Teenagers' Practices of Online Sexualization and Sexting in Bulgaria

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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. It is a popular belief in mass media and the general public that social media proliferated this phenomenon by vanity metrics such as likes, comments and shares and we often see titles such as “How social media has changed the dynamic between teen girls and boys” (Johnson). Girls are reported to feel obliged to display their bodies in underwear online, while boys, in “a hyper-masculine way, […] to show off muscles” (Ringrose in Papadopoulos, p.8).

The problem is also framed around the bigger picture of whether sex should be spoken of publicly or stay as something private, and how this may differ across cultures. While some consider sexualization as sexual liberation, for others sex should stay private. The topic also leads to a broader discussion of sexual abuse and new affordances for bullying.

Pornography as an industry is blamed by certain feminists such as Catherine Mackinon and Andrea Dworkin among others, for objectifying women (Seidman, p.99) and creating unrealistic expectations about sex. On the other hand, it is seen as a liberation and societal development by libertarians (Seidman, p.100). What classifies as pornography is another debate which this paper aims to touch upon. The famous quote

“I know it when I see it” by Potter Stewart, now a colloquial term, was originally used in a pornographic case in the United States Supreme Court in 1964. Today, teenage persecution is one of the hot debates in the United States because of recent cases of arrested minors distributing pornographic material.

Cummings (p.10-11) highlights the problems of perceiving nudity as pornography and forgetting about children’s’ participatory rights. Albury and Crawford (p.471) call against the restrictive attitudes towards the production of sexual images by teenagers.

Technology and Intimacy

Technology has changed the intimate relationships between humans. From bots who comfort children and the elderly to sexbots, more and more inhumane objects are becoming intimate companions. Another aspect of teenagers’ sexualization and sexual exploration is sexting. It is only one aspect of the bigger story of cybersex which involves the communication of sexually explicit messages online. Its emergence is almost ‘natural’ as historically love messages followed technological determinism in the form of letters, polaroid photos, telephone sex, and sex chat rooms. “Computer screens are the new location for our fantasies, both erotic and intellectual.” (Turkle, Screen, p.26) Nowadays teledildonics and other haptic media enable cybersex to take physical forms too.

Sexting is “the creation and sharing of personal sexual images or text messages via mobile phones or Internet applications, including Facebook, Snapchat and email” (Hasinoff, Panic, p.1). To explain the term further, it “can, therefore, refer to communication that is voluntary or involuntary, serious or humorous, public or private, trivial or significant, pleasurable or hurtful.” (Livingstone et al, Children, p.152). Legislation regarding sexting varies depending on the country, but in the vast majority of

countries sexting under the age of 18 is illegal. There is a public debate, especially in the USA, around the criminalization of sexting. Hasinoff has done extensive research on the moral panic around the issue. The risks associated with sexting online include sexual abuse, grooming, and breach of privacy, which can be considered serious and legitimate reasons for panic. However, she calls for shifting the attention from blaming the victims of privacy violations, to raising awareness about consent. What is more, she claims that as a society we blame the ‘sexters’ more than the people who harass and distribute sexts without consent. This also connects to a larger debate about victim blaming in sexual assault cases.

Another hot issue is “sextortion” which is defined by the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) as “blackmail in which sexual information or images are used to extort sexual favours and/or money from the victim.” The National Crime Agency in the UK reports for a high increase in the number of the victims in the past years including teenagers (Whitworth, 2018).

Uploading sexual content is also a violation of the Terms of Service published by social media platforms (see Appendix 1 for examples). Snapchat offers the affordance of sending a message or a video to another Snapchat user which he/she can only see for a certain amount of time, ranging from 3 to 10 seconds. By agreeing to the Snapchat Terms of Service, and producing content with the application, a user gives the platform the right to “a worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable and transferable licence to host, to store, use, display, reproduce, modify, adapt, edit, publish and distribute that content” (Snapchat).

Studies and popular media, however, suggest that there is a discrepancy between the terms of service and the actual practices of users. Even though Snap Inc explicitly prohibits pornographic content (see Appendix 1), Snapchat has won its fame for the ultimate sexting app. In addition to the Terms of Service, the community guidelines of Snapchat have a section devoted to Adult content. Again, it remains unclear who will be the one to judge which depiction of nudity is non-sexual as examples are not given besides breastfeeding which is mentioned explicitly and in this case shows the company’s culture of supporting breastfeeding as a non-sexual act. The act of breastfeeding is also an issue of hot debates around the world. There is a special section detailing the guidelines for minors which prohibits any form of sexual material.

Studies (such as Albury and Crowford) have explored young people’s expectations of privacy and the results show that they care about their privacy and expect high level of confidentiality when sharing personal information, including intimate data such as sexts. By performing both media discourse analysis and empirical research with young people, McGovern et al. found out that while the perceptions in the media are mostly negative, teenagers’ perceptions are much more diverse. Contrary to the panic in popular media, a very small minority of teenagers have had upsetting experiences with sexting (Mitchel et al). This can be explained with the fact that teenagers mainly sext with their partners and it is consensual. Popular media tend to blame the victims of privacy violations when it comes to sexting and not the person who executed it (Hasinoff, Panic, p.133).

In the academic literature there is a predominance of cases from Western Europe, USA, Australia but not much academic research done in Eastern Europe. It is worth investigating both teenage practices and attitudes in this geographical area, and the attitudes of organisations directly involved in digital safety and literacy.

Sexual Education

Although this research is interested in sexual education focusing on the issues of online sexualisation and sexting, it is important to explore the general level of sexual education teenagers receive. Zimmerman traced the history of sex education and the dilemmas raised by community planners, religious institutions, legal authorities, schools and parents. Discussing teenage sexuality is never a topic on its own, it is used as “an instrument to manage and an indicator of the moral health of a nation.” (Lee at al, 41) The philosophy of sex education is one that can mirror political debates. Lewis and Knijn discuss the political agenda present in the approaches the UK take in sex education, in comparison to the Netherlands where sex education is not an arena for that.

The Netherlands’ curriculum Long Live Love is given as an example of a country which teaches sexual education starting at the age of four, applying a positive approach which focuses on love. For example, at the age of 4, children are discussing hugs and when people hug. In the USA, sex education varies significantly by state, but according to Orenstein is focused on physical acts and dangers, rather than on sexual pleasure.

