 Sexting in the USA
It isn’t a new phenomenon and therefore shouldn’t be underlined by spell check when typed; in fact, “sexting” happens every day, every minute and every second by people all over the country. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy says that, “According to a recent study, 1 out of every 5 children are sending inappropriate pictures of themselves, called sexting to peers via their mobile phones.” Additionally, as defined by Wikipedia, sexting is “the act of sending sexually explicit messages or photographs, primarily between mobile phones”.
If you aren’t familiar with the situation and how it has impacted our society, then I invite you to Google the term “sexting”. The problem is a profound one and with the number of text messages sent and received every day exceeding the population of the planet, it isn’t surprising that it is estimated that 72% of adults are now texting and teenagers are sending almost 4,000 texts per month.
At first glance, the occurrence of such situations suggests an easy solution, take away a phone or take away the phone with imaging technology. With equipment ever enhancing, good luck finding a phone without a camera. Further, cell phone plans that include internet access, texting, and image sharing are cheaper. Bundling of services becomes the better package economically and almost unlimited in usage. Images, videos, and text have viral capability with seemingly no protection against the reputation of the sender or recipient.
The current trend is for state legislators, school administrators, law enforcement and parents to try any means possible to reduce the amount of sexting throughout the country. However, today, very few states have policies in place that are effective at ending the practice. Where laws do exist, the solution doesn’t work. Minors are being labeled as sex offenders, adults are still transmitting child sexual abuse images, and because of the viral rates at which it is occurring, the damage is already done.
Where we are struggling as a society and as lawmakers, is keeping our controls in line with the consumption of technology. As a nation of innovators, we have a responsibility to balance our technology with responsible consumption. If the technology exists to take pictures of ourselves nude, then our technology should have safeguards in place. We should fight on all fronts, technologically, legislatively and morally to protect our society.
Contact IVL to ask us about our anti-sexting technology. We have dedicated our vision to the best in online and mobile communications, as should society. We have done our part, now legislators and user should do theirs. Content moderation of objectionable images and video is a good thing, legislation is a good thing and SEXT education is a good thing. More on this topic later!
Said by Stephy
|