Sext Me Later!

Meaghan Waldron

English 109

Field

20 April 2010

When the word “sexting” (sex+ texting) is used, only one thing comes to mind, naughty text messages. Whether the texts are naked pictures or sexual innuendos the concept of sexting is controversial. Of course the word is clever and is pretty straight forward in its meaning, but this new word is causing an up rise across the world. But is the concept of texting naughty messages and naked pictures really that farfetched for this technology obsessed nation? The once modest and personal experiences of sexual encounters are now being plastered across the internet without consent all via cell phone.  But it is ones decision to have the picture or message sent. This calls of an argument of who is wrong or right in each situation. A naked picture to a friend or boyfriend can be exposed to an entire phonebook and or uploaded online in a matter of minutes. The main concern about sexting is the exposure to teenagers. Teenagers may think that a flirty text or a half nude picture is okay, but there are serious consequences.

This may be the new craze of technology following the video taping of sex, which is still popular today. But the concept of “sex texting” is hard to grasp because one text can get in the hands of the wrong person and felonies are convicted. Although there are many arguments brought up about sexting, it is hard to have a defined view because there is a clear understanding of why sexting is careless and why sexting is not as bad as people make it out to be. Mike Brunker, an editor at MSNBC investigates a sexting controversy “In an unusual legal case arising from the increasingly popular practice known as “sexting,” six Pennsylvania high school students are facing child pornography charges after three teenage girls allegedly took nude or semi-nude photos of themselves and shared them with male classmates via their cell phones” explains Brunker.  Child pornography! These are 14 and 15-year old students that are going through puberty, they are experiencing new encounters they are not trying to ruin lives or hurt their friends. The same curious nature is possessed in children today as there was twenty years ago. Now we have the technology to make certain actions easier. The correct choices are not always made, but isn’t that life? There is no safe bet to say that if generations before ours had the technology that is used today, that they might have experienced sexting or possibly worse, who knows. The use of the cell phone has become out of control and the thought of texting someone sexy messages may seem wild and juvenile, but it is not wrong. A little flirty text message can lead into a cyber sex over a phone, a weird concept but a popular concept. But that is the decision of the sender, if you don’t want your pictures exposed, don’t send them. For the most part technology is readily available to almost anyone when needed. Children are the proud owners of cell phones at a young age. With the internet, cameras, and text messaging feasible on a phone, of course there are going to be problems. The world is spinning in an out of control technology infatuated fad.

 The question of punishment for sending a text does not have a clear answer. Is it wrong to send a naked picture to your boyfriend or girlfriend? Maybe to some people but the conversation between you and your partner should remain private. When a picture or message is leaked to the internet or to friends and family that is when problems erupt.  Sending a sext message can lead into being labeled as a sex offender. But how is sending a text message to someone or receiving a sext considered a sex offender. No physical contact is made and faces may not have been exposed, but still you are labeled. Although being called a sex offender differs in many cultures and legal jurisdiction, most cases are rape, downloading child pornography, or child sexual abuse. Sexting could be considered child pornography if the child sends naked pictures to someone of legal age.  But other than that, a message or picture sent to a partner is not a crime. It is a conversation between two people that was taken too far. Peter Cumming, an associate professor at York University in Toronto, argues that “such online activities are safer than traditional sexual games because there is no immediate physical contact and thus are less likely to lead to pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases.”  While this is true, an opposed side can beg to differ, sexting could be considered the same as sending out pornographic pictures, once you send them you cannot get them back. But isn’t that the same thing as a conversation in everyday life? Every action has a consequence, in a recent study which was commissioned by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and CosmoGirl.com, 22 percent of teenage girls and 18 percent of teenage boys have taken nude or semi nude photos of themselves and have either sent them to someone via cell phone or posted them online.  This is a large number of teens, and the trend of sexting is only getting more and more popular as each day goes by. Exactly how can this trend be stopped, police cannot arrest 20 percent of American teens for sexting, and it is just absurd. But the fact of the matter is that maybe children are getting cell phones when they are too young, maybe camera phones shouldn’t be allowed for juveniles, there is no answer to completely squash sexting, and people will find a way to commit the action. The repercussions of sending sext messages are irreversible and sending texts to the wrong person can be detrimental. Teens that think they are in love with their high school sweetheart may want to think twice about aftermath of the sext, a young immature boy or girl is more likely to share the photos and flirtatious texts if he or she is dumped and upset.