Zimmerman discusses the idea of a “global right to sex education” (p.123) and the varying approaches countries have taken to address the issue. The Declaration on Sexual Rights of 2008 is “an apotheosis of sorts” (p.125) for Zimmerman. UNESCO presented standard guidelines for sex education which provoked criticism by some national experts.

The state of the affair in Bulgaria

The policy making in Bulgaria is vague and has left every school to decide how to approach the topic of sexual education. This gives schools freedom but it also means that sex education is open to subjective opinions, putting the quality of lessons at risk. Sex education is part of the subject Civil Education, which is currently an elective in Bulgaria as a separate subject but can also be integrated in other compulsory ones. This paper will explore the question of whose responsibility it is to educate teenagers about sexual culture.

The project Safeguarding Teenage Intimate Relationships (STIR) concluded that the competency of teachers in Bulgaria is insufficient and the education system has relied on the third sector to develop initiatives on sexual education (STIR, 19) This research interviews representatives of a Third sector organization teaching sexual education to explore this further. The statistics show that the majority of teaching staff are approaching retirement, which leaves a huge generation gap between them and their teenage pupils (see Appendix 2).

A local newspaper in Bulgaria calls sexting “the disease of the youth” (NDT Newspaper). It is classified as a “Danger” on the website of the Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre. The center also initiated a campaign, #облечисебе (#dressup) where teenagers are encouraged to post selfies dressed up with as many clothes on as possible, as an antidote of the early online sexualization. Hasinoff and Shepherd critique the “abstinence-only” advice given by educators, and encourage a public debate. Their policy advice is to shift the attention of the campaigns from abstinence to a discussion of when it is ok to share a photo. This research project interviews representatives of the Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre to find out more about their motivations and aims.

LoveGuide is a YouTube channel and a website which teaches Sexual Education to teenagers in Bulgaria. The founders won funding from Nova TV’s challenge The Change. This once again shows that the gap in teenagers’ sexual education has been noticed by the media and third sector initiatives. The website offers tips on sex and the internet. The research is interested to find out whether the teenage participants know about it and if they have used the website or follow the channel.

As the table below shows, according to Eurostat (Teenage and older mothers in the EU) data of 2015, Bulgaria is in second place (11.9%) for the highest share of births of first children to teenage mothers.

The rate of teenage pregnancies in Bulgaria is high and this is explained mainly with the Roma minorities living in the country who give birth much earlier in comparison to the ethnic Bulgarian teenagers.

Cultural differences

Culturally, Bulgaria is more conservative when speaking about intimate issues. As the issue of sexualization and sexting is closely related to society’s attitudes towards sexual pleasure, it is worth looking at the country’s value dimension of Indulgence. Hofstede Insights defines this value as “the extent to which people try to control their desires and impulses, based on the way they were raised”. Bulgaria scores low on the value dimension of Indulgence which makes it a “Restrained society”, characterized by pessimism, cynicism, people who behave guided by social norms and who perceive indulgence as “somewhat wrong”.

Unlike countries like the Netherlands, where homosexual relationships are normalized, in Bulgaria there is still a stigma towards the “queer community”. Thus, it can be speculated that there will be a problematic political debate in how sex education will be taught and whether information regarding homosexual sex will be included.

Law

The Criminal Code of the Republic of Bulgaria (Article 159) (see Appendix 3) does not mention sexting explicitly, nor does it clearly define pornography.

Research question

The main research question this paper is going to pose and explore is

RQ1: “What are teenagers’ experiences of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria and what are their attitudes towards digital privacy?”.

The sub-questions the research aims to answer are RQ2: “What are the tensions between the balance of risks and opportunities in the context of online sexualization and sexting?” and RQ3: “How should we, as a society, educate teenagers (in Bulgaria) about sexting and online sexualization?”

Hypotheses

Prior to conducting the research and based on the review of the affair, the following speculations are made:

1. Teenagers are likely to start using social media platforms before they are legally allowed to do so. 2. Online sexualization is present and is likely to be driven by vanity metrics. 3. Media, educators and the Third sector in Bulgaria see sexting as risky, indecent and an issue that needs prevention. 4. Teachers and parents are likely to be inadequate in keeping up with the digital lives of teenagers which poses a challenge to teenagers’ online security. 5. The fact that sex education is not a compulsory part of the curriculum, coupled with culture-specific characteristics (such as a lack of dialogue on sensitive topics such as sex and sexting) is likely to leave Bulgarian teenagers in a disadvantaged position.

Methodology

This section gives an account of the reasons for choosing an empirical research as the best-suited method and a detailed explanation of the question formation. I would like to acknowledge the fact that in New Media studies, more contemporary research practices, such as digital methods (Rogers) and data visualization are common, and thus, my method is not in vogue with the New Media scholarships. However, to answer my research questions satisfactorily, more traditional methods had to be used.

Empirical Research

A semi-structured interview is the method which would enable to gather in-depth insights into the practices and motivations of teenagers. This format allows a degree of comparison and analysis while leaving room for expanding on points relevant only for the specific participant. The work of Crang and Cook was valuable reference in my preparation for the field work. A survey would have provided the collection of more data and thus more representative results for the country. However, it would not have allowed for the researcher to ask additional questions when applicable which is crucial for answering the research question. What is more, the validity of who is actually taking the survey cannot be guaranteed. One focus group was used as a test group.

The EU Kids Online is a large collaborative project which produced extensive research on children’s use of the Internet in Europe. “Safeguarding Teenage Intimate Relationships” (Stiritup) is another research project based in five European countries which also has collected valuable data on the topic. Bulgaria has been one of the participating countries in both of those projects, thus, up-to-date quantitative data

already exists. The results of this research aim to complement the existing studies with more extensive qualitative research.

What makes this research different is the fact that it is interested in capturing teenagers’ own experiences and practices and is not interested in their attitudes towards the issue. Thus, no questions are scenario-based as had been the case in multiple prior studies, such as Hasinoff and Shepherd. If a participant replies “No” to a prerequisite question such as “Have you ever received a sexually explicit image”, there will not be follow up questions, exploring “what if” scenarios. McGovern et al. perform an online survey and a focus group to capture both perceptions and experiences of sexting. My set of questions, on the contrary, requires a one-to-one interviewing (with the exception of a couple of scenario-based questions used in the test focus group). Thus all results represent actual practices and not attitudes. As the questions would be directly related to them, it was important to approach the teenagers in a friendly manner which would make them comfortable to share intimate data.

