About three years ago I came across an article in a Focus on the Family publication about sexting. It was the first time I had heard of the word. I was stunned to read that teenagers were participating in this popular and dangerous trend. For those of you who are unaware, sexting is the use of sending photos via text messages with nudity or other sexually explicit content to others, usually of the opposite sex. It is illegal. It is child pornography and your child, if they participate, could be arrested. It’s that serious.
Even though I read the article and took it to our school administrator, I had not thought about it seriously for quite sometime. Then my son walked in one day and dropped the bomb. Three teens he knew had been caught sexting. Some of the kids involved, I personally knew. I was surprised to find out who they were-kids from good homes, kids who are loved by their parents, kids who have been taught what is right, and kids who professed to be Christians. I began asking myself why? Why would these young people do such a thing?
I started doing research, looking for an answers. Everything I found pointed to peer-pressure, but I knew that the answer went much deeper than that. As I began to read and pray, I felt like God was giving me the answer. There was more to it, and it started a long time ago.
Kids learn by imitating from the time they are born. They soak in everything they see and hear. They learn from parents, siblings, relatives, peers, teachers, television, movies, and sexual images. As parents we have become so conditioned to these images ourselves, that we overlook them in our entertainment, but our children haven’t learned how to overlook them. They take every image in and they begin to imitate what they see. I know this is only part of the answer and there are many contributing factors. I hope you will follow this series of articles as I examine other aspects of sexting and it’s long term consequences.
Watch next week for part two in this important series.
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