Sexting: Your Views On This?

[usmcgirl]

Okay, so I'm not quite sure if I'm posting this in the right forum, but it has to do with my SO so I'm assuming I am...?

Short version is this - my boyfriend and I were sexting, I forgot to sign out of my email, my mother snooped, found the emails, and flipped. She (once again) cut off all contact between my boyfriend & I.

My question(s) are/is this: your views on sexting? Would you have done the same thing in her position? In mine?

If you're wondering, he's 19, I'm 15. We've never met in person, and in case this reflects your opinion, I'm a virgin. LOL, that was so blase`.

[Brieasaurus]

Personally, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I don't know if there's like a formal definition of sexting or anything but in my mind, I think of it as dirty pictures and just talking dirty, so that's what I'm assuming you were doing haha.

You can't really blame your mom for being upset (even though I think it's wrong for parents to snoop around their kids' stuff) because I mean.. what would you do in her shoes? Not everyone can understand that when you're in a LDR, you get whatever you can get because you can't actually be physical with your SO. It's not even a long distance thing, it's just a case of being horny. I don't know anyone who hasn't sexted. It's actually fun, I'll admit to turning my SO on when he's with his friends or something. It's just something that people do. However, I don't have any advice to offer about what to do because I think trying to talk to her about it would be beyond awkward.

I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I think it's better for teens to sext than to have sex. As long as you choose who you send pictures to and you know the risks (if that person sends them around, etc) then I don't see why it's a problem. There are laws about it being child pornography though, so you have to be careful but I bet you already know all of that.

[usmcgirl]

Personally, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I don't know if there's like a formal definition of sexting or anything but in my mind, I think of it as dirty pictures and just talking dirty, so that's what I'm assuming you were doing haha.

You can't really blame your mom for being upset (even though I think it's wrong for parents to snoop around their kids' stuff) because I mean.. what would you do in her shoes? Not everyone can understand that when you're in a LDR, you get whatever you can get because you can't actually be physical with your SO. It's not even a long distance thing, it's just a case of being horny. I don't know anyone who hasn't sexted. It's actually fun, I'll admit to turning my SO on when he's with his friends or something. It's just something that people do. However, I don't have any advice to offer about what to do because I think trying to talk to her about it would be beyond awkward.

I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I think it's better for teens to sext than to have sex. As long as you choose who you send pictures to and you know the risks (if that person sends them around, etc) then I don't see why it's a problem. There are laws about it being child pornography though, so you have to be careful but I bet you already know all of that.

Actually, the only pictures he's seen of me, are on facebook... O.o Lolol so it's not even child porno. You're right though, as much as I would love to, I can't blame her for being mad.

[Haley53]

As a mother, I would probably have a hard time finding someone who's 19 writing sexually to my 15-year-old daughter and as a 15-year-old, I probably would have found it odd as well. This is because of my personal opinion on age gaps, however. If my daughter were 18 and the boy were 19 or they were both 15/16-years-old, I would probably be more lax about it because I'd realise that it happens. Is it a double standard? Maybe. But I'm too aware of development and some of the key biological and psychological processes to really care.

---------- Post added at 08:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:57 PM ----------

I want to add, however, that I would never have snooped either. :P I don't believe in it, never have done with anyone, and never will do, not even in cases where there are suspicions. My mother brought me up respecting my privacy and I in turn have taken on the same trait. Sure, I'm curious about some things sometimes, but that's what signing out or putting the book/letter/etc. away is for. :P

[DemonxOisin]

^Like Brieasaurus said, I can understand why your mom flipped out. She´s trying to protect her baby girl. I consider myself uber-liberal when it comes to stuff like that, but if it was my 15 year old daughter, I´d be overly concerned too. I think though, that you really have no choice BUT to talk to her about it, because dissaproving parents can be a very large road block in LDR´s, especially when you are not of legal age. You need to tell her that opinion that you just told us, and make her see that your not just totally whoring yourself out (for lack of a better term).

Personally though, I do it all the time. We trust each other to keep them private, and we both enjoy nekkid pictures of each other >:3 So I see no harm in that. But we are also a bit older and live on our own.

[usmcgirl]

As a mother, I would probably have a hard time finding someone who's 19 writing sexually to my 15-year-old daughter and as a 15-year-old, I probably would have found it odd as well. This is because of my personal opinion on age gaps, however. If my daughter were 18 and the boy were 19 or they were both 15/16-years-old, I would probably be more lax about it because I'd realise that it happens. Is it a double standard? Maybe. But I'm too aware of development and some of the key biological and psychological processes to really care.