Livingstone has interviewed teenagers by inviting them to show her their social media accounts and to discuss their motivation for posting the information they have posted. In my research, I suggested to the teenagers to share personal stories and examples of online sexualization and sexting if they feel comfortable doing so.

Studies have been done regarding the sexualization of girls but no much attention has been paid on exploring the extent to which it affects boys. Prior to the interviews, a great concern was whether any male teenagers would volunteer to take part in the research given that the researcher is a female. The representativeness of male participants was of great importance because across the academic literature on the topic, there is a larger representativeness of the female perspective. Hasinoff & Shepherd (2948) highlight as a limitation of their focus groups research the fact that it was with female participants only and they suggest a larger sample for a future research which can mark

the gender differences better. Another suggestion of theirs is for the legal and educational practices regarding sexting to be evaluated which is what my research aims to do.

Dealing with the concepts

Referring to the Urban dictionary, Karaian argues that teenagers do not define their practice as sexting and this is a definition constructed by the media (64). The word was considered by the New Oxford American Dictionary for a word of the year in 2009 but “unfriend” won instead (Oxforddictionaries.com). This shows that the term itself is relatively new. Gill disagrees with the generalization of the term sexualization when it is used “within a violent generalizing logic” and she uses it in “scare quotes” in her paper to convey her strong position against it (Gill, 139).

The word sexting is not popular in Bulgaria. It is not a dictionary entry in the latest versions of Bulgarian dictionaries. If searched in Google.bg one can observe a predominance of lifestyle magazines with tabloid style articles discussing tips on sexting, rather than discussing the topic itself. Sexualization is a dictionary entry; however, it is not widely used. As the teenagers might not be familiar with the meaning of those concepts, they were gradually introduced during the interviews, rather than used without defining. Every concept in the interview questions was defined to the participants to make sure that they fully understand the question. The experts were also asked if they need clarification of any terms.

“Sexting is the act of exchanging messages, images or videos of a sexual nature through digital communication platforms such as text message, social media or mobile apps. It refers explicitly to self-generated content.” (Kidscape) This definition of sexting does differ from Hasinoff’s definition cited above in one significant aspect. As can be

seen, different definitions of sexting mention specific channels of distribution of sexually explicit content. Some definitions perceive sexting as referring to self-generated content only. The interview questions in this research specifically distinguish between self-generated and other content when discussing sexting; participants are directly asked questions such as “Have you ever sent a sexually suggestive message online? (of yourself or otherwise); Have you ever received a sexually suggestive photo? (of the person you are communicating with). Was it naked or semi-naked?”

Finding and recruiting participants

The focus group of this study are teenagers (both female and male), aged 14-18, living in Bulgaria. The data set consists of twenty-one private interviews and one focus group. I interviewed fourteen teenagers where the gender ratio of the participants is nine girls and five boys. Eleven interviews were conducted in the High School I attended and three via Skype. I also interviewed two parents and one school psychologist who wished to remain anonymous and four experts who gave me permission to use their real names.

The focus group was conducted with students from one class who volunteered and the purpose was to serve as a test group. I was interested to see if the teenagers would react differently when they are with their peers as opposed to when we speak in private. Twelve people participated in the focus group, three of whom were also interviewed privately.

According to Poole, a researcher needs to spend time with the children to break the ice and make them trust the researcher before asking sensitive questions. The research deals with sensitive information and all measures have been taken to conduct it in an ethical manner. More information about my approach in interviewing the participants

and the ethics of this research, together with a link to all signed Consent Forms can be found in Appendix 4.

It is important to briefly introduce the five experts and their specific expert fields in order to show the different perspectives they represent and how they are engaged with the topic. More detailed information about the experts and the organizations they represent can be found in Appendix 5.

Georgi Apostolov is the Coordinator of Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre. Apostolov and his colleagues receive signals of online aggression and crimes, organise campaigns and take part in international conferences. They provide training and work on developing methodologies on online safety; they also train trainers which is the way to reach more children.

Margarita Kaleynska teaches Civil Education in a Bulgarian University and is the Head of GLOW Association, which has been teaching Sex Education in Bulgaria for 18 years.

Neda Shishmanova is a final- year student at high school and a Youth trainer at Leadership academy Glow. She has trained teenagers on the topics of sexual education and online image. I was interested in her point of view because she is both a teenager and a creator of the sex education game “Rano Mi e”.

Nadya Zdravkova is a co-founder of LoveGuide (introduced above). She is teaching Sex Education through the website and YouTube channel and as a guest speaker in schools.

The fifth expert is working both as a teacher, teaching the subjects of Psychology and Philosophy in a high school and as the school psychologist in the same school.

Questionnaire formation

The interview questionnaire for the teenagers consist of 60 questions which can be found in Appendix 6 together with a very detailed explanation of the process of question formation. A different set of questions was prepared for all the different experts with some main questions being present in all of them.

Analyzing the data

For conducting the interviews and analyzing the data, I have followed Raymond’s guidelines. All interviews were audio recorded, ordered, named and can be accessed via a link in Appendix 7. During the fieldwork, I aimed to interview the participants in a professional and impartial way. Since the topic is highly personal and sensitive, I was empathetic with the participants and my intellectual judgement is only projected in this thesis and was not shown during the interview process. I was taking minimal, verbatim notes during the interviews. In the analysis, a spreadsheet was used to record the answers, which can be accessed via a link in Appendix 7. In addition to that, important quotes were transcribed and used in this thesis to illustrate examples in the narrative. All interviews were conducted in Bulgarian and all translations of the quotes were made by me.

General Remarks

My research aims to assess the issue of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria and to compare the results with international studies on the topic. The issue is part of

larger debates of sexual harassment and sexualization of the childhood among others, which will be touched upon but will not be the focus of this paper. It is important to note that when making comparisons to previous studies, those are aimed only as tentative analogy, as the age group and gender ratio of the samples differ. Thus, the comparisons are not absolute.

Teenagers tend to generalize a lot which I found listening to the extent to which they use nobody and everybody. They live in somewhat closed environments. When they say everyone, I believe they mean everyone I know, in my age.

