Sexting and Abuse in Teen Relationships

I've got two separate topics today that I'm going to deal with together because they both should give us great concern for our teens and the direction in which our culture is heading.

Post #1:

Teenage "Sexting" Statistics are Alarming.

I checked this out after seeing a spot on the "Today" show this morning discussing an 18-year-old girl who committed suicide after a nude photo she sent by cell phone to her boyfriend was forwarded to dozens of people after they broke up.

These numbers blew my mind:

Percent of teens who have sent or posted nude or semi-nude pics of themselves:

20% of teens overall
22% of teen girls
18% of teen boys
11% of teen girls, age 13-16

Percent of teens sending or posting sexually suggestive messages:

39% of teens overall
37% of teen girls
40% of teen boys

15% of those who sent pictures did so to someone they knew only from online.

21% of teen girls and 39% of teen boys send these messages to someone they simply want to hook-up with.

36% of teen girls and 39% of teen boys say it is common for these photos to get shared with people other than the recipient.

12% of teen girls report feeling pressured to send this type of content.

The numbers are very alarming. As I said earlier, at least one suicide has been linked to this messaging, after the breakup of the relationship found the pics distributed freely. More frequently, teens can face felony child pornography charges due to spreading these photos.

There are so many layers to this societal problem that I'm not sure that I could unpack them all. It's easy for me, a 26-year-old with no children, to blast parents for not being involved enough to know what's going on when I don't have kids of my own and have no way to know what raising teenagers in today's society is like. But something's going on here that must be discussed. For some reason we've got a generation of girls and boys who want to be adults, who want to "feel sexy" and who morally have no reason not to attempt to act on these desires.

In a world whose standard of right and wrong is now determined only by causing harm to another, teen sexting then only seems like a "no harm, no foul" issue to these teenagers.

And speaking of this standard of right and wrong...

Post #2:

Some Teens Say Dating Violence is Normal.

In the wake of the Chris Brown/Rihanna abuse case, more and more is coming out about teenagers' view of violence in dating relationships.

I read this story (from the Chicago Tribune) in yesterday's Raleigh News and Observer. Listen to these teenagers own words about this type of violence:

"People said, 'I would have punched her too!'" one girl said. "And these were girls!"

"She probably did something to provoke it!"

"There was a girl this week at school with a scratch on her eye," another girl said. "She was talking openly about her boyfriend hitting her, but she was smiling and saying it was funny."

The numbers say 1 in 10 teens experience such abuse, and females age 16-24 are the most likely to experience violence in romantic relationships.

Again, I'll leave it to you mostly to draw conclusions. But, as I told my wife last night, what can we expect in a society where there is no standard right and wrong. If I'm okay with it after you hit me, then it's okay for you to hit me.

Moreover, in a culture that is rapidly losing it's distinction between males and females, it only follows that it becomes increasingly acceptable for men (and boys) to abuse women (and girls). I was raised in a home where hitting a girl was more or less a capital offense. Sadly, those types of homes today seem fewer and farther between.

All in all, the church has to do something. From calling on fathers and mothers to shepherd their children carefully through our dangerous culture to youth pastors and pastors engaging the church with stories like these. If the numbers for so many areas of life are virtually the same in the church and outside of the church (e.g., divorce, etc), we'd be naive to think these two issues are any different. As SEBTS President Danny Akin says, for ministers not to engage churches over this would be ministerial malpractice.