Sexting is not only an issue in the United States, but worldwide. In March, two Emirates cabin crew were arrested and ordered to jail for three months for over sexually explicit text messages. According to Fox 28, “42-year-old flight attendant and her 47-year-old cabin services supervisor, both Indian, were convicted of “coercion to commit sin,” the Dubai newspaper The National reported. They were sentenced to six months in jail and deportation by the Dubai Court of Misdemeanors in December. The court claimed the SMS texts “fulfilled all the necessary angles of coercion to the commitment of sin,” according to The National.” The subject of culture comes to mind; in Dubai obviously sex is a lot more private and unspoken than other countries. The word “sex” is not even used in everyday dialect like it is used in the United States. The fact of getting arrested because of a text message is a little on the crazy side. Yes, there are consequences for sending pictures to the wrong person and having them spread across the internet, but the couple in Dubai, they were older, in their 40s and were in a steady and established relationship. They knew what they were getting themselves into. It is not horribly wrong to text someone a flirty message; it is a personal matter that no one else should care to look at. A punishment of jail for sending a text to your partner is out of hand, but again, it depends on culture and sexuality in Dubai is not as out in the open.

            Another story was posted on The Smoking Gun, “A pair of Indiana middle school students are the latest minors to face felony charges for allegedly “sexting” naked photos to each other. The students a 13-year-old girl and a 12-year-old boy were charged in connection with an incident at Ben Franklin Middle School in Valparaiso. The students are each facing felony child exploitation and possession of child pornography charges, according to the below police report. The case against the minors began when the girl had her cell phone confiscated after it rang during class. Crying, she told a teacher that “a 6th grade boy had sent her a dirty picture and she was going to get into trouble.” A subsequent investigation determined that the boy had sent her a photo of his “exposed genitals” and that she had responded by texting him a shot of her “exposed body and breasts.” The girl, the report notes, showed the explicit photo of the boy to a friend of hers, a seventh grade student at a local Catholic school. After conferring with prosecutors, the juveniles were charged with the two felony counts.” These two children are so young they do not know what they are doing, how can they possibly be charged with three felonies for sending a picture of their “private parts”? There must be another alternative for children and young teens instead of having a record. MTV did a half hour special “Sexting in America: When Privates go Public” which took a closer look at the dangers of sexting and the serious repercussions for the people who send and receive naked pictures of peers on their mobile phones and other devices. Alley explains to MTV her story, “”It was one picture, and he sent it out to everybody in his address book,” the now-20-year-old told MTV News.”We were broken up, and I guess he did it to make himself seem cool. I never thought anybody else would see it. … It was an impulsive thing that I did.”  Ally acted on impulse just like many other teens, her actions had consequences because she was caught. She wished she had never taken the pictures.

The whole concept of sexting is not unusual. Sex is a well defined subject and many people go to extreme measures to constantly be reminded of sex. Is sending a flirty text or a half nude photo shunned against? Well to some people yes, to some cultures that is private matters and should not be express through technology. But on the other hand, sending a text is not the end of the world, there are so many other problems to worry about. The use of cell phones is beginning to get out of hand but if there were no cell phones wouldn’t people still find a way to send sexual messages, videos, and pictures?

Mike Brunker. “Sexting’ Surprise: Teens Face Child Porn Charges.” MSNBC [Http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28679588] 19 Jan. 2009. Print.

Initialed “R”

Initialed “R”

                August 14, 1936 was the date that the last person was publically executed in the United States. His name was Rainey Bethea and he was a black man from Roanoke, Virginia. His pride quickly crumbled when he was caught guilty for the rape and murder of a grandmother, a 70-year-old white woman from Owensboro, Kentucky. “The other blacks in town offered to burn him themselves” (5), this is saying a lot because everyone during the 30’s knew that rape was wrong especially for a black man to rape and murder an elder white woman. Throughout the sonnet written by Jill McDonough, the tone is eerie and quiet. This 14 line sonnet is just four stanzas long, but the information packed inside can tell a lifetime’s story. The beginning of the sonnet sucks the reader in by the ABAB rhyme scheme, but the rhyme scheme quickly changes into a partial rhyming story during the second and third stanzas and then back to an AB rhyme scheme for the last stanza which makes the completed poem more satisfying. The structure of the sonnet is not consistent, rhyming to partial rhyming makes the sonnet choppy, which allows some of the information to seem less important than the rest. But this whole poem is important; it is a powerful and haunting story that should be recognized.