640 234 young people (aged 10-19) are living in Bulgaria as of 31 December 2017 (NSI). The sample of teenagers is not representative for the Bulgarian youth and my conclusions are only based on the collected data, thus should not be generalized for the whole of Bulgaria. Roma and Turkish minorities live in Bulgaria and their religion and cultural specifics often differ from the ones common for the ethnic Bulgarians. Thus, the research lacks the point of view of a variety of ethnic groups. One of the teenagers interviewed identifies as Roma but his replies did not stand out as different.

The participants who volunteered to take part in the survey through skype have seen my call online and are people who are generally interested in this topic. Thus, their replies might be affected by their previous knowledge of the topic. In the school, nobody has a previous experience being taught about/ participating in a project/event on the topic. One of my skype interviewees is volunteering for the Youth Council in her hometown where she was involved in initiatives on the topic and her attention was drawn to my research when she saw the Facebook post where I was recruiting participants. She admits that the fact that she is “into the topic” has influenced her decision not to sext because she is well aware of the risks.

The students in the school were all volunteers. Their parents also had to agree to their participation in the research. The fact that the research was happening in the school might have made some students reluctant to take part. What is more, the ones who have been involved in a sexting scandal, might have avoided the research on purpose. During our interview, I gave Elena a definition of sexting and asked her if she had ever come across it as a practice. She immediately started talking about a classmate who was about to join my research. “She didn’t come [to the interview]. And she didn’t come exactly because of this. Because her mother didn’t let her. She was in a lot of trouble because of this type of pictures.” Summaries of the stories and commentaries I collected and more detailed descriptions of my examples can be found in Appendix 8. All stories have been analyzed in the next section.

Direct quotations are used as subheadings when they summarize accurately the point made in the section. Asterisks are used to replace some profanity words in citations.

Findings and discussion

Platform Usage and Digital Privacy

Internet Usage

97% of Bulgarian children aged 9-17 use Internet (Hajdinjak et al, 4). Livingstone et al (63) report that 61% of Bulgarian teenagers, when at home, use internet in their own bedroom. As globally, the use of mobile devices has increased, it is likely that even more teenagers nowadays do not use a shared computer. EU Kids Online classify

Bulgaria as a country where “use of mobile phones is above average, but use of other handheld devices is below average” (Livingstone et al, 289).

Apostolov begins our conversation by making a remark of how old-fashioned it is to classify as teenagers the children aged 14 because of the early puberty. 50 % of Bulgarian children are online before they turn 7. Those who mainly play games and watch videos are passive IT users. The interest for active online participation grows at the age of 11. This key moment is when the risk becomes higher and teenagers get exposed to harmful content such as websites which promote bulimia and anorexia and websites with suicidal content among others.

Platform Usage

All teenagers interviewed are minors and study in a public school. In the focus group, 1 teenager was 18 years old. A table with the results of the platform usage of the interviewed teenagers and a comparison of those to the results of the Global Kids Online data from 2016 can be found in Appendix 9. Facebook and Messenger are the most popular Social Networking Sites, used by all of the teenagers followed by Instagram (92.9%), Snapchat (78.6%) and Viber (57.1%). Two (14.3%) teenagers have used Tinder, although one needs to be over 18 years old to do so according to the application’s Terms of Service.

I ask Stoyan how often he uses Facebook, and his instant reply is: “24/7, 365 days a year”. His response illustrates how intertwined the online and offline lives of the teenagers are . A few of the students replied that they created their profiles when they were in fashion. They did sound as if they did not necessarily need to be part of those social media platforms, but they could not miss out because that was the trend. “We don’t send texts because this is a past fashion” explains Stoyan. Carolina says she had

“no need” to create a Facebook profile because she prefers to talk to people and Viber and Skype are enough for this. However, her classmates had a Facebook group of the class where important messages were shared and she ended up missing information by not having an account. Fashion and peer pressure are two key motivations in teenagers’ decision-making process about whether to engage in specific activities. Those are key factors that need to be taken into consideration when designing methods to approach them.

When I ask Elena if on her newsfeed there are sexually provocative images and text, she answers with “They are not on Facebook. They get forwarded on Messenger, Snapchat”. Messenger started as a chat on Facebook and later on was transformed into a separate instant messaging application and a platform. Messenger however remains property of Facebook Inc. Teenagers talk about it as if it is a different, private channel. Thus the teenagers do not feel “watched” as a post on the Facebook Newsfeed makes them feel. The private aspect of the messaging applications creates a somewhat false idea of intimacy.

I ask Carolina how many friends she has on Snapchat and she says “I don’t know, around 100, or 200”. This suggests that although she claims to be concerned about her online content production and consumption, she is not aware of the target audience of her own posts, and “snaps” in this case. When Ivan’s son started using Snapchat, his dad installed the application as well as a form of parent mediation. He knows that teenagers share content from parties, such as drunk photos in the app and wanted to stay in the loop with his son’s activity on the application.

The teenagers in the focus group talked about Snapchat’s feature of keeping a Snapstreak - this is an icon next to a users’ name, serving as a badge which means that you send each other snaps for more than 3 consecutive days. This icon illustrates that you created a bond through snaps. The gamification apparently works successfully on

the teenagers from this focus group because they shared that when one keeps a Snapstreak with a friend, they feel closer and can ask each other for a favour. Another point of discussion was the platform usage and how the content they upload differentiates across platforms. “Snapchats is for secrets” commented the teenagers. This again confirms the platform’s fame as a sexting and parties app.

Snapchat has the affordance of sending a notification if another user has “screenshotted” a snap or parts of a video. The teenagers in the focus group talked about the applications used to record one’s screen which means they do not need to screenshot a snap, and thus the person will not receive a notification. What is more, they enable a whole video to be recorded. In this way even the safest application for explicit content becomes vulnerable. This comes to suggest that technological solutions to privacy breach are inadequate, and this is an argument which will be further explored in this paper.

Creating an account before the age of 13

As discussed in the Theoretical Framework, users need to be at least 13 to create an account in most Social Networking Platforms. However, children aged 8 and 9 are part of social media and even if an email verification is needed, they easily create a fake email account of the parent and give themselves the required permission.

All of the participants of this research had their first Facebook account before they turned 13, the majority saying they were around 10 or 11. Preslava claims to have had her account since she was 7 or 8. For the rest of the platforms, the teenagers were over 13 when they started using them. It is important to note that Instagram became trendy in Bulgaria (and generally) much later than Facebook, so when discussing the age when the teenagers first created an account, this is a factor to have in mind. This can

also be seen in teenagers’ responses, trying to recall when they started using a certain app based on when it became “trendy”.

