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Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Book Report: Teenage Girls Are Seeing Red

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Everything MidnightBikeRide does is a balloon.
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Sexting? I've got time for this right in between making a pregnancy pact with the girls and randomly swallowing my parents' prescription meds. Might have to push back my appointment to videotape my friends' fistfights.
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lalaland13
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Agree with the others who say the panic is a bit overblown. In some cases, yes, it's an issue. But otherwise, this is just the combination of two things TV news people love: 1) sex and 2) OMG YOUR KID IS IN MORTAL PERIL!
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prettycool
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Dani Cox's story reminds me of a freshman in some drama production I was in. He was a little horndog and one day he kept asking me if I wanted to see his "thang", so to get him out of my hair I told him to go into the bathroom and take a picture of it from his camera-phone. A few minutes later he came out and said he didn't take any picture because it made his dick look small.

That guy now lives in New York. With his boyfriend.
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rocknrollunicorn
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
I don't send dirty pics. And most sexually explicit text conversations I enter go back and forth for awhile before I pass out in front of an old episode of Jeopardy with half a glass of wine next to me.

I kind of wish I was a sexting teenager, I kind of love my life.
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pandorasmittens
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
With all of this conflicting information about what is and is not cool, I am finding it incredibly difficult to keep up with these whippersnappers.
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Newsgirl
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Can we change Teen Girl Panel to Teen Girl Squad?

Cause I love the Teen Girl Squad.

Anybody else?
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pandorasmittens
02/24/09

@LesliePaige: It's GROOD.
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GeorgeFayne
02/24/09

@LesliePaige: I have a crush on every boy.
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hellosunshine
02/24/09

@LesliePaige: The other ooooone!
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Newsgirl
02/24/09

@GeorgeFayne: We are looking SOOOO good!
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water baby
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
I have a feeling people were taking nude pictures of themselves before cell phones existed. They were just a bit harder to pass around...
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MizJenkins
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Inappropriate sexual exhibitionism probably isn't that much more "widespread" among teenagers than it's ever been in terms of the percentage of teenagers who take part in these activities.

What is more widespread is the venue for that exhibitionism, which technology has increased exponentially along with the risk of negative repercussions.

Call me an alarmist old fart, but I think the heightened awareness and precautions are warranted.
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PilgrimSoul
02/24/09

@MizJenkins: Or... and I know this is crazy of me to suggest... perhaps we could just quit slut-shaming?
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MizJenkins
02/24/09

@PilgrimSoul: Oh for...what did I say?!!

In the Dani Cox excerpt she's talking about a boy circulating inappropriate pictures of himself. That's a problem too. Where does gender or the word "slut" come in here?

"Don't circulate pictures that might entice sexual predators to a large (potentially worldwide) audience. It's dangerous."

I mean I can't...I don't...huh??
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LaFemme
02/24/09

@PilgrimSoul: I like to think of the shaming as being genderless; the sexting people don't have to be ashamed of their sexuality, only their idicoy or maybe naivete.
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Newsgirl
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
I hate the "all teenagers" assumptions that come across the news so often.

"The new dangerous Teen Trend, up at 7!"

"Is YOUR teen following an illegal gang, too? Tune in at 8!"

Blah, blah, blah.
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bluebears
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
I apparently live under a rock because I had no idea there was a panic about teens sending sexy text messages to each other.
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rocknrollunicorn
02/24/09

@bluebears: me neither. Personally I adore it when I miss crazypants news like this.
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nerdycellist
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
This, like every other "teens are curious about sex" news story in the last 50 years, is just a bunch of media-driven hype in the quest for ratings. Yeah, there are some teens that do some dumb stuff, sometimes naked. There always have been. There are also adults that pull that kind of stupid shit too - it's just that the News programs don't get the same number of viewers when they're not talking about/shaming nubile, barely legal girls.

I saw a breathless promo after Dollhouse with some random (overage) hottie talking about how it's really gross, and she doesn't want to get these pics. Then they showed some blurry cel-phone pics while the announcer intoned: "How to keep these provocative messages off your phone."

