According to Family Circle magazine’s editor in chief, Linda Fears, young children are dressing and acting too sexy way too soon. The problem, she says, is that many kids think they have to be sexy to be popular or fit in with the right crowds. Fears also said ‘it’s not healthy for children to emulate stars before they figure out who they are as individuals’ [1].
Many believe that this problem only exists with young girls; however, this trend has also been seen in young boys. Today, young boys are sporting t-shirts with an arrow pointing up saying “The Man” and an arrow pointing down saying “The Legend”. This shows that this ‘too sexy, too soon’ phenomenon is affecting young boys as well as young girls.
So who is to blame for children trying to act too sexy, too soon? For one, marketers and advertisers are presenting images that saturate new media, like the internet, with the notion that sex sells. Children develop in their minds that if they want to be accepted or liked by people, they have to become “sexy”. As well, these images and videos that are posted all over the internet and television are contributing to young children believing that their identity is determined by their bodies. Therefore, new media and the market are targetting young people way too early on, leading to sexualization.
Pussycat Dolls
According to the American Psychological Association, sexualization “occurs when a person’s value comes only from his or her sexual appeal or behavior, to the exclusion of other characteristics, and when a person is sexually objectified” [2]. Today, this notion of sexualization is occuring more rapidly than ever. In the case of YouTube, a girl typically puts pictures of herself online to get attention and comments from others. However, some girls get so caught up in the Internet culture, ‘their own self-worth is measured by how their Internet ‘friends’ view their physical appearance’ [2].
Great Role Model for a Young Child
Although it is nice to believe that new media is going to recognize the problem of children becoming too sexy, too soon and begin to censor their programs and images, that is not reality. No one can deny that sex sells and will continue to do so; therefore, parents need to monitor what their children are watching and surfing online as well as educate their children on healthy body images, etc.
Sources:
[1] Johnson, Caitlin. A. (2006). Retrieved on March 24, from http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/27/earlyshow/main2042360.shtml
[2] Noble, Bethany. (2007). Too young, too soon, too bad. Retrieved on March 24, from http://www.ncregister.com/site/article/2151
