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| Britain |
| Schools get help for 'too sexual' pupils |
| 2006-07-18 |
| Task forces are being sent into primary schools to tackle the rise of inappropriate sexual behaviour in young pupils. Teachers are growing increasingly concerned that children as young as seven are interacting in a "sexualised" manner with each other, with old-fashioned games such as kiss and chase no longer being deemed innocent enough not to set alarm bells ringing. Now Birmingham council's inappropriate sexual behaviour unit has set up eight teams of experts that are being dispatched to schools across the city. Stephane Breton, a social worker at the unit, said an increasing number of primary and secondary schools believed that they had a problem. He said: "Sometimes you have a whole school where all the kids are very flirty. They are seven and eight and they are flirtatious. We go with them and address the issue to make sure they know what they are talking about. We have been to at least eight schools. That is on request from the schools. At the end of the session there is an evaluation." Mr Breton said some boys believed that girls wore short skirts to get attention because they wanted to be touched. In other cases, youngsters flirted because they had low self-esteem or to get rid of their anger. He said children were being ever more exposed to sexual images and messages through television, magazines and the internet, which they then copied and thought were acceptable. They were therefore becoming aware of sex at a much younger age. Birmingham's sexual health charity, the Brook Advisory Clinic, also expressed concerns over children being exposed to sexual material. "I feel we do live in a very sexualised society," said Penny Barber, the charity's chief executive. "Both young men and women are subject to enormous pressure to be sexually attractive early on. They are bombarded with images when they're young. What they don't have is a counterbalance to that which is access to information and confidential advice." |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #40 Trailing daughter #1 has a pair of real camo pants, from the Army Surplus store. These are so popular here that each of the local high schools has its own preferred colour ways, I was told there -- the td's schoolmates wear red/white/black, but td#1 preferred the look of the blue/grey/black pair. (They come in pink, too, for that girl soldier look I guess.) I found the Army Surplus store in the Yellow Pages, Rex Mundi. I had a reading student who'd had her first child, suddenly, when she was 15, and her first grandchild by the time she was thirty, but you've got be beat by a long shot, 6. That kind of thing is really dangerous for the child/mother; her parents ought to be jailed for endangerment, and the sperm donor castrated, in my gentle opinion. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-07-18 21:00 |
| #39 Steve you got that right!!! As a youngen (20's) my wife ran her own small riding stable. That damn thing attracted girls the way the manure pile attracted flies! She "raised" more than a few teens (starting at about 10) whose parents had gone awol from their duties. When she was away at college she used to get panic stricken calls from Mom or Dad asking how to deal with the little angel. Oh yeah, on the boy front? The two that were "at the barn" were outnumbered about 8 to 1. |
| Posted by: AlanC 2006-07-18 19:44 |
| #38 If you really want to get scared - go look and see what they are writing online. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-07-18 19:27 |
| #37 Got ya beat Rex: our youngin', a young teen, is into horses. Horses all day and all night. Horses seven days a week. She doesn't have time to a) go to the mall b) talk to boys c) hang out with the other mall rats etc, because she's always at the barn. And the teen-aged yuppie slut clothes do not work at a barn. It's a T-shirt, a pair of jeans, and barn boots. All the parents at our barn agree on this, and we're pleased as punch to pay through the nose to keep our girls there with their horses. And I must say, if I were a 16 year old lad and looking for a chance to meet girls with no competition from other guys, I'd learn to ride a horse. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2006-07-18 19:09 |
| #36 Ever seen a Bratz doll? Ever watch TV with your kid and truly let them pick the channel? Seen the magazine covers at the checkout stand? Listened to their friends talk? Watched even some Disney movies? Sometimes even looked in the mirror or listened to your own words? Duh. It's all right there in front of you. Kids go out and bring this stuff to their classmates, just like this blog goes out and brings back all the cool news, where they amplify it and try to take it to the next level. You're thinking too hard when you start believing in this low self-esteem crap. It's a way to put the blame on something completely out of your control, instead of putting it partially within your control, and partially within society's control. Maybe the Taliban have a point. |
| Posted by: gorb 2006-07-18 18:50 |
| #35 Luckily...the Li'l Rexette is into Jr sizes where there's more choice. She still won't be caught dead in anything remotely associated with boy or hip hop. True about the cell phone thing. Refuses purse and case. Now, if I can just get her into camo (the real stuff) that would really increase our choices. |
| Posted by: Rex Mundi 2006-07-18 18:49 |
| #34 Keep the girls home, and they are gotten pregnant at home, Muhammed Hupinerong Clegum1377. Isn't that why there are so many honour killings in Pakistan? |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-07-18 18:37 |
| #33 Keep the girls out of school. Works everytime. |
| Posted by: Muhammed Hupinerong Clegum1377 2006-07-18 17:22 |
