Parent Resources

Parents,
Your role as parent will have more influence on your student’s life than any other relationship.
We recognize the pivotal role you play as the God ordained spiritual leaders of your students
and we want to partner with you to provide all the help that we can. Also we feel that is important
to help you beware of what we feel are the latest unhealthy social trends, among teens.

Sexting
A 2009 poll conducted by CosmoGirl:
22% of teen girls and 20% of teen boys have sent nude or semi-nude photos of themselves
22% of teens admit that technology makes them personally more forward and aggressive
38% say exchanging sexy content makes dating or hooking up with others more likely
29% believe those exchanging sexy content are “expected” to date or hook up

What Is “Sexting?”
When people take sexually revealing picture of themselves and send them as text message attachments, it’s called “sexting.”

Fortunately, networks with large teen audiences — MTV, for example — are using their platforms to warn teens against the dangers of sexting. And the website That’s Not Cool uses teen-speak to help resist cyber peer pressure. Hopefully, these messages will get through.

Advice for Parents
Don’t wait for an incident to happen to your child or your child’s friend before you talk to your kids about the consequences of sexting. Sure, talking about sex or dating with teens can be really uncomfortable, but better to have the talk before the fact.
Remind them that once an image is sent, it can never be retrieved — and they will lose control of it. Ask teens how they would feel if their teachers, parents, or the entire school saw the picture, because it happens all the time.

Talk about pressures to send revealing photos. Let teens know that you understand that they can be pushed or dared into sending something. Tell them that no matter how big the social pressure is, the potential social humiliation will be hundreds of times worse.
The buck stops with them. If someone sends them a photo, have them delete it immediately. Better to be part of the solution than the problem. Besides, if they do send it on, they’re distributing pornography — and that’s against the law.
If you can’t deal with this, have your kids go to ThatsNotCool.com (and you should go yourself). It’s a fabulous site that gives kids the language and support to take texting and cell phone power back into their own hands.

www.thatsnotcool.com

Internet Pornography Resources
www.xxxchurch.com
Internet Accountability “xwatch”: find it at www.xxxchurch.com