alright, so this has been all over my FB and now i'm seeing it on GMA. what are your feelings on the post?
http://givenbreath.com/2013/09/03/fyi-if-youre-a-teenage-girl/
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I think it's honest, and I can't fault her for writing it.
I think it's possibly a wake up call to some parents who have their heads in the sand as to what's going on on social media.
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Interesting, I have never read her blog before so it is hard to understand her intention but I can't imagine too many teenage girls were going to read that. I get where she is coming from but I can't imagine I would have handled it that way. It is hard to know what I would do though and I agree that towel pictures aren't appropriate. Part of my hesitancy is that I don't have kids, let alone teens and I guess I don't view purity in the same way as their family.
Overall though I don't think there is anything wrong with what she wrote, just isn't how I would handle it.
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We are judged by what we post. Her sons friends may be smart and funny and kind, but to her they are projecting sex in an open forum. She has every right to censor what her sons do and see online. While she is scolding these girls she is also holding her sons to a high standard too.
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@mrs. bird: this was in my feed this morning ha http://theirondaisywrites.wordpress.com/2013/09/04/fyi-if-youre-a-teenage-boy/
Im on my phone so not fast enough to type out an intelligent response but I feel bad for her sons and the attention this is bringnjng on them. I don't agree with her messaging or tone. I took plenty of stupid pictures posing how I thought was "sexy" in early high school and probably would've posted them on FB if it had existed yet and I'd like to think I grew up into a rational, responsible adult who most moms would be happy to see their son with. The whole "keep modest so boys aren't led astray" bit totally doesn't sit well with me and I think it's insulting to boys.
Eta- I also think its ridiculous that she accompanied this with a picture of her sons shirtless, presumably posing in a way that emphasizes their muscles/body.
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1. My body, my choice. Making the duck face does no mean I don't have a BA. It means I thought I was cool in 2004.
2. Less focus on the girls, more focus on the parents. Why aren't their parents monitoring their social media activity? This isn't 1997: when AOL first came out, I had no idea that what you put online STAYED online. No excuses for that mistake anymore. You can't blame the girls for making poor choices when their parents aren't guiding them.
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Honestly, I can't even with this shit. There was a rebuttal letter I read the other day that pretty much summed up my feelings.
http://theirondaisywrites.wordpress.com/2013/09/04/fyi-if-youre-a-teenage-boy/
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@scg00387: " The whole "keep modest so boys aren't led astray" bit totally doesn't sit well with me and I think it's insulting to boys."
It's insulting to women as well.
No means no. Women get raped every day wearing modest clothing. Sometimes women are raped by their boyfriends or husbands.
Leading boys astray? Really? Puke.
I used to freelance for a rape crisis clinic so this statement really burns me up.
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@Mrs. Jump Rope: I think that was her point, I dont think her readers are teenage girls, but the parents of the teenage girls.
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@BananaPancakes: jinx
@Mrs. Jump Rope: I hope you don't mean my statement burns you up! But yes I agree 100% and think that this mentality is harmful for every one and contributes to rape culture.
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@scg00387: the parody post definitely calls out the sanctimonious nature of the original blog BUT I still feel if the tables were turned the parent has the right to police and block their children's social media.
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@scg00387: no! I'm on my phone & copied and pasted too much content. Just her part about the boys being led astray.
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I like her post. I like that she is involved in what her sons see on their computers. I like that she's teaching her boys what standards are important when choosing someone to date. She's just guarding her boys' hearts, and I think that's a good thing.
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@Mrs. Jump Rope: I don't think her definition of being led astray meant rape. I think she just means from their Christian teachings. She's not worried about them raping someone, but she probably is concerned with premarital sex (or sex before they're really ready) and other complications along those lines. I don't worry about my son one day raping someone, but getting too involved with a girl that it complicates all areas of his life.
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@Mrs. Lemon-Lime: I don't have any issue with that part, I think it's responsible to work through social media with your kids and censor if needed, with ensuing discussion about why, just don't agree with her choice of censorship or the rationale behind it... Or the post she wrote
@Mrs. Jump Rope: gotcha!
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I think monitoring your child's social media is a great thing, good parenting.
However, I didn't like her tone. I didn't like the fact that she said girls shouldn't post pics of them in their towels (I don't think anyone should) but she had pics of her boys at the beach shirtless and making muscle poses. She made men sound like neanderthals and girls who don't dress modestly sound like they are the downfall of men.
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I don't have a problem with this post at all. The rebuttle doesn't really make sense since for the most part it's teenage girls (and not teenage boys) who purposefully flaunt their bodies on social media for the sake of attention. I see no issue with this woman screening what her teenage boys see online. Once they grow up and don't live under her roof then they can make those decisions for themselves.
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I disagree most with this statement,
"Did you know that once a male sees you in a state of undress, he can’t quickly un-see it? You don’t want our boys to only think of you in this sexual way, do you?"Really? I had no idea that when my (now) husband saw me in that way he lost the ability to see me as intelligent, thoughtful, fun, and adventurous. No, from that time until now I suppose he sees me entirely as a sexual object.
This sells her sons (and all men) short. It is a shame that they are being taught that they aren't responsible for their own thoughts and actions with regards to how they view women.
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@BananaPancakes: that is awesome!!
I hated the original post.
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@scg00387: @mrs. jazz: exactly. That was my thought, too. You're writing about scantily clad girls and you post pictures of your boys on the beach, posing.
I do think parents need to be involved with their children's social media. This woman came off WAY too high and mighty for me, though.
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@Mrs. Lemon-Lime: You can't tell because she changed the post, but she actually wasn't holding her sons to that same standard - the original article featured pictures of her sons at the beach in their bathing suits, no shirts on, making poses to show off their muscles and stuff. That's why there's that note at the top of the article now. Despite the fact that she took the pictures down, I think the fact that she didn't even think about it when putting them up shows how overly critical she is - she's immediately judging these girls, but didn't give those photos of her son a second thought until it was pointed out.
I do think that duckface is stupid and that teenagers (both boys and girls) tend to post a lot of stupid pictures online because they want people to think they're pretty and sexy, and I do always roll my eyes at that. Yeah it's their body to show off if they want to, but I just hope my children will never feel the need to do that.
But the way she's presenting her point of view is bullshit, in my opinion. She's setting these kids up for failure in their future relationships. Kids that grow up in a household where sex outside marriage is seen as a horrible unspeakable thing, boys need to keep their minds pure and never look at inappropriate photos or have 'unpure' thoughts, and girls need to not do anything to tempt boys or they'll never see them in a nonsexual way ever again...those kids often have extremely unrealistic views about sex and relationships and haven't been taught how to handle them in a mature way.
I'm not saying people should encourage these kinds of pictures or sex or anything like that. But I think you should be realistic and have real conversations with your kids. Not the kind where you're just shaming them with warnings of terrible things, but the kind where you teach them how to be sexually safe, that being curious is normal, but to respect themselves - both their bodies and their hearts.
I like this response too: http://www.mommyish.com/2013/09/04/mom-slut-shames-girls-for-posting-selfies/
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I would prefer that my daughter not post pictures of herself in her towel or otherwise "flaunting" herself online, but the slut-shaming in this post bugs the crap out of me. Men and boys have the capacity to be so much more than that, if they've been raised right.
And I am a fairly conservative, born-again Christian. Just not so conservative when it comes to gender equality and the rape culture. -
i don't find her approach nearly as malicious as many seem to, i think calling it 'slut shaming' (not that anyone here has used that term, but it seems to keep coming up elsewhere) is a bit extreme because she is not name calling or making assumptions about what activities girls taking selfies that she disapproves of. i think she genuinely thinks she's doing something positive by restricting access to these photos. however, it seems short sighted, in a couple years her boys will be on their own and inundated with sexual images of women and they will be expected to respond appropriately. if you've never addressed the subject, other than to banish all images depicting woman as sexual beings, it seems unrealistic to expect men and boys to have a healthy understanding of boundaries or to understand that woman are sexual, but that is doesn't always mean it's an invitation for them to be sexual with them.
that said, there is a difference between a grown adult who understands that fully the internet is forever and how it will effect their future, making the choice to post sexual images of themself vs a minor, who cannot fully understand that these images will be found by future employers, partners (who hasn't googled their SO?!), and family members, posting sexual images. i don't want some 60yr old creep abusing himself to pictures of my 14 year old daughter in a towel trying her best to show off her newfound sexuality. i think there needs to be more discussions among families about internet conduct- both for boys and girls! and that no matter what a person posts, it is never an invitation for a sexual act.
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i don't find her approach to be something more than a mom concerned about the pics that her sons may come across online. i don't think she's a she-man women hater, i don't think she's trying to say that women are at fault for all types of attraction that they may or may not seek from men.
i think it's a post by a mom who wrote something to vent about pics she came across while handling social media with her sons, it got picked up as a news story, it's getting a lot of attn, and now she has to deal with every word she jotted down because ppl all over the word are judging her for it.
