Sexting “Banned” in Texas

Now sexting is banned in a Texas school.

Hmmmmmm. I can just picture the conversations now.

“Hey Blake, do ya want me to send you a picture of me naked?”

“Well Amber, I would have wanted that last week… but now the school has banned it, so we better not.”

I’m not knocking it… I’m just chuckling at the fact that we have to put that policy in print. Don’t get me wrong. I actually agree. But it’s just like I always tell my kids when they get busted doing something that I had never actually never prohibited. “Yes Alec, you’re right. I never outright told you that you couldn’t hang the dog over the balcony by his back legs. But I would have hoped that common sense would have kicked in on this one!”

Well, for some kids, apparently common sense hasn’t kicked in. That’s why a Houston school has put the policy in print. Here’s a snippet of last week’s Washington Post article:

At 19, Melanie Young knows firsthand about the devastating consequences of sexting.

Too bad she didn’t learn her lesson sooner.

“I thought it was fun and just a way of flirting,” the McKinney resident said of sending a nude photo of herself to a male friend when she was 16. “I sent it to someone that I thought I could trust.”

Turns out she couldn’t. The person she sent the picture to promptly forwarded it to others. She was stunned when she went to school soon after and a classmate showed her the embarrassing photo on his cellphone. Other students saw it, too.

One in every five teenagers say they have electronically sent, or posted online, nude or semi-nude images of themselves, according to a 2008 survey conducted by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy.

And while some youths may see “sexting” – sending sexually suggestive or indecent text messages or pictures – as harmless fun, some Texans are beginning to take steps to stop them.

(the entire article about banning sexting)

For more about sexting, check out our recent Youth Culture Window article on the subject.