---------- Post added at 08:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:57 PM ----------

I want to add, however, that I would never have snooped either. :P I don't believe in it, never have done with anyone, and never will do, not even in cases where there are suspicions. My mother brought me up respecting my privacy and I in turn have taken on the same trait. Sure, I'm curious about some things sometimes, but that's what signing out or putting the book/letter/etc. away is for. :P

Well.. Lol I don't know. Honestly, I thought nothing of it. My mother has made claims that because of that, he doesn't love/care about me. However, we were dating for a month and a half before that and he treated me the same as he did after we sexted a few times. And yes, I agree. Her snooping was way out of line. Although, in my defense, usually when I closed the browsing window, it logged me out of everything. Appppaaaarreeenntttlllyyy, the one time I needed it to, it didn't. *sigh*

[princessmeg1328]

If I was a mother, the main problem I would have with this situation is the fact that you're 15 and he's 19. It's not the age difference that would really bother me, but the fact that you're a minor and he's not. You need to be super careful about what you put on the internet. Even if you delete it, it never completely goes away.
Also, I agree with the others that it's not fair for your mother to have gone snooping through your stuff. Just be more careful with your email if you decide to continue sexting with your SO.

[Haley53]

I won't start a debate but I wanted to point out that my disagreement with age gaps in high school has nothing to do with whether or not I think the two people love or care about one another. :P

[usmcgirl]

I won't start a debate but I wanted to point out that my disagreement with age gaps in high school has nothing to do with whether or not I think the two people love or care about one another. :P

Oh no, I knew that! Sorry, I got a little bit distracted there. xD

[kiara_silver]

I'll reply my best to both points of views. For myself, before we met we didn't do a lot of sexting really. I mean we had intimate conversations, but not a lot until after we met. And I was careful around my family then i moved lol. But I remember one time my dad found a letter of mine that I was going to send my SO. And he flipped out, and it wasn't anything bad! I had said he has all of me, but i honestly did not mean it in a physical way. I was so mad at him for reading my personal stuff. I remember writing my SO crying upset, because my dad found it and was saying cruel stuff. Not sure if your parents view things the same as mine. But to my dad my SO was a stranger who I met online who was most likely lieng to me, telling me what i wanted to hear, dangerous, just trying to get in my pants. (I still want my "i was wrong" out of all of them, but i think there all to proud to say it) Try seeing it from there point of view for a moment. There's all these horror stories of guys and even girls you meet online who turn out to be someone else. Or who you go meet and they take advantage of you or ect ect. So you can see why this would be scary to them. There daughter talking to someone they don't know.
I think you should be allowed to live your life. Make your own choices, but also remember that they just love you and are looking out for you in the way they know how.

[goalie_girl34]

Nothing wrong with sexting but you are 15, mom has a point.

[Katelyn]

Nothing wrong with sexting but you are 15, mom has a point.

agree.

[Dziubka]

I, too, think it's wrong for parents to snoop and disrespect their children's privacy. It's sad when they seem to have so little trust in their child's common sense.

However, I can also understand that she was upset. To me, it's not so much the age difference, but that he's someone off the internet that you haven't met yet.
At 15 I wouldn't have sexted with a 'stranger' (=someone I hadn't met) off the internet, especially not after only talking to him for a bit more than a month. I don't know, have you skyped?
Obviously not everyone's a creepy old perv, but sexting with a 15 year old... is sort of... off? At 15, now and probably also as a mother, I would probably think he was some dirty old creep who went after little girls. Sorry, but everyone can write a few e-mails pretending they're a hot 19yr old. Hell, as a teenager I went around chat rooms making up the most fabulous life stories for myself, it's really not that hard.

Sexting doesn't do anything for me, so I don't even do it with my boyfriend, but even now, I wouldn't sext anyone I only knew online.

edit: Oh and one more thing:
Emails aren't very confidential. I have no idea who else might read mine or my boyfriend's e-mails. Even if I wanted, I couldn't send him sexting e-mails, because I could never shed off the vision of some gross creep somewhere reading the mails and getting off on them. (Haha, sorry if that was tmi, but yeah no).

And PS: Thank you for the Rep, whoever you are. I really appreciate it.

[books]

I have a little sister who's turning 15 next month and I can assure with that if my mom found out she was sexting she would be very upset. I would be upset as well, but I really think I would try to talk to her about it openly..like what led up to it (I don't agree with snooping at all and only think it builds mistrust). Given how my sister typically "meets" people- adding tons of new facebook friends per day and then chatting and forming friendships online, the #1 question to her would be- do you even know who this person is? And the likely question would be no, so then I'd have to ask...why are you exposing such intimate pictures/details to them? I guess too it's the strictly knowing only from online aspect that is a little more concerning for me.

[temporaryuser]

coming from a mothers perspective of a now 18 yo, yes, i would have flipped out. For several reasons. You are 15. sexting tends to lead to the real thing. At 15, you really need to consider the outcome of having sex, especially with a 19 yo. Why rush things?Are there not other ways to entertainyourselves? You say you are a virgin, so why sext? Now should she cut off all contact? No. I was that age, forbidden love never works. You will find a way to contact each other, everyone knows that.
Now if you were older, would sexting bother me? Not a bit. But you have to remember that not everyone respects the fact sexting is a very private thing. Consider how you would feel if you messages/pictures got shared. Or posted on the internet somewhere.