            The first stanza is very harsh and overwhelming; we learn that Rainey “raped a grandmother to death. She bled” (1). The guilt that he had to live with was quickly relieved when he was sentenced to a public lynching. He was still stained with her blood when he was found. “He took her rings and left her dirtied bed.” (3) And some say that he was in a drunken state, that is why “He left his ring behind, initialed ‘R’” (4). A new identification technique was used to track down Bethea, -fingerprinting- which established Bethea’s true character. He had a criminal record and had previously been to prison, so he was easily tracked down. 

            The story unfolds in the second and third stanzas when the poem changes to a partial rhyme scheme. The words ‘burn” and “earned” are the two words linking the partial rhyme together. But these two words are very powerful; burn is harsh and condemning especially in the context of “The other blacks in town offered to burn him themselves” (5). During that time period, each race would stick together especially laborers, but the crime of “black men who raped white women still earned a public hanging” (7), and Bethea understood that he was wrong. He pleaded guilty with no fight. According to the State Master Encyclopedia, “Habeas Corpus is a writ, or legal action, through which a person can seek relief from unlawful detention, or the relief of another person. The writ of habeas corpus protects persons from harming themselves, or from being harmed by the judicial system”. Beathea explained to the court that he did not want to plead guilty and that his lawyers talked him into confessing. But under the rule of Habeas Corpus, the judge denied his attempt and ordered the hanging to proceed. Lines six and seven in the poem are very powerful because usually for a murder, the electric chair is used, but since Bethea raped and murdered a white woman, further action was taken. His crime should be shown to the world and his punishment should have been severe, and that it was. He was never charged for the murder of the 70-year-old woman or the multiple break-ins or grand larceny, each one of those crimes would result in the chair. But what Bethea did was a lot worse. Rape is a horrible crime and for that, he was to be hung. Because of the crazed media, Rainey Bethea was the last person to be publically hanged in the United States.

            The third stanza explains Bethea, readers can understand more of who he was. But the tone of the poem changes, still using a partial rhyme scheme, the message conveyed is almost guilt. The tone went from negative to a sense of “feeling bad”. He was a boy that was brought up alone after his parents died; he had little money and made a big mistake. “In photographs, his hair’s neat, waved. Head tilted, insolent and just baptized, pale collar open at the neck.” (8-10), at first glance, Bethea seems innocent, pure, and a sense of guilt comes over the audience, but once we realize what he did that sense of care ends. McDonough reassures the reader that “The hot dogs, drunken hangman, white crowd that rushed to snatch his hood-that hasn’t happened yet” (11-12). It seems as if the reader is given a break from all of the negative images that Bethea has placed in our heads because of his actions, but knowing what is going to happen is underlying throughout the entire sonnet.

            The last stanza, only made up of two lines is extremely powerful. “Thousands wrote the sheriff:’ It was wrong.’ Or ‘hang more niggers. We’re with you thousands strong” (13-14). These lines show the distinction between the two sides that people had regarding Bethea’s death penalty. The electric chair would have been for the murder and the thefts that Bethea had been convicted for, but the rape of the white woman took over all of his other felonies and resulted in a public hanging. The hanging was what the white crowd wanted. They wanted to see him suffer and die in misery, what Bethea did was wrong, but what the public decided to do was also wrong. Electric chair or not, Bethea was killed for his wrongful act, he will be remembered as the last person to be publically hung in the United States.

            The details within the sonnet are open to one’s own interpretation of the story. McDonough leaves the door open for the readers to decide how they individually feel without being persuaded. But we learn through small attention to details what the message is trying to convey through our own eyes. The switching of tone and the rhyming add a sense of tension to the sonnet. The story is very interesting and after the sonnet it read, it leaves you wanting to learn more about Rainey Bethea.

