Teenagers' Practices of Online Sexualization and Sexting in Bulgaria
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Teenagers’ practices of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Media Studies: New Media and Digital Culture at the Graduate School of Humanities at the University of Amsterdam Word count: 22 836 0 Table of Contents Table of Contents 1 Abstract 4 Acknowledgments 5 Theoretical Framework 7 An online self 7 Children online 7 Sexualization 9 Technology and Intimacy 10 Terms of Service 11 Sexual Education 13 The state of the affair in Bulgaria 14 Cultural differences 16 Law 16 Research question 16 Hypotheses 17 Methodology 18 Empirical Research 18 Dealing with the concepts 20 Finding and recruiting participants 21 Questionnaire formation 23 Analyzing the data 23 General Remarks 23 Findings and discussion 25 Platform Usage and Digital Privacy 25 Internet Usage 25 Platform Usage 26 Creating an account before the age of 13 28 General Data Protection Regulation 30 Education 30 Sexual education 30 Media Literacy Education 32 Awareness of the risks online 34 Attitudes towards digital privacy 36 1 Civil Education in Bulgaria and the teaching staff issue 37 Current initiatives and the Third Sector 40 Promoting abstinence 40 Taboo 41 Generation X 42 Online sexualization 43 The importance of social media for self-actualization 43 Girly stuff 44 The impact of social media on teenagers’ intimate relationships 45 Teenager’s sexual exploration 46 Pornography 47 Vanity metrics 48 Is social media sexualizing? 50 The warriors and the groups 51 Gender difference and the double standards 54 Role Models 55 Sexting 56 How widespread is the issue? 56 Why stats might be misleading? 57 How often do photos leak? 58 What are the channels? 59 Sexting practices with adults 59 Discussing Consent 60 Collections 60 Trust 61 Porn for revenge 62 Blaming the victim 63 What happens after a scandal? 65 What is next? Recommendations and challenges 66 Digital Literacy 66 The debate in Bulgaria about sexual education and sexting 67 Introducing sexual education at schools 68 How should sexal education be taught? 70 Pedagogical methods 72 Technological vs human solution 73 Parental education 74 Test group 75 Conclusions 75 2 Teenagers’ experiences of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria and their attitudes towards digital privacy 77 The balance of risks and opportunities 78 Educating teenagers about sexting and sexualization 78 Recommendations 79 Limitations 80 Suggestions for further research 81 Conclusion 82 Bibliography Anonymous Interviews 92 Appendix 93 Appendix 1 Terms of Service 93 Appendix 2 94 Appendix 3 Criminal Code 95 Appendix 4 Interviewing the teenagers. Ethics 96 Consent Forms 97 Appendix 5 Experts 98 Appendix 6 Interview Questions 101 Interview questions: Teenagers 102 Interview questions: Parents 107 Interview questions: Psychologist 108 Interview questions: Third Sector 109 Interview questions: Educators 110 Interview questions: The Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre 111 Interview questions: Loveguide (Bulgarian YouTube channel about sex, targeting teenagers) 111 Appendix 7 Audio files 112 Appendix 8 The Stories of Sexting Practices 113 What is on the sexts? 113 Personal stories 113 Appendix 9 Platform Usage Results 122 Appendix 10 Third Sector Initiatives 123 3 Abstract This research studies the social metamorphosis of teenage intimate communication brought by digital media. The paper presents the findings of a field work in Bulgaria exploring teenagers’ practices of online sexualization and sexting. It analyzes the stories of fourteen teenagers who talk about the way they balance risks and opportunities online, the peer pressure they face and their motivations to engage in the above mentioned practices. The analysis is enhanced by the point of view of two parents, one school psychologist and four experts who bring political, economic, social, religious and ethnic specifics into the debate. The research presents five initial hypotheses which are later on investigated and comes up with recommendations for legislative reforms. 4 Acknowledgments I would like to thank my lecturers for sparking my curiosity and introducing me to the academic discipline of New Media. I would like to thank my supervisor dhr. dr. Johannes Simons for his support, understanding and guidelines. This research would have been impossible without my participants. Thank you so much for trusting me and sharing your stories with me. 5 Introduction: the new old anxieties New media technologies have transformed the way people meet, communicate, work and entertain themselves. All the endless opportunities come with serious risks and there is a need for discussion and legislation on important issues such as safety and privacy in the digital world. Internet has afforded the spreading of phenomena, which have long existed offline but are now mediated online. A lot of our safety and privacy concerns, including the e-crimes are actually “old anxieties” (Lee et al.), such as exposure to violent material, child pornography, grooming and sexual abuse, cyber bullying, identity