Yeah, Fox News at 11, sure you're just doing us all a favor by showing us how to keep the naughty, filthy, sexy, illegal photos off our precious cel phones. Thanks for giving me news I can use.
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rhymeswithfeather
02/24/09

@nerdycellist: But don't you get naughty porno spam texts 100 times daily from people you don't know? Fox is the savior of our country's purity, don'tcha know.
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SomeAuthorGirl
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
And the verdict is... there are some very smart young people and some very stupid young people. Not unlike their counterparts in the over-18 set.

Teenagers! Just like us!

I don't want to detract from these young women in any way, shape, or form. But I am not a person who thinks that all kids are idiots as a general rule.
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pandorasmittens
02/24/09

@SomeAuthorGirl: That's honestly how I see it. These teenagers are obviously well-spoken. Not every teenager is well-spoken though, and the ones who aren't may be a little more likely to clamor for attention in the manner of sexting, just as some parents who would rather blame their children's problems on "society" instead of communicating with their children would be far quicker to believe anything the news reports excessively is an "epidemic".
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pandorasmittens
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
Sexting sells. So do multiple births, human interest stories of the week, and any other fear-based rhetoric that will send us flying into the arms of our favorite news outlets.
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NefariousNewt
02/24/09

@pandorasmittens: "All we have to fear... is on the evening news."
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rhymeswithfeather
02/24/09

@pandorasmittens: I'd fly into the arms of my city's news anchor any day, but I guess that's not the point.

But you're right; we sure do love our nightly news fear mongering.
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par3
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
lol Dani Cox...some how her name is just awfully sextacular.
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OMG a Girl Gamer
02/24/09

In reply to Teen Girl Panel: "Sexting" Panic Is Overblown
I didn't do "sexting" till I was 20 years old. I sent dirty pics... and forgot to delete the pics on my phone. My then-boyfriend needed a new phone so I gave him that one and got a new one. It was awkward at first trying to explain the pics, but then he laughed bout it and said he would keep them for his benefit. Oh, how I love a drama free boy.
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tscheese
02/24/09

@OMG a Girl Gamer: I sent a slightly racy text message - no pics or profanity - at the ripe old age of 26, then deleted it forever and frantically scrabbled through my phone bill when it arrived to double-check that no message content was there.
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rhymeswithfeather
02/24/09

@OMG a Girl Gamer: Hahahaha. I had a similar incident, only with my computer. My present boyfriend has a desktop, and needed to borrow my laptop for a conference. He found some racy pics I'd taken for an ex and was all, "Uh... why do you have naked pictures of yourself in a folder entitled "Unicorns?"" We both laughed hysterically over my choice of folder name (I thought it would throw people off if I ever got hacked or had my laptop stolen; obviously it just makes people interested), and he was totes cool and just requested I send them to him, too.
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rocknrollunicorn
02/24/09

@Rhymeswithfeather: I have to use the folder name "dragons," "unicorns" is too obvious.

And, you made me laugh :)
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rhymeswithfeather
02/24/09

@rocknrollunicorn and @OMG a Girl Gamer: He was in a busy conference hall and yes, it was effing hysterical :)
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egg cream
02/24/09

@Rhymeswithfeather, @rocknrollunicorn: Ha! All my racy stuff lives in a folder called "Recycling," because I used to download porn and put it in my Recycle Bin, but not empty the Recycle Bin, because I figured that way it would be stored, but not in a place where anyone would think to look. And then one day my computer went all wonky, and I called my dad in to fix it, and the first thing he did was open the Recycle Bin to look for a file he thought I deleted -- and up came a bunch of files with names like "19YO GETS POUNDED HOTTTTT." And we both just stood there silently and pretended it wasn't happening. And I thought, "Maybe I should start storing these things elsewhere."
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rhymeswithfeather
02/24/09

@egg cream: HAHAHAHA. This is the main reason I'd rather pay for the pros to fix it, even though my dad's a computer whiz. If the nerd in the repair shop finds my secret stash of porn, I can still look him in the eye. My dad... not so much.
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