Tuesday, May 27, 2008

WARNING: To All Parents and Anyone Working With Teens

Sexting: New, Dangerous Teen Trend
ABC 7
May 15, 2008


A new, dangerous trend is growing among teenagers: text messaging explicit photos of themselves, also known as sexting. Students as young as 12 are exchanging salacious pictures and messages through their cellphones.

"A picture got out of somebody else's older sister and that kinda spread like wildfire through our school," said a tenth grader.

The phenomenon is raging as wildly as their hormones. It's known as sexting or sex texting, sending lewd messages and pictures through a cellphone. "Nude body pictures, topless, bottomless, poses, inappropriate," said one tenth grader.

Its invaded middle schools as well. A seventh grader said, "It's not usually strangers. It's just somebody you've been talking to lately and they want to see more of you... literally."

Half of the 12 year old's ABC 7/NewsChannel 8's Julie Parker talked to had heard of this happening in their school. All the students talked to for the story said while they knew about it, they hadn't done it themselves. Both genders agree the boys are the instigators, but some girls play along.

"I think the girls, they just want to get their attention and usually it works," said an eighth grader. Another student in the same grade said, "Sometimes they'll say, 'Send me a picture of your boobs' or 'Send me a picture of your butt.'"

The risque game has very real consequences. "The phones these days are like very good so they can just like send it to the Internet and they can put it on MySpace and other people can save it so it's like all over the place," said a seventh grader.

John Shehan from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children said, "Once it's out there, while they might think it's just their classmates looking at these images, well, it's also the dirty old men. It's the pedophiles. It's those that want to sexually prey on children who take these images, who collect them and spread them worldwide."

It's a very real fear for parents. "It's alarming. They're not protected." "It's really disappointing! It's hard to be a parent today."

The kids said very often it starts as a girlfriend sending a boyfriend a picture, but then they break up, he shows a friend and it quickly gets forwarded around. It's a felony for children under 18 to not only receive one of these pictures on their phone, but taking a photo and sending it could lead to pornography production and distribution charges.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

CALL TO ACTION: Stop Allowing Alleged Sex Offender, Rabbi Shlomo Aviner From Being A Spokes Person On Child Abuse.

rabbi Shlomo Aviner
From The Awareness Center:

The Awareness Center, Inc.
(the international Jewish Coalition Against Sexual Abuse/Assault)
P.O. Box 65273, Baltimore, MD 21209
www.theawarenesscenter.org
443-857-5560

CALL TO ACTION:
Stop Allowing Alleged Sex Offender, Rabbi Shlomo Aviner From Being A Spokes Person On Child Abuse.

May 23, 2008


Back in 2002, serious allegations were made against Rabbi Shlomo Aviner of sexually harassing women both verbally and physically. Like in many other cases, those who tried to speak out where shunned and made to look as if they were crazy.

Rabbi Shlomo Aviner continues to be the senior rabbi and a Rosh yeshiva (dean of a seminary) in Jerusalem, Israel. In the last few months Aviner has been publicly speaking out against child abuse as a PR campaign to correct his image. This needs to be stopped!

Due to the seriousness of the past allegation, Rabbi Aviner's actions should be scene as endangering the safety of adolescent girls and adult women, who might see him as a "safe person."
The Awareness Center is demanding that Rabbi Aviner undergo a psychological evaluation conducted by a mental health professional approved by our organization prior to him becoming a spokes person on the issue of child abuse.

Please write letters to the editor of the following Israeli newspapers to ensure they are aware that their actions of quoting this alleged sex offender may lead to another woman being harmed.

YNET News
Editor in Chief
editor-in-chief@y-i.co.il
click here to send letters


Jerusalem Post
Telephone 972-2-531-5666
David Horovitz, Editor-in-Chief

Amir Mizroch, News Editor

Haaretz
Letters to the editor

972-3-512-1212

For more information on Rabbi Aviner go to: