website and pilot program, to be used in 100 schools, to warn young people off sexting.

The result — TextED.ca — offers up discussion pages and specific guidelines for “safe texting.” The latter include the reasonable, “I will enjoy all of the technologies available to me, but I will not allow them to control me” (good plan); and the categorical, “I will never send nude pics, either of me or another, via text message (or by any other means)” (now, there’s a concept!).

I suppose if sexting is wreaking havoc with teens’ lives, one can say that TextEd.ca is necessary, and that I shouldn’t be making fun of it. (News articles about the program reference a sad story of a Florida teen who killed herself after her boyfriend shared with classmates the topless photo of her that she’d sent him.) But it’s hard to read the site without being left with the impression that (1) teens are going to smell the condescension from miles away, and (2) there’s a far bigger problem at work here.

Such lessons as “although you may feel all grown up, those who are much older than you should not be paying attention to you in a sexual way,” are all fine and good, but didn’t parents and teachers ingrain them in their charges from day one? If a teen is learning them for the first time from an institutional website, isn’t it likely to be too late?

Neither cell phones nor BlackBerrys are the real issue.

An ill-advised text is no more dangerous than an ill-advised letter. It doesn’t matter if the topless shots kids are sharing of themselves are digital or on photo paper — it’s the fact they’re sharing topless shots that’s cause for concern.

That’s an important distinction because it suggests that all the “safe texting” education in the world isn’t going to address what is going on. Sexting is just the silent canary in the coal mine. It’s the sign, not the cause, of the dangerously cavalier attitudes to sex and sexuality that have been building up in teen culture for years now. The only sure-fire cure is a full-blown evacuation — a complete retreat from the mainstream movies, videos, video games and songs of the day that sexualize kids before they’ve even reached puberty (or, in some cases, potty training).

But since it’s hardly realistic to expect a young person to abstain from all forms of popular entertainment (and the verboten becomes that much more appealing, in any case), the real answer is parents. Parents have to resist the temptation to cede the moral education of their kids to outside authorities — even well-intentioned ones like the Canadian Centre for Child Protection — and transmit the old-fashioned basics of what’s decent and good and right in as firm a manner as possible, as soon as possible.

For a message to be meaningful, it has to come from an extremely respected and trusted quantity, and in the early years of a child’s life, only Mom and Dad fit that bill. Teachers and Elmo and cheerfully illustrated board books can help, but like so many other important things, integrity starts at home.

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