On the night of the last Sunday in February, the second season of the successful series euphoria, what is it about about adolescents and shows scenes of explicit sex, conflictive relationships, violence, drug use, crimes, loneliness, anxiety, depression, family, friendship, love… and sexting.
Although the series is restricted to those under 17 years of age, many of its fans are teenagers who feel identified with the characters, as if somehow they saw themselves, but on the screen. In Quito, this was realized by Susana, who requested the reservation of her real name, a 39-year-old single mother who lives with her 16-year-old daughter, Diana (fictitious name for protection).
Susana knew nothing about euphoria nor was she interested, until one day she heard her daughter send a voice message to a friend in which she commented on the drama. That piqued her curiosity. She watched the first few episodes, but didn’t make it past the fourth. “They are very strong”, says so far. She was scared to think that her daughter feels reflected in the series.
It was not easy. He approached her daughter and, after a long conversation, which was not free of arguments, she discovered that Diana had shared photos of her with sexual content to her boyfriendof the same age, and that the boy had responded in the same way.
What is sexting?
Diana and her boyfriend found in the exchange of sexual messages —texts, audios, photographs and videos— a way of relating, to maintain a level of intimacy that outside of virtuality was almost impossible for them. This exchange, which is known as sexting (in English: sexting), it was for both of them a kind of “natural way” to meet and fall in love, as happens in euphoria.
Although there isn’t one formal definition of sexting, the Pan-Hispanic Dictionary of Legal Spanishof the Royal Spanish Academy, points out that it consists of the “sending images or text messages with sexual content explicit through an electronic device, especially a mobile phone”.
Susana had talked to Diana about sex and its implications since she was 14 years old. She tried to guide her, without fear, so that she would make responsible decisions. However, she in her talks did not measure the new youth codes, living the heyday of platforms and social networks, nor the risks involved in the unusual exposure of private life and the commission of crimes through technology, an evident aspect in HBO’s production.
Sexting, a practice that creates doubts about whether there is a safe way to do it
Research in young people from Ecuador
The sexting practice is a reality among adolescents, in the same way that it is among adults, points out clinical psychologist Paula Yépez-Tito, professor at the University of the Americas (UDLA). The subject, she says, must be understood by parents and teachers as a fundamental part of the sexual education that young people receive, especially now, when there is more and more access to the Internet.
In his opinion, the approach should not focus on the rigid and severe prohibition of this type of exchange, but should be done from the reflection of the effects that sharing sexual content can bring. If the person receiving the material is not aware of their responsibility and does not respect the privacy of the person who sent the messages, it is likely that they will share them with more people and these with others, generating an infinite chain.
For his doctoral thesis at the University of Malaga (Spain), Yépez-Tito carried out a sexting study involving 664 teens, between 12 and 18 years old, who study in five educational institutions in Quito and represent different socioeconomic strata. The work has been developed since 2017 and was published in October 2020.
The author immersed herself in this topic as a result of meeting several girls who came to his office with depression and anxiety disorders. Some had even attempted suicide, because the photos or videos they shared with someone they trusted ended up in the hands of many people, known and unknown. That generated harassment, criticism and ridicule in the extreme.
Two types of sexting
In the investigation they differ two types of sexting: active and passive. The first consists of the creation, publication, sending or forwarding of material. The second occurs when content of a sexual nature is received or requested.
Among the results, it stands out that the sexting passive is more frequent than active in the adolescents analyzed. The use of mobile phones and social networks as tools and means of dissemination prevails. The most shared are text messages.
Boys are more involved than girls in both types of sexting. 27% of men receive content and in women it is 14%. 27% of men send and 6% of girls do too.
The causes that motivate young people to get involved in this practice they start with the desire to have sex, followed by joking, the desire to go out with someone and want to talk to someone, the study concludes.
Furthermore, 15.4% of all research participants agree with the idea that the sexting increases the chances of having sex or going out with someone.
Likewise, it was found that adolescents who reported having a moderate and high involvement in sexting frequently use the Internet and their mobile phone, especially through Facebook and Instagram, WhatsApp and Snapchat.
“The use of social networks to share photos and videos increased as the level of involvement in the sexting”, states the doctoral thesis.