| #32 Sounds like we're mostly discussing dress and swagger. Where I works the dress is poor but the behavior is more than outrageous. Raise your hand if you've dealt with a preganant 5th grader. It's their parents |
| Posted by: 6 2006-07-18 17:19 |
| #31 Haha! Assimalate? My ass! |
| Posted by: Muhammed Hupinerong Clegum1377 2006-07-18 17:17 |
| #30 BA, Rex Mundi, the trailing daughters (ages 14 and 16) wear the long boy shorts as often as they wear the tiny girl ones, and the baggy, multi-pocketed boy pants as often as the hiphuggers. Their friends dress the same -- they prefer not carrying purses for the cell phone, etc when they are out and about. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-07-18 16:48 |
| #29 Very true, Rex. It seems that's ALL they sell. Probably some very heavily-invested agenda pushers up in corporate. Heck, I'm not that old (parent to 2 kids under 2), but I'm appaled at what's being displayed in Old Navy, Gap, and don't even get me started on the others like A&F. Heck, I still try to shop there for myself, but can't find any options. Seems to be the guys are headin' toward longer stuff (think about all the longer shorts you see now), while the girls stuff is getting shorter & tighter. Not any options. Of course, I wore parachute pants back in the day, and some of them were tight :>) |
| Posted by: BA 2006-07-18 16:12 |
| #28 What else is not being said is that it isn't that the stores are selling....that's ALL they are selling. Just try to buy jeans for a 10-13 yr old girl that aren't hipsters. It's almost impossible. We had to resort to buying jeans from Jrs dept and then getting them altered. That is truly sad commentary. |
| Posted by: Rex Mundi 2006-07-18 15:50 |
| #27 what are their PARENTS doing it for, in the case of the little ones? Training. That's how mom got dad and she's got to teach the little one early. That's what dad found attractive in mom, so why would he suddenly object? |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-18 15:31 |
| #26 hopes their daughter will get a part in the next Roman Polanski film? *ducks* |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-07-18 15:27 |
| #25 Wow, twenty more responces and there's been no incoming. I took cover for nuttin'. I definitely agree with BA. The stores sell the stuff cause it sells and it's the parents buying it. As a father of 3 "boys", 35, 24, 20, I paid particular attention to this and as I'm sure you all know, teenaged boys would find a full length burlap sack on a teenage girl sexy. So, it's obvious that the girls aren't dressing to attract the boys; so what ARE they doing it for? And, more to the point, what are their PARENTS doing it for, in the case of the little ones? |
| Posted by: AlanC 2006-07-18 15:19 |
| #24 ;-) |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-07-18 15:11 |
| #23 Neither have I, TW; but I've enough sense not to ask. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-18 15:02 |
| #22 Context please, Anonymoose? I've no idea what that means. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-07-18 14:58 |
| #21 Viagra is handing stuff I'd say. A quarter tab a day keeps my boots dry. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2006-07-18 14:49 |
| #20 "All you need is a fistfull of rubber bands and a pencil." -- old joke from The National Lampoon |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-07-18 14:37 |
| #19 What about dirty old men ? Nobody ever cares if we are drooling at young girls or our lip went to sleep. Where are all these girls, huh ? Where's my glasses ? |
| Posted by: wxjames 2006-07-18 14:14 |
| #18 I blame Bush! If only he stopped wearing these skimpy outfits and daring cleavages! |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2006-07-18 14:13 |
| #17 I blame Britney Spears. |
| Posted by: Angising Flurt9300 2006-07-18 14:10 |
| #16 Which is great education-wise, but doesn't give them the opportunity to function comfortably in the presence of the opposite sex. That's a bit of a canard. Two daughters through girls' school. They are two different people. The shy one is still shy. But at least she hasn't had to deal with 15 year old boys, which would probably have made her shier. The other one played only with boys when young and doesn't have trouble finding them now. Based on my experience as a teen and parent, most guys 13-18 are jerks a large percentage of the time. It's a period we have to go through but that doesn't make it nice. Most girls that age will get competitive in their efforts to gain the boys' attention. Even at an all girls school. Kids get plenty of time to see the opposite sex if they want to. religious groups, service groups, dances, etc. They never seem to have trouble finding each other. But best to keep them seperated at that age as much as possible in the class room, in my opinion. They've got plenty of time for remedial education. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-18 13:49 |
| #15 well said, tw. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-07-18 13:04 |