theft and fraud, hate speech and radicalization among others. This research is going to delve into the topics of online sexualization and sexting among teenagers and is going to explore the tensions between the risks and opportunities associated with them. To begin with, a theoretical framework will be presented, addressing the hot debates in the academic literature. The case study of Bulgaria will be brought up, outlining country specific characteristics on the topic. Next, the research questions will be formulated, followed by hypotheses. The methodology section of this paper justifies the choice of empirical research and provides detailed account of my research practices. The findings are grouped in themes which were developed based on the theoretical framework. The five main themes are 1) Platform Usage and Digital Privacy, 2) Education, 3) Online Sexualization, 3) Sexting and 4) Legislation Recommendations. They relate to one or more respective research questions. The conclusion gives an overview of the research project and compares the findings with the initial hypotheses. 6 Theoretical Framework An online self The Internet has transformed the ways in which we present ourselves, explore the world, communicate, learn and participate in society. People have created online identities, and terms such as ‘online self’ have emerged to describe these online lives. In her book “Life on the Screen”, Turkle explores the online identities that users create. As this research was done back in 1995, the affordances of past technology differ greatly to the modern day ones. The main focus of her study is how we choose characters in games and live a dual life simultaneously. In contrast to the Multi-User Domains (MUD) space which Turkle explores, creating an online identity on social media can be an identity that fully or partially corresponds to our offline one. According to Facebook’s Terms of Service, one is prohibited from creating an account for anyone other than themselves (Facebook Terms of Service, Section 4.1.). Children online A child is anyone under the age of 18 according to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UN CRC). From a historical point of view, today we are living in an age of ‘extended youth’ because young people stay young for longer – by studying longer and being economically dependent on their families. However, in juxtaposition to the latter point, people are also becoming independent/mature much earlier in regard to sexuality, leisure and consumption (Gadlin in Livingstone). 7 Considered a vulnerable group, children’s digital rights, safety and privacy have become a new issue of scholarly and public interest. Online challenges such as the game Blue Whale, blamed for the suicide of teenagers around the world, have raised great concerns about the use of digital technology by children (BBC). As such, computer games have received both supporting and critical stances from the public. Raising awareness and educating children on media literacy has become a priority in the school curriculum in many countries. In a recent report, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) highlighted ten key messages about children’s rights in the digital age (Third et al.), such as self-actualisation through media use and balancing risk and opportunity. Teenagers are an age category which is particularly interesting and worth looking at, because while they are legally children, their rights (digital among others) and desires differ significantly. For example, according to the Terms of Service, children above the age of 13 can use the platforms Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, WhatsApp, YouTube, and Pinterest. Thus, the affordances of those platforms are the same (with some exceptions discussed here) regardless of whether the user is above 13 or 18, while the risks may be greater for the minors. This paper is going to delve into “the complex spirals of pleasure and danger” (Karaian, p.66) by investigating the practices of sexualization and sexting. Both concepts are portmanteau and stand for “sexual socialization” and “sex texting”. The topic relates to a broad spectrum of academic disciplines, such as sociology, philosophy, anthropology and communication studies among others and thus can be approached differently. As a new media researcher, I am approaching it in view of the intersection of technology and humanities. 8 Sexualization Sexualization is a broad term with varying definitions. Papadopoulos (p.23) defines it as “the imposition of adult sexuality on to children and young people before they are capable of dealing with it, mentally, emotionally or physically. It does not apply to self-motivated sexual play, nor to the dissemination of age-appropriate material about sexuality.” The problem with this definition is that when it comes to the use of social media and instant messaging apps, teenagers may claim to practice ‘self-motivated sexual play’ and to have each other’s consent, which raises the debate around their rights of sexual exploration and the opportunities which new media affords and the risks associated with it.