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While I think every parent should monitor and sensor their kids' social media, I really really disagree with her post and the way the topic was approached.
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@mrsjyw: she is a blogger, posting presumably for traffic and readers? I don't think that a long thorough post counts as something jotted down like a note in a journal or something. She wrote this, proofed it, posted it, posted her sons pictures.
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@scg00387: i don't know what type of blogger she is. big box, paid, etc. i assumed she was just a nobody blogger (like myself who does not post for traffic and/or readers) and she wrote an albeit sarcastic and poorly written post about an incident she happened upon with her sons. i have no idea how it got picked up on national news, but i'm sure she wasn't expecting that when she wrote the post. regardless, it was her choice to put it on the www and it's her mess to deal with now. my opinion as a reader of that post, is that i see things on the internet that i disagree with or written in bad taste all the time. i specifically choose to ignore and/or not judge ones that are written by nobody ppl who happen to use the web as a forum for their personal writing.
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Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see how her post as perpetuating rape culture. She clearly stated she wanted her boys to bring home a modest girl. She connected sexy pics to impure thoughts and sex objects, but not to rape or assault. If she is trying to keep her boys virtuous (virgins still?), then it makes sense for her to keep them away from girls that seem like they put out. I see her post as a way to prevent consesual sex.
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@Mrs. Lemon-Lime: I think it's the idea that the girls are responsible for not "inflaming" her boys and "causing them to have impure thoughts" by posting those photos...that places the responsibility (and potentially the blame, if it is not successful and the boys ARE turned on) on the girls, and it's a small step from that to "oh well, she was dressed like that, so she was asking for it". Rather than teaching or expecting her sons to control themselves, regardless of what else is going on, since, you know, they're not just walking penises.
My thoughts are pretty well detailed in the comments on that post...I think she is coming from a very specific (Christian, conservative) perspective.
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@mrsjyw: amen!
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I think it's absurd to call this post "slut-shaming". Did she name any girls individually? No. So no one feels shamed.
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She gives the girls the benefit of the doubt...
"That post doesn't reflect who you are at all! We think you are lovely and interesting, and usually very smart. But, we had to cringe and wonder what you were trying to do? Who are you trying to reach? What are you trying to say?"
I think she made a good point there. She wants her boys to see women for more than just sexual objects, and I think it's a good thing to teach her sons.
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@Mrs. Lemon-Lime: I think it's the assumption that girls that dress in a way the mother deems inappropriate 'put out' Her sons were more undressed in the photos she posted yet she assumes they don't put out.
But placing the idea in her sons head that there's a type of girl that doesn't deserve as much respect because of a facebook picture is both demeaning to her sons, who hopefully are more capable than judging a book by it's cover - or a single picture, and the girls, who may just be having a teenage idea of what beauty is and are probably not saying come stick your wiener in me.
If I were a mother and found out a woman had talked about one of my daughters like that - even if she had posted a duck face towel picture - I would be livid and there would be strong words shared if she was in my community.
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@Dandelion:
I think it was more this part:
"Did you know that once a male sees you in a state of undress, he can’t quickly un-see it? You don’t want our boys to only think of you in this sexual way, do you?
...men of integrity don’t linger over pictures of scantily clad high-school girls."
It's not women's responsibility to create men of integrity or to control the way men think. It demeans men as well, implying that they are only able to control themselves insofar as there are no scantily clad women around.
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@hilsy85: Right and it doesn't even really make sense. Her boys obviously go to the beach and a bathing suit is usually more revealing than a towel. Her boys should probably be banned from the beach to protect them from impure thoughts and all the girls there trying to lure them into immodesty.
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@hilsy85: @Maysprout: Thanks for the explanation.
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I actually really like the post! Dh and I have very similar views, I hate to see what the internet is like by the time my kids are old enough to have a facebook.
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@mrsjazz: "She made men sound like neanderthals and girls who don't dress modestly sound like they are the downfall of men."
Agreed. Her tone really annoyed me.@hilsy85: agreed as well.
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I didn't like her tone at all. It seems a lot of self righteous mommy blog posts have gone viral lately.
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I would have interpreted it a little differently if she hadn't had those pictures of her sons. It shows she is really seeing this from a very biased point of view. Her sons are obviously children, but when I was a teenage girl, I probably would have "lingered" over those photos... what a double standard.
Having said that, I found this to be a thoughtful response: http://putdowntheurinalcake.com/2013/09/dear-mrs-hall-regarding-your-fyi-if-youre-a-teenage-girl/
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