Young People´s Sexuality and Sexting

1452 Words3 Pages

Over the years so much has changed in terms of peoples views on young peoples sexuality and on sexting and the rules and consequences associated with sexting. If you jump forward a generation or two to the contemporary world, you will realise the social and sexual landscape has changed dramatically. Sex is regulated less and is in some ways less risky for many young Australians. More young people are having sex and more are having sex at young ages. Social mores have changed. The feminist and gay rights social movements have mobilised for legal and social change. For heterosexual young people, effective contraception is widely available and pregnancy terminations are legal and available through the public health care system. Homosexual sex is legal and health and social support services for same sex attracted young people are steadily increasing. (Lindsay, 2005, pp 86). Sexting can be referred to as sexual content communicated through text messages, smart phones, or visual and web 2.0 activities such as social networking sites. It has been defined as the ‘exchange of sexual messages or images’ (Livingstone et al., 2011) and ‘the creating, sharing and forwarding of sexually suggestive nude or nearly nude images’ (Lenhart, 2009) through mobile phones and/or the internet. There are many factors associated with sexting. This includes that fact that it is coercive, this means that sexting does not refer to a single activity but rather to a range of activities which may be motivated by sexual pleasure but are often linked to harassment, bullying and even violence. (Ringrose, Gill, Livingstone and Harvey, 2012, pp 7). Although sexting can be viewed as a serious offence, many young people still perform the act. There are many reasons a... ... middle of paper ... ...lly, Girlfriend and Cosmopolitan all of which discuss sex and sexuality. Through this type of media these young adults are trying to figure out who they are, what their sexuality is and what is considered acceptable and what is not. Music videos also influence the attitudes and behaviours of the young people today; but when we see women being sexualised and dancing sexually in a music video it can be degrading towards women and can give us a negative label or reputation. Additionally not all music videos are like this, some do reflect on sexuality which can influence young peoples opinions. Overall it is evident that sexting and younger peoples sexuality has negative and positive effects on youth and on the opinions of other people, the moral panics about younger peoples sexuality are high but can be avoided and towards the future will slowly be diminishing.

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