Yikes. What they did was stupid, but the legal system is way out of bounds if it seeks to permanently ruin the future lives of these teenagers with child pornography convictions. The amount of humiliation they will suffer as a result of this stunt going public should be sufficient.
Apparently these uninhibited Pennsylvania teens are part of a new phenomenon that includes everyone from the kids next door to Disney teen star Vanessa Hudgens, a disturbing wide-spread trend known as "sexting": do-it-yourself nude photography distributed among teens via cell phones and the Internet.
....
As I stated earlier, I don't believe that ruining a teenager's adult life by finding him guilty of a sexual offense is an appropriate way to handle this problem. But we should be leery of outright dismissal of this kind of activity as "normal" and "good clean fun." And we should resist anyone who suggests that this kind of exploitation should be promoted as a "safe alternative" to sexual intercourse.
Another problem with finding a teenager guilty of a sexual offence because of "sexting" is that it dilutes the meaning of "sexual offense". Right now, sex offenders are stigmatized. In a number of ways, a wall is built between anyone charged with a sex offense and "the rest of us". The reasoning behind this is very straightforward -- we want to separate sexual predators from potential victims.
But when people can be charged with sex offenses for doing what "everyone" is doing, we soon have a perverse system where predators and victims are shoved to the same side of this protective wall. This "tough love" policy will, I'm convinced, have the effect of making it easier to victimize teenagers, not harder.
The law of Unintended Consequences strikes again.
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