Meaghan Waldron

Eng 190

Technology vs. Orwell

I found an article in the New York Times titles, “Language as a Blunt tool of the Digital Age” by Anand Giridharadas that explains Orwell’s argument by using technology. The author goes on to explain that “In our own day, the threat would seem to come instead from a new trinity of technology, globalization and business, which seem to exert a pragmatic pressure on language, to undermine the idea of language as an end in it.” Technology is extremely important and popular for many people throughout the world, especially music. Music is produced and listened to everyday. Rappers pop, R&B, country, and heavy metal do not follow the rules of the English language; they sing/rap what they want to. They make up words and use slang as if it is normal, and to think about it, it is normal. We understand what these musicians are saying, when they are not even using real words. Technology is changing the way we read, whether it be from a quick e-mail, to a verse in a song, and to a text message. The fast passed world has changed our English language in to a mess of letters. Giridharadas makes a valid point when explaining that “Cell phone keypads make us promise to “call u back after the mtg.” Twitter coaxes us to misspell to meet the 140-character maximum. Blogs, though they seek to bring out the writer in us, are notable for how little stress they put on the actual writing.” When we write/type to people we are comfortable around, our perfection in English becomes stupefied into quick words/letters. Although the English language is changing, so is time, and with time, oral and written words change and our vocabulary becomes more diverse. Orwell said that the English language was dying, and it may seem that way, but it is not dying, it is transforming. Giridharadas goes on to explain “But language, like culture, is a dynamic thing. It was an oral thing once, then became a printed thing and is becoming a digital thing, infinitely reproducible, infinitely disseminable. As such, we are not abandoning language so much as reimagining it.” We are not leaving the origin of the English language; we are simply changing language with time. Orwell does not agree with this, but there is no stopping the transformation. Technology is a major part of life now, so language has to change with the times just like many other things.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/16/world/americas/16iht-currents.html?pagewanted=2

Cultural Event One

            Over winter break, I was asked by my neighbor to help wrap presents her friend. My neighbor is one of those “hip-moms” that wears low rise jeans, Underarmour spandex, and is up on the latest fashion trends. She is in her mid 30s, but looking no older than 27. She has been sending me Cosmo since I was 12. She is more than a neighbor; she is a very good family friend. Anyways, back to the present wrapping. I have always been a slacker when it comes to wrapping presents, I prefer to throw the present in a bag and top it with some tissue paper. But no, I had to learn to make “perfect corners” to please this woman. Now, my neighbor warned me that this woman can be a bit over the top and can rub people the wrong way, a perfectionist some may say, so I was on for the challenge. I mean I was only wrapping presents, how bad could it get?

            Well, I show up at six in the morning to wrap presents, this is the time that the women had requested I be there by. So, I come dressed all comfy, sweatshirt, sweat pants and hair in a pony tail. I figured I would be put in a room left alone just wrapping my day away. As my neighbor said, she can be a bit over the top. With that in mind, I trudged through the snow on up to the front door.  I am guessing that this house was around two million, just guessing though. Anyways, I ring the door bell and I hear the women’s voice yell “come in, doors open”, so I went inside, eager to see what the interior looked like. There were kids, cats, dogs, gerbils, Barbies, and Tonka trucks, everywhere! This woman was out of her mind. My neighbor forgot to mention that this woman had six kids all under the age of 12. All I could think about was: the number of kids, the size of the house, and the reputation my town had of this woman. I was going to be wrapping presents for the next two weeks. The woman, very attractive, but worn out, shook my hand and said to me “you’re wearing that?” I took a step back and explained that it was early and I rolled out of bed to wrap the presents, and that I was sorry I did not dress up. She looked at me with a blank stare after my response, I was puzzled.

            What have I got myself into? All I wanted to do was make some extra cash for winter break. That’s it. Ugh, so she showed me to the basement and where all the presents were scattered about. I did not know where to start.

            I was completely out of my element, I am not used to being around kids, let alone having to wrap so many presents. Now I know how my mom feels. Anyways, an hour goes by and the woman came down to help. She explained that her sister came to take the kids for a few hours. We got to chatting and I realized that the woman wasn’t so bad, she actually was quite pleasant. She was simply just wrapped up in her crazy life. She never wanted six kids, she actually only wanted, one, she never wanted this life, she explained to me that too much money causes too many problems. I listened as she went on about her husband and how he is probably having an affair, and about her friends, how they stab each other in the back.

            I realized that I do not want my life to take the same turn. I was learning about her life, her culture, and the daily battles she has to fight alone. She has no support from anyone besides my neighbor, who unknowingly is her best friend. I now know why my neighbor sent me over to this house, it was not to sit and wrap presents, or to be bombarded by kids, but it was to learn, to experience something new. And I did. I was taken out of my normal culture and put into a situation where I had no control.

             I email this woman every week now, as a friend, as someone she can talk to. One day of awkward, uncomfortable, actions turned into a friendship. A friendship of two different cultures: one of a grown woman with children and one with a naive college student that had many choices ahead. I have learned a lot from this woman.