Technology fuelling sexting craze

Source: AAP

A group of Tasmanian schoolgirls took explicit photos of themselves with "objects inserted into different orifices". In NSW, another group of girls took topless photos.

In both cases the photos were electronically forwarded to other people.

In the first case the girls were 13. The second group involved eight-year-olds.

Social researcher Maggie Hamilton, who cited the examples, says sexting among Australian teens has taken off in the last five years and is now involving more explicit images and younger kids.

"We now have young girls sending photos not just of their cleavage or even topless, but of their vaginas and various things to boys to kind of get them interested," Hamilton said.

The NSW based author uncovered the extent of sexting while researching her book about boys' issues, due out next year, a follow-on from her most recent work, What's Happening To Our Girls?

While there have been no official studies into sexting in Australia, an online survey conducted by Girlfriend magazine in 2007 found almost 40% of the 588 teenage girls who responded had been asked to send a "naked or semi-naked" image of themselves over the internet.

Almost a third had been sent a "sexually explicit" image online.

Sarah Cornish, editor of the popular magazine, said while some teenage girls are approached or pressured for the pictures, others willingly participate.

"Some girls say they don't see a problem with it, they think that it's kind of considered a normal way to flirt with boys nowadays," she said from her Sydney office.

Both Cornish and Hamilton agree that advances in technology and easy access to mobile phones and the internet are behind the trend, allowing kids to have a "secret life" beyond the reach of their parents.

Hamilton says the sexting trend was kickstarted with the creation of the "tween market" and fuelled by the internet and user-friendly mobile phone features like cameras and video.

It was also symptomatic of the wider sexualisation of children, she said.

Easy access to online pornography was also changing the boundaries of acceptable behaviour.

"If you can download porn onto your phone you don't have to wait till you get home," Hamilton said.
"This is changing their views on what is acceptable and what is unacceptable behaviour."

Hamilton said exposure to online porn has fuelled an interest in "kinky sex" amongst teenagers.

The Girlfriend study found 67% of respondents had "mistakenly" seen porn online and Cornish said this has "numbed" them to explicit images.

"Increasingly at parties the kids are quite open about this and they're not disappearing off ... to give each other blowjobs," Hamilton said.

"They are tending to capture each other in compromising situations .... anything from lying semi-conscious in the gutter to receiving ... oral and anal sex.

"The whole sexy image is very alluring to them because they equate that with being grown up."

But far from being innocent fun and games, sexting can have serious consequences for those involved, Hamilton said.
She found girls were coming into sexual assault units traumatised "as if ... they'd been raped".

"They're actually displaying post-traumatic symptoms (like) withdrawals, flashbacks," she said.
"(Psychologists) are seeing girls 12 to 14, going to parties, behaving very provocatively ... making bee-lines for much older boys who are getting them drunk and anally gang raping and filming them."

Hamilton said girls who have been photographed or filmed are sometimes blackmailed to do more revealing things, often by threats that their parents will find out.

She said provocative images seen on music videos, reality TV, advertising and in magazines have helped shaped a society where "presentation is everything".

"These kids naturally strike a pose, so then to step across and do something that is more risky, more inappropriate, is actually a much shorter step than previous generations," Hamilton said.

The NSW government in May launched a campaign to educate teens about the long-term consequences of sending explicit images, including legal ramifications.

"Everyone needs to understand ... it is illegal to take sexual photos of children and young people and it is also an offence to pass them on," NSW Community Service Minister Linda Burney said.

"What they think is an innocent joke or harmless flirting can be very damaging if it falls into the wrong hands.
"It is then impossible to retrieve and delete them.

"They are there forever and can damage future career prospects or relationships."

How to protect your kids against sexting:

Warn your children about the consequences of sexting
Remind children to think before they act
Tell children that sending or possessing child pornography is illegal
Warn them about sexual predators
Learn how to use and monitor your kids' mobile phones
Check photo galleries on your kids' Facebook and MySpace accounts
Give your children clear rules on what they can and can't do with the mobile phone