Sex by text

By Ty Heimerl and Ty Heimerl of New Prague High School

“Bow Wow,” a 16-year-old boy from New Prague, has between 20 and 30 pictures of semi-nude to naked teenage girls on his cell phone.

Those photos are called ‘sexts’ and came from both friends who forwarded the pictures to him by cell phone and from girls who sent him the pictures themselves.

‘Sexting’ is sending or posting semi-nude or nude pictures online, by videos or messages to another person by cell phone, e-mail or by video.

Twenty percent of teenagers have posted or sent pictures of themselves to other people, according to a survey done last December by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and CosmoGirl.com.

Some teens regret doing it. A teenage girl named “Nemo” from south Minneapolis sent a picture of herself to her boyfriend from the waist down just wearing underwear. She did it because her boyfriend pressured her. She broke up with that boyfriend soon after the incident and worried that he would send her picture to other people out of anger.

Because of the sensitive nature of this topic, sources in this article are identified by their nicknames, or their names have been changed to protect their privacy.

Nemo’s boyfriend did not send her picture out to anybody, and that was a relief for her. “Sexting is a bad situation gone worse because people can send it and forward it to other people, and you also don’t know who is looking at you,” she said.

The consequences of ‘sexting’ vary. A teen who sends or receives such a photos may draw a juvenile court sentence or could be charged in adult court with child pornography. A conviction could mean being labeled a sex offender for life. In a worst-case scenario, an 18-year-old Ohio woman hanged herself after she was ridiculed after a nude picture of her was circulated.

The “Sex and Tech” survey last December questioned 1,280 teens and young adults from ages 13-26. Of the 653 teenagers surveyed, 49 percent were males.

Two big reasons that teenagers sext is because of pressure from friends and the person they are dating, and because they just think it’s fun, according to the study.

Of the teenage girls surveyed, 51 percent said that they were pressured by a guy to send revealing pictures, while just 18 percent of teenage boys said they sent a picture because a girl pressured them.

Teenagers know that ‘sexting’ is wrong, but they do it anyway. Seventy-five percent of teenagers admitted to knowing that ‘sexting’ is wrong and could have serious consequences.

According to the same survey, 91 percent of teens have shared sexts sent to them with close friends.

“Goldilocks,” a 16-year-old boy from New Prague, said that he has received about six pictures of semi-nude teenage girls on his cell phone. Whenever he receives a new picture, he laughs at it and shows his friends as a joke. “Bow Wow” said that more than half of the naked photos on his phone were forwarded by friends.

A big reason that teenage girls send pictures of themselves to guys is to get or keep their attention, according to the survey. Eighty-five percent of teenage girls said that they sent a picture to keep their boyfriend’s attention, and 80 percent of teenage girls would send pictures to get noticed by a guy.

“Nemo” sent her picture to her boyfriend because she thought that it would be fun, like 78 percent of teen girls in the study.

But according to Paul Gustafson, executive assistant with the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office, the consequences of ‘sexting’ in Minnesota are very serious.

In Ramsey County, one teenage boy was charged with a gross misdemeanor for sending out a picture of a girl who had broken up with him.

Gustafson said that there is a state law, Registration of Predatory Offenders, that sets out the requirements for registering as a sex offender. Among the offenses that require sex offender registration are conviction of possessing pornographic work involving a minor and using a minor in a sexual performance — which ‘sexting’ can be.

“This is a new kind of problem that comes to prosecutors. We are very much aware of it, especially if it has images of minors,” Gustafson said.

Nyasia Arradondo contributed to this report.