| #14 Are the fashions really more revealing than in the 1970s and 1980s? Truly? Because I remember wearing short skirts and cutoff tops, dance leotards and tight jeans, with never more thought than that it was fashionable and comfortable (I took a lot of dance classes). Granted, I was (and likely still am) naive and more than somewhat oblivious, so if I was garnering the wrong kind of attention nobody bothered to tell me. And certainly all the boys and young men I knew were perfect gentlemen always. When I was young all the girls (except my sister and I) had Barbie dolls, each of which had a large wardrobe of fashionable and seductive clothing, often enough made by the girl's mother. Now they have Bratz dolls, ditto, but the girls (if the trailing daughters are anything to go by) get them at a younger age and get tired of them younger -- and think of the clothes only as "dress up" items without noting the skimpiness thereof. I have seen very young girls dressed as if they are 18...or 25. That results from inappropriate parental or grandparental choices -- the girls like the colour, or the fancy trims, or the texture of the fabric, or that they are gifts, and have no thought of boyish (or manly) response because they aren't thinking in those terms yet. I've seen boys that age dressed inappropriatedly, too -- generally shorts and a t-shirt with no coat all through the winter due to similar mis-parenting... not a class or income-based thing as far as I can tell, but busy parents who don't want to fight with their kids in the morning. And the boys continue such nonsense all the way through high school -- I can't imagine what the district spends on heating to keep the buildings warm enough in winter, but they do. Parents who want their children to be in single-sex situations generally send them to private schools. Which is great education-wise, but doesn't give them the opportunity to function comfortably in the presence of the opposite sex. (Think of the stereotype of the wild Catholic schoolgirl -- real enough, sadly.) Certainly I was shy enough as a child that if I'd been in that situation I wouldn't have known that males are people rather than sexual/romantic objects. So I'm grateful my parents didn't choose that for me. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-07-18 13:00 |
| #13 Lileks had a piece a few years back with a similar theme. He wrote something like, maybe I do think I'm a better parent than you when you allow your teenage daughter walks down the aisle in the airplane with "sexy butt" (or something like that!) plastered across the backside of her short, shorts. It was good. Wish I could quote it better. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-07-18 12:39 |
| #12 Uniforms. BTW, the single sex class thing almost always gets shut down by the courts. Some schools are taking this seriously. I was waiting in the admin office to speak at a high school a couple of years ago. There was a scantily clad maiden there whose mom showed up with a bag of more appropriate clothes so she could return to class. |
| Posted by: 11A5S 2006-07-18 12:22 |
| #11 Yup. That is an excellent idea. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-18 11:21 |
| #10 One Principle in Washington DC experimented. He arranged the class schedule so that the coed school had single-sex classes. Grades improved all around. Girls no longer were afraid of looking too smart in front of the guys. Guys were no longer afraid of looking foolish in front of the girls. Grades increased. I think schools should be trying this sort of thing more-often. Perhaps entire districts could get into the game and make specific schools all boys and all girls if things work out. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2006-07-18 11:12 |
| #9 Not only clothes - but toys. Look at |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2006-07-18 10:37 |
| #8 (social progressive) We can't stop them from acting like pole dancers. We'll just have to teach them poletrick safety, that's all. (/social progressive) |
| Posted by: eLarson 2006-07-18 10:27 |
| #7 Take cover, Alan, but I agree with you. Often times "the apple falls not far from the tree." Mom probably dresses the same way. I'm completely aghast at what the stores sell nowadays (especially to girls) as "clothes." Listen, I'm no puritan, but good grief. However, the free market side of me says, "Well they must be selling that stuff like hotcakes." So, I pin it on the parents. Often, the parents model that behavior themselves OR buy the crap. I mean, no 2nd grader is buying clothes by themselves if the parents really have any interest in their child's well being. Teenage years may be different, because the child has a job, makes $, and buys the clothes him/herself. But, 2nd graders (and I second your point about the younger kids...my wife taught kindergarten too, and saw this in some of her 5 year olds). Of course, long story short, she found out one of her girl's mom was a single-mom stripper who freakin' took her 5 year old to the club while she "worked." |
| Posted by: BA 2006-07-18 10:23 |
| #6 Damn, you better take cover, Alan. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-07-18 09:35 |
| #5 If 8 year old girls are flaunting their bodies "because they had low self-esteem" there is a problem. My wife is a kindergarten teacher and sees this type of thing a lot. The girls come to school in outfits that you would expect on the backup singers of a gangsta rap video as young as second grade. We live in one of the most conservative areas of a bright blue state. I do have a serious question for all the people in RB of the female persuasion. To the statement " girls wore short skirts to get attention " exactly what type of attention are these girls expecting? When teens or 20 somethings wear "attractive" clothes of the body revealing kind, what do these women think they will attract? What do they WANT to attract? |
| Posted by: AlanC 2006-07-18 09:23 |
| #4 If 8 year old boys are shoving their hands up and under 8 year old girl's skirts to "get rid of their anger", there is a problem. |
| Posted by: Thinemp Whimble2412 2006-07-18 08:43 |
| #3 So basically they send in government agents to administer "political reeducation". It's been done, overdone even. |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2006-07-18 08:02 |
| #2 More girls? |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-07-18 07:59 |
| #1 Birmingham's sexual health charity, the Brook Advisory Clinic, also expressed concerns over children being exposed to sexual material. "We've been handing out condoms to teens and telling them for years now that if it feels good, they should do it. I can't understand what went wrong?" |
| Posted by: Mike 2006-07-18 07:21 |