All right, here's the latest sexting story from those hard working folks at CNN.com, who make sure that no real news manages to make it to the front page:
http://www.cnn.com/...
But they've suckered me in, and I have to comment on it here. You see, this is the first article I've seen that actually looks at the trend with some skepticism, but somehow, in true media sex-panic fashion, manages to conflate completely different issues and bungle its whole coverage.
Cross posted at Billingham.
We've got several things going on here: the story of Philip Alpert, who at 18 sent nude photos of his 16-year-old ex-girlfriend to her friends and family. There's Marissa Miller, who took pictures of herself and is being threatened by the DA with being charged as a sex offender unless she attends a re-education camp (Glen Beck declined to comment). And there's Jessica Logan, who hanged herself after her ex-boyfriend distributed nude pictures she sent him.
So, who gets the lede? Why it's Mr. Alpert, of course, who CNN paints as the big victim here, convicted of child pornography charges and forced to register as a sex offender.
Now, I think there are some serious problems with our system of sex-offender registration, and I think that the child pornography panics have gotten the entire system out of wack. But honestly, Alpert isn't some kid innocently having fun, as CNN lets him portray himself.
He got arrested for maliciously humiliating his ex-girlfriend. Nude photos to "dozens" of family and friends. It's an extraordinarily nasty move, and if they were both adults, I think his actions would be morally reprehensible and he should be found liable. At a minimum, it's sexual harassment, and he definitely should have been sued and forced to pay damages.
As for Alpert, life is not easy as a registered sex offender, a label he will carry until the age of 43. He's been kicked out of college, he cannot travel out of the county without making prior arrangements with his probation officer, he has lost many friends and is having trouble finding a job because of his status as a convicted felon.
I'll admit that our criminal justice system is often too harsh, but you know what? I'm not sympathetic to this guy. He is a sex offender - people in his community really have a right to know that if you date him, well, he has a history of criminally sexually humiliating his partners. If I were a college admissions officer, his crime is especially one that I think could endanger his classmates. And if I was his friend before, I wouldn't be now.
I do believe that he deserves a chance at redemption and forgiveness, and I think he should be offered an avenue out: I don't want to make an unqualified defense of our sex crimes laws. But that's not at issue here: CNN is nearly saying he should be let off the hook for what he did, because, in his words, "I'm being punished for the rest of my life for something that took two minutes or less to do."
But sandwiched between complaints about his harsh treatment is Logan's case, which clearly shows the damage that can result from distributing someone else's photograph maliciously - she hanged herself! And while the article marvels at the harsh punishment Alpert received, it here sighs that the distributing boyfriend has received no punishment.
Then there's the two girls. Marissa Miller's case is clearly the opposite extreme. She is an innocent victim of a bloodthirsty prosecutor, for apparently committing a crime against herself when she was 12. When the pictures got mass-distributed by other people, I have no idea how anyone would think that she should be especially punished. There's a lot of good coverage around the blogs on this case.
But it comes down to this: every case involving teenagers' sexuality and cell phones isn't the same thing, and while it's usually pretty safe for them to play around with sexy photos sent back and forth with a partner, equating this with the malicious revenge-driven distribution of those photos is despicable.
You get to own your own sexuality. You don't get to own anyone else's.