Yépez-Tito explains that in men it is more common this situation, due to a context in which macho patterns are reproduced and “masculinity is measured” based on the number of women they attract to chat.
Instead, girls usually bear the brunt of sexting, because they are discriminated against, judged, harassed and are often victims of blackmail, describes the psychologist. Some of the adolescents that she treated in her office had changed schools several times, due to the lack of empathy shown by her classmates and even certain teachers.
His patients were between 13 and 16 years old, the most had shared an image to their boyfriendswho distributed the material, without permission, to their group of friends, they to other friends, and so on.
“The cases that came to my office were girls who were already taking antidepressants, anxiolytics, because some had attempted suicide because of the harassment they experienced in one or another school by boys and girls”, she mentions.
Consent
The theme, says Yépez-Tito, is not being addressed preventivelywithin the early stages of adolescence. “The most important thing is to teach what consent means in every sense. This goes beyond traditional sex education. Teenagers have access to the internet, a lot of access to pornography,” she notes.
In the development of the research, it was also discovered that the restrictive rules that parents use regarding the management of technology in young people are not effective. Removing the cell phone from the teenager does not work, but the situation should be approached from what responsible sexuality and sexting mean, indicates the expert.
“You have to work on the awareness of acts and their consequences”, he specifies, since, as evidenced in the doctoral thesis, there are young people who receive sexual content and spread it as if they were making a joke. Hence the importance of reflecting that humor can also hurt. Teachers should also be trained in what sexting involves, so they know what to do when these situations arise.
In Susana’s case, after discovering that her daughter was exchanging intimate photos with her boyfriend, she sought help from the psychologist she had been consulting for a long time. The specialist provided her with documented information on what sexting entails and guided her to discuss the subject with her daughter in an environment of trust.
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The red lines that border on crimes
Juana Fernández, an expert on gender issues at the State Attorney General’s Office, warns that young people can fall into pedophile deceptions (in English: child grooming) in the conversations they have with people they contact through social networks, who approach them with the aim of violating their personal space.
“Thats why he sexting there is a fine line between being a voluntary exchange and becoming a child grooming”, indicates Fernandez. The pederast deception It is a strategy used by an abuser to establish contact and seduce a minor for sexual purposes, according to a glossary used by the Ecuadorian Prosecutor’s Office.
Fernández explains that these cases can occur through false or real profiles that manage to deceive minors.
Although in the Comprehensive Criminal Organic Code (COIP) In force, sexting or pedophile deception are not criminalized as such, there are several crimes that derive from this exchange of images of sexual content, the expert points out.
“If there is a dissemination of information, violating the privacy of the person, can be classified as a crime of violation of privacy. If the person who is in the images is extorted, from the threat of ‘give me such a thing or else I will share the photo’, we are in a case of extortion”, Fernández exemplifies.
From article 103 to 178 of the COIP, they stipulate various criminal types ranging from the commercialization and distribution of pornography with the use of children or adolescents to contact for sexual purposes and the offer of sexual services through electronic means, as well as violation of privacy and cyberbullying.
According to figures from the Prosecutor’s Office, in 2021 they received 1,902 complaints related to these crimes. That is, an average of five complaints per day. They are cases of people of different ages.
Of that total, 1,882 were completed crimes and 20 attempted, according to the statistics of the Prosecutor’s Office. However, it is an underreporting, as there are countless cases that are not reported.
There are three ways you can file complaints: through the telephone line 1800 DELITO (1800 335486); via the Internet, on the website of the Prosecutor’s Office, in the section “Online reporting of violence against women and the family unit”; and in person, for which the minor victim must go to the Prosecutor’s Office accompanied by an adult.
Fernández maintains that one way to prevent these cases is for parents communicate with children with assertiveness. Teachers should do the same with their students. Talk about sharing images and that they understand that they have to reject any pornographic sexual content. That they have a good use of technologies and awareness of the problems that may arise.
“That young people know that, in case something happens to them, if they of their own free will shared an image with someone they want to meet or with their partner and that person breaks that trust, they have channels to report it,” says Fernández. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
Paul is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment and general news. He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established herself as a respected voice in the industry.