Yana created her first profile on Facebook with her mum’s name when she was 10 to play a game. Then when she turned 13, she created her own one. Ivan’s son created a Facebook account before he turned 13 without a picture and used it cautiously. This shows that even when teenagers break the rules, they are concerned. His dad warned him that this is illegal but a huge factor plays the fact that “everyone” has it and this is really important for teenagers. The balance is thus assessed individually, whether to “limit” your child and to what extent. Teddy admits that when she was in 4th grade, her older sister had a Facebook account, which is the only reason why she wanted an account too. This confirms experts’ observations that the practices of older siblings are often portrayed in teenagers’ behaviours.

The EU Kids Online categorizes five types of intervention - active mediation of the child’s internet 1) use and 2) safety; 3) restrictive mediation, 4) monitoring, 5) technical mediation which can be performed mostly by parents. What is more, teachers’ mediation, peer mediation and other sources of safety awareness are three additional categories the EU Kids online outlines as performed in other contexts, outside the family. I ask Ivan if he has ever filtered content and he replies “No, unfortunately not” and the reason is because he does not live with his son. He does not have an access to the devices and the mum does not have the technical skills. He would otherwise filter content because he thinks that especially under 13 that is compulsory. It is contradictory that he thinks it is compulsory but he has not done it for his own son. Catherina has never filtered content either.

The social media platforms are very well aware of the statistics and are looking into ways to provide services to the children too. Messenger Kids is “tailored to give kids

aged 6 to 12 the ability to engage in conversations as well as exchange messages, videos and images with parent-approved friends and family” (Magid 2018).

General Data Protection Regulation

The Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre has objections about Article 8 from the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) whose implementation began on the 25th of May 2018. Its very first draft used to forbid the access to online services which require registration before the age of 16 which according to Apostolov was “a complete insanity”. After pressure from their network, the Human Rights Commission decided that the national states will be able to decide for themselves if they want to adopt an earlier/ different age, the minimum being 13. In Bulgaria, the Commission of Personal Data Protection (CPDP) recommends the age of 14. The reference in Bulgaria is the criminal code. In Bulgaria a person is an “under-age” before they turn 14 and “minor” before they turn 18.

Education

Sexual education

“It was related to diseases” (Petar).

The Bulgarian education system teaches teenagers about the biological changes that occur during puberty and gives them some basic information about sexually transmitted diseases and their prevention. In most cases, this is a one-off presentation or a lesson. For 12 years at school, Shishmanova had two sexual education lessons in total and it

was not recommended for the boys to attend them because it was all about menstruation. During those lessons everyone was laughing. She admits that if it was not for GLOW (described above) and for the campaign she organized, she also would not have known much about sexual education because it is a taboo topic at school.

2 (14.3%) participants have never had any form of sex education. In 7th grade Teddy’s class had sexual education and she deliberately did not go to school that day so she can miss it because she was feeling really uncomfortable. She recalls that she faked she was sick to avoid having to experience this. This shows how unprepared teenagers are and also how challenging it will be for educators to approach them in an effective way. Everyone else had some form of sex education during a Biology class. 4 people (28.6%) have talked about online sexualization and sexting in class or other type of formal training. 1 student has discussed it with a teacher privately but not as part of a lesson.

My first set of questions explores teenagers’ experience related to those classes. Preslava confidently says they have never had sexual education at school. I challenge her by asking about the Biology classes, to which she says “very little”, “the reproductive system only”. Borislava, like most of the teenagers, had sexual education only once, and thus has “vague memories”. She did not find it useful and does not remember much of it because the training was focusing on how to put a condom on. Yana remembers that the lesson covered the protection, the diseases and “nothing more”. As their responses show, sexual education is something they relate to diseases and pregnancies. In comparison to the Netherlands, where the approach to sexual education is positive, in Bulgaria, in a similar fashion to the USA, the focus is on the risks and how to avoid them. The students have never been given the opportunity to discuss intimacy, touch, emotions and relationships, the respect for your own body and the bodies of others.

One of the key elements of a project that the psychologist I interviewed is managing, is devoted to Sexual Education and Reproductive Health. She admits, in an honest and slightly guilty manner that maybe it is too late for that, because the teenagers in this project are in 11th grade (17 and 18 years old). She then defends herself by saying that it is only now that they have actually been given the opportunity to discuss issues like this, and by opportunity she means time: “Things are in a vicious circle, simply because we don’t have the time.” She expands that by explaining how much theory and other material is compulsory to be covered in class, which does not leave room for ‘extra’ topics. This supports this thesis’ position that sex education should become a compulsory part of the curriculum because otherwise, time or resources are not enough to cover it.

The psychologist says grooming definitely exists but personally she had never had to deal with such a case and argues that she believes those are more prominent in bigger cities. This understanding contradicts with Apostolov’s experience who does not see a difference in the online risks being dependent on the size of the town. Kaleynska, who teaches Sexual education, admits that topics like online grooming and online sexual abuse have not been discussed yet in her practice. The experts’ responses show that the online side of sexualization is often ignored during the training given to the teenagers.

Media Literacy Education

“They have no self-consciousness about what is personal and what is not” (Zdravkova)

As there is not a specific media or digital literacy subject in school curriculum in Bulgaria, those skills need to be developed during other classes. My next questions explore if they are taught at school and how. Kaleynska clearly positions the ideal levels

of responsibility as family, school and third sector. In practice however, the state of affairs in Bulgaria is rather different. Parents themselves do not know the risks of social media. The teachers are not prepared to teach or discuss media literacy. The Ministry of Education and Science (MES) still has not defined online security as a problem to be dealt with at school (Kaleynska). In 2017, only 29 % of the individuals aged 16-74 have “the basic or above basic overall digital skills” (Eurostat) the average for the EU being 57%.

Most of the students recall studying about online privacy during their Information Technology classes. From their responses, I understand that it was mainly the technical side of security which they have dealt with, such as strong password creation. The psychology lessons, on the other hand, are not enough to cover all important issues according to the teacher “they get hinted, but they can’t be fully developed as concepts”. The opinion of the psychologist matches completely with the teenagers’ responses, who recall mentioning concepts like privacy and consent in class but fail to remember what exactly the discussion was about. This leaves the children unprepared for the online risks or makes them more likely to breach someone’s privacy.

Zdravkova is citing directly a schoolboy who said that if a photo is on his phone, he can do whatever he likes with it. Sexual education and privacy are closely related because part of the sex education is to respect the privacy of others and to realize that everyone has a different privacy border. She adds that even adults lack consideration sometimes, especially when tagging people and uploading photos of children and mutual friends’ children online (Zdravkova). Digital literacy appears to be a skill even adults have not mastered yet and the reason, according to Zdravkova, is the newness of digital communication as a phenomenon, forcing us to “learn by the trial and error method”.

If a teenager lacks media literacy, they will not be able to assess what is realistic, what is advertising and what is not. The risk of false advertisement is what Zdravkova brings

to our conversation, having seen Google’s first page results on the search “extending the size of your penis” is mostly advertising and exercises. Her experience shows that teenagers often search for similar queries and as a result of this, get unrealistic expectations, based on advertising.

Awareness of the risks online

The EU Kids Online categorizes four groups of countries, illustrating children’s use of the Internet and related risks. Bulgaria is placed in group 4 - high use and high risk. What is more, the experts report that Bulgarian and Romanian children “encounter more online risk despite lower national broadband penetration” in contrast to countries like the UK and Germany with high broadband penetration and lower risks, thus Bulgaria is given the definition of a “new risk” country.

To explore this further, my questions aimed at mapping teenagers’ and parents’ awareness of the risks online. During our conversation, Georgi, like other teenagers, differentiates between social media and “real life”. This comes to suggest that teenagers do not fully perceive social media as real life which is why it might be harder for them to assess the risks and the possible consequences of their actions. Borislava thinks she is “somewhat aware” of the risks, while Elena starts giving me some “right” answers about what is not advisable to do without actually naming any risks.

A couple of times Catherina as a parent confidently says there are risks but fails to name them or explain what they are. She highlights the fact a lot of the studying preparation for school is done online, somehow thinking of ways to “excuse” children for spending a lot of time online.

Parents should track the applications and websites which their children use only while they are young, says Shishmanova who is also still a teenager. By the time they are teenagers, they should already know how to use them safely. If a parent starts tracking a teenager and their browsing history, this is an “unpleasant interference into your personal space” says Shishmanova. She clarifies that the internet space which teenagers use is their own, like their rooms. Thus, checking someone’s browsing history is “the same like entering a room without knocking”.

Neither Catherina, nor Ivan has ever confiscated a device from their children. They also have not searched their children's’ browsing history. They both claim to know what kind of applications their children use although they did not mention them. Ivan follows his son everywhere on social media and has his settings adjusted so that he receives a notification when he posts online. I can see from their responses how hard it is for them to “stalk” their children and respect their privacy at the same time.

The school psychologist is rather pessimistic and has a negative attitude towards new media technologies which for her are a “manipulation”. “Our children are experiencing an information overload” , arguing that they cannot find the borders and things go out of control which leads to early marriages, abortion and children being manipulated by sects. She also mentions the game Blue whale (mentioned above) as a big online danger. Apostolov, on the other hand, expresses his great disappointment of parents who believe in this game but he acknowledges the fact that it is the media that is talking about it and confusing the masses. According to Apostolov, a game like this does not exist. It is peculiar how even this school psychologist will be a person the Safer Internet Center will have to educate on what is fake news and what is not, while the topic of our discussion was indeed the fact that students cannot assess information. This once again comes to prove the point that the challenges which teenagers are experiencing are challenges all adults face, too.

Attitudes towards digital privacy

In the focus group five people (41.6 %) had a public Facebook profile and seven (58.3%) had a Friends only account. Of those who have Instagram - six (66.7%) have public profiles and three (33.3%) have a Request only profile. Zdravkova’s observations are that teenagers often have public social media profiles. She believes a user is less likely to get approached if their profile is locked which is what she recommend in her talks. She also advises teenagers to avoid “checking in” regularly. According to Stoyan, however, nobody is going to be interested in tracking his life because “there are 7 billion people on the planet”. His password is secure, his Facebook settings are adjusted to “Friends only” and only mutual friends can send him requests. He would receive a notification if someone attempts to log in to his Facebook account from another device which is why he is not concerned. This again brings the debate of whether technological solutions are enough to prevent fraud, e-crime and privacy breach.

Dimitar does not upload photos which is why his Facebook and Instagram accounts are public. Teenagers seem to believe that only photos are “personal data”. A few of them justified their choice of having public accounts with this fact. They are not aware of the “power” of all other data which they generate, even if it is just by clicking, such as likes, comments, views among others. The reason for this is that they have never been informed what kind of trackers there are online and what exactly personal information is.

EU Kids online survey shows that Bulgaria and Romania rank in top places in Europe according to the frequency of teenagers searching for new friends online (Livingstone et al 2012, p.105). Until recently, Borislava did not include her hometown in her Facebook profile because of privacy concerns. Friends she has met on training had messaged her to ask where she is from. As a result of this, she added her hometown so her friends

can see it. This shows that even teenagers who are highly concerned about their privacy are likely to share personal information if asked and if attention is paid to them.

The results come to suggest that overall, the teenagers in my sample are concerned about their privacy and have taken the necessary measures to secure their accounts according to their own understanding and need. This contradicts the general opinion found in popular media that teenagers are oblivious Internet users and confirms Livingstone’s argument that teenagers are concerned about their digital privacy.

Civil Education in Bulgaria and the teaching staff issue

“And then I meet children’s rebuff, their opinion which is completely opposite to my own. And here is the clash between positions which cannot be resolved” (Psychologist)

According to Eurostat, based on 2012 data, children in Bulgaria spend 16.4 years in education. Sexual education and digital literacy are components of Civil Education which in Bulgaria is a “hotchpotch” as Kaleynska jokingly defines it. It can be chosen as an elective but the elements of Civil Education are integrated in other subjects such as Philosophy. All teachers are expected to teach Civil Education but in practice, teachers are not adequately prepared to do so as the results of this research suggest. However, experts often see that in smaller places, the community is more united and the teachers feel more responsible about their students. Even though the communities feel close to each other, the school psychologist comments that “our relationship with them is fleeting” describing the fact that teachers don’t spend enough time with the teenagers. She also discusses the “barrier” teenagers build because having Internet, they have gained the confidence that “they already know everything” and teachers are unable to give them new knowledge.

Both the experts and the teenagers claim that the educational staff in Bulgaria is not satisfactorily prepared and “competent” (Anna) to teach Sexual Education, and especially issues related to online sexualization. Many of the older teachers lack media literacy skills, and cannot work with social media for example, comments Kaleynska. The school is not adequate and teenagers approach the sexual education “with laughter” (Ivan) because it is introduced too late and in a distant way.

Usually when the LoveGuide team attends schools, the teachers leave the room so that the students would feel free to ask all of their questions. I also did my focus group discussion without a teacher present, for the exact same reason. I ask Zdravkova if the age of teachers has an impact and before I have finished my sentence she sharply answers “Definitely!” and adds that this is something that the teachers themselves are well aware of. This is also something students have shared with her and with me. Zdravkova clearly says there are many “cool” older teachers. However, when they initially tried to contact schools all around the country as part of their project “The Change” in 2017, most replies came from young teachers. “The current generation of teachers needs to change” (Zdravkova). Bulgarian students need younger teachers to talk to about sensitive topics.

The school psychologist, who is also a teacher, starts our interview by admitting she is aware that she has an extreme opinion on the matters to be discussed and maybe it is her age which is the main reason for it. She has recently attended an UNICEF event where she has heard “different opinions” of people advocating against “putting kids in a frame”. She disagrees and says that helping teenagers assess information is not putting them in a frame. “A person has to find his own limit”, but this is not an easy task to achieve, especially when working with young people. The participants in the focus group have not discussed sexting and sexualization with teachers but they say they would be happy to do so if given the opportunity. They all agreed that their teachers are old and although some have “a young mind”, the rest are both old and old-fashioned.

“We are free and more liberated” says Teddy about their generation while she compares it to their teachers who are highly critical of the youngsters and would make comments like “how did the world end up here” with regards to sexting for example.

One of Anna’s classmates (let’s call her Iliyana) got her nude photos leaked. Iliyana sent them to a guy who forwarded them to a girl, who made a Facebook page and uploaded them to a website which is how they became public. I have heard this type of story a number of times. What grabs my attention in this occasion is their teacher’s reaction. “The form tutor scolded her” says Anna. The teacher entered the room, holding a phone, showing it and asking the girl “What is this?”. Her friends comforted her as she was crying. The rest of the class decided not to address it, to minimize her concerns. For Anna, it was more helpful to pretend this did not happen in front of the girl. “We didn’t judge her”. The issue was “quenched” and it was not discussed with the class. This illustrates the fact that teachers are unprepared to deal with accidents like this and sometimes do not react in the most neutral and professional way.

Another story, with a more adequate reaction which happened in Anna’s school is when in a 5th grade class, someone “photoshopped” a penis next to the picture of a girl (the girl is not naked in the picture, it was a photo downloaded from her Facebook profile). The montage was shared in a group chat. After this accident, the school psychologist invited Anna to discuss online security with the 5th graders. Two things strike me in this story. First of all, what happened did not get ignored and there was a follow up to discuss it which was lacking in the previous accident. Second, the teaching staff shifted the responsibility to Anna, another student, who is older. My research shows that teenagers seem to prefer talking about sensitive issues like sex with younger people, so peer to peer education is a solution which will be explored more extensively later in this paper.

Current initiatives and the Third Sector

According to Kaleynska, the expectations towards the third sector in Bulgaria are huge and the NGOs “struggle to compensate for the gaps in the system”. There is a variety of initiatives on both sexual education and digital literacy in Bulgaria which this paper does not have the scope to discuss. A few are mentioned in Appendix 10 as examples of projects the interviewed experts have worked on. I was interested if the teenagers know about them and the results suggest that the reach was not very wide. None of the participants in the focus group had heard about the campaigns Rano Mi e and #dressup while four people had heard of LoveGuide. From the personal interviews, three (21.4%) have heard of Rano Mi e and eleven (78.6%) have not. Nobody has head of #dressup and six (42.9%) have heard of LoveGuide. Thus, although the Third sector is trying to organize campaigns, this is only as much as they can do in reaching everyone.

Promoting abstinence

“There is no way a phenomenon like this one [sexting] can be stopped and we would be silly to think we are able to do it” (Kaleynska)

Not all organizations have “an adequate approach” (Apostolov) in teaching sexual education but what is more, creating campaigns aimed at teenagers is highly complex as they cannot be one sided- only positive or only negative. According to Apostolov, “the don’t-do-it attitude” is a pointless strategy. Despite this, Kaleynska argues that promoting abstinence is the tendency in Bulgaria and also the main problem. When it comes to sexting, it would be more effective to teach students how to do it safely but most organizations prefer to promote abstinence. “There is a lack of confidence in the ability of young people to provide their own safety.” (Kaleynska)

This argument got proved in a variety of ways. LoveGuide strongly advises teenagers not to send naked photos, even if they know the person, because they do not know for how long they are going to be with this person and whether this photo might end up in someone else’s hands and be misused. This is the general understanding teachers and part of the third sector has. The position of LoveGuide regarding sexting is strictly promoting abstinence. “For their safety, even as a joke, no nude pictures should be made. [...] Because they are young and because they have too limited digital skills to allow them to do it in a safe way” (Zdravkova).

Kaleynska does not see sexting as indecent because the idea of sexting is to make virtual life mirror real life. People are not aware of the risks in comparison to the real world where we have limits,such as our morals, or our sexual culture. “We find it easier to navigate in the real world” says Kaleynska and explains that in the virtual one, we do not assess the person and the risk in the same way.

Taboo

“This is a taboo topic in the families.” (Psychologist)

Teenagers avoid pronouncing words like sex, masturbate, vagina, penis. So they always refer to them as it, this, that. This again shows how much of a taboo this topic is for them. People in Bulgaria do not name sexually related concepts. The school psychologist touches upon the problem of sex being a taboo which she is facing. Teenagers feel uncomfortable to talk about sex, especially for the Roma communities, it is indecent to even pronounce sexual concepts in public. (Psychologist)

My observations show that indeed they feel uncomfortable, but only when it comes to discussing those topics with teachers, not about discussing them among peers and

even with young people like me, because as a researcher, they happily talked to me. What is more, they engage actively with LoveGuide on social media.

Sex in Bulgaria, if discussed in public, is “only a penis vagina penetration” (Shishmanova), because people are narrow-minded. Thus, they do not discuss the risks which can come with other types of sex too. The Red Cross has mentioned it, but according to Shishmanova, nobody has ever talked about homosexual sex.

Generation X

“The parents still have a barrier and sex is still a taboo at home” (Kaleynska)

EU Kids Online suggests that parents underestimate the extent to which their children are exposed to sexually explicit content (Livingstone et al. p.154)

Catherina says sex used to be a taboo topic in her family and all families from her generation, which is why it should not be one now. On the other hand, Momchil and many of the teenagers I talked to, have never discussed the topics of sex or online sexualization at home. Momchil says he would discuss it with his parents and teachers if given the opportunity. Neda says parents are ashamed to talk to their children as much as the teenagers are. The family expects that the school will give children sexual culture, while the school expects that they will receive it at home. In this way, children are caught in the middle. (Kaleynska)

According to Zdravkova, it is understandable that both parents and teachers do not feel prepared to discuss sex with their children because when they were growing up, this used to be a taboo topic. “How did we manage? You find “Man and Woman, Intimately” and read some stuff”. Here she refers to the book “Man and Woman, Intimately: Issues of Healthy and Unhealthy Sex Life” by Siegfried Schnabl which during the socialist

regime served the purpose of sexual education textbook in the Eastern bloc. As a Bulgarian, I have been told this story multiple times. Generation X has never talked about sex with their parents. In every household there was the book which either appeared “out of the blue” or was given to them to read.

Today, 29 years after the end of the socialist regime, the state of sexual culture has improved but apparently, not enough. Diana shares that she likes watching American and English Youtubers talking about sex because “Bulgarians are not so open about those topics while the others are more competent and more open to share their experience with society ”.

I ask Preslava if she has ever watched the LoveGuide videos. She says “ No [..] I don’t feel comfortable, even when I am alone”. This leaves me wondering how she is going to get educated and what would be the right way to approach teenagers like her.

When it comes to online sexualization, the issue becomes even more complicated. “My parents can’t manage to use Facebook and Messenger, let alone me explaining to them what sexting is” says Radostina. This comes to suggest that there is a gap between the teenagers’ practices of online sexualization and sexting, and adults’ assumptions about it.

Online sexualization

The importance of social media for self-actualization

“On the Internet, you decide which part of you to ‘display’ and this way the others can understand how you want to be seen” (Anna).

To compare the academic literature on online identity creation to the practices of teenagers, I asked them about the ways in which they present and express themselves online. This appeared hard for them to talk about, mainly because they have never thought about social media in this way. They struggled a lot to reflect on the way they express themselves and their responses were often projected on the “others” and how they might see them. “When one wants to know who you are, everyone will open Facebook or Instagram and see your photos” says Elena. If you are different offline, this is easy to notice, which is why Anna believes she is selective in what she shares.

I find huge contradictions in their replies, too. Diana, for instance, realizes that people behave differently on social media and when they are offline but her friends know her “offline self” anyway, so there is no point in that. Then I ask her if she tries to portray herself in a positive way on social media and she says “Yes, of course, everyone wants to look good in front of the others”.

Girly stuff

“Today’s society is so open” says Georgi in relation to one of his female friends who often receives explicit content from her best friend (also female). Georgi highlights the fact that they are not homosexual, they just show each other provocative photos of themselves. Yana is a girl who has done this. “We just send each other photos.” She explains that there is no goal, or subtext in doing this. Yana decided to forward to other friends a picture which was showing her friend in underwear and nice abdominal muscles. “I sent it to my best girl friends”.

Two best friends (girls) have argued and after that, one of them sent around the naked photos of the other girl to people, including Stoyan. Stoyan is telling me that girls

exchange photos between themselves and that is often how they end up in boy’s phones too.

The impact of social media on teenagers’ intimate relationships

“You can’t have a relationship if you don’t have a social media account” (Radostina)

Diana explains that when you upload a picture online, you also write a message and this is what often serves as the first point of interaction after which a boy would write to the girl for the first time. It is the combination of the photo and the message that provokes social interaction. Georgi sees the way social media has affected the dynamics as twofold - for some, it is liberating while for others the liberation remains on the screen only.

“To text him or not to text him, this is the question.” jokes Shishmanova illustrating her observation that nobody is debating whether to go and talk to a person they are attracted to or not, what teenagers are doubting is always about whether to contact them via a messaging application or not. You do not see the person, you do not hear the tone of voice. The nonverbal communication is taken away and the communication is disturbed, according to her.

Stoyan defines the long-distance relationships as “Facebook relationships” and this “annoys” him. “There is only bare letters and emojis there” and he tries to spend as much face to face time with his girlfriend as possible. Stoyan has never asked his own girlfriend for a sext. Zdravkova also shares that they encourage teenagers to communicate live as much as possible.

Georgi and Dimitar state that relationships start on Messenger, not face to face anymore. It is more unnatural, “it is a pity but that is how it happens” comments Dimitar with regret. Teenagers cannot imagine being in a relationship without using social media as a communication channel. According to Radostina, only if you are married or live with your partner, you could have a relationship without a social media account because otherwise there are not other ways to communicate. “You can’t talk on the phone because it is not popular anymore”. Fashion plays a big factor in teenagers’ decisions, based on their replies.

Borislava does not like couples who are constantly messaging each other because in her opinion this “constant flow of information” can be harmful for the relationship. She admits that although she has no experience what it was like in the past (pre-technologies), she believes that face to face communication must have been of a greater importance. Teenagers very often talk with regret about the way Internet has impacted intimacy. However, there is always the greater good. “Thanks to Internet, the world has developed” (Stoyan)

Teenager’s sexual exploration

“Especially in Bulgaria, this topic is a big taboo. It is discussed neither in the families, nor at school” (Radostina)

Borislava like all of the teenagers I talked to, says that Internet is her “main source of information’’ about sex. “You are alone there” says Georgi adding that all of his friends have used the Internet for their sexual exploration. Zdravkova also confirms that teenagers who are older than fifteen prefer to ask their questions online.

“Those topics are still not publicly acceptable” (Anna) which is why Internet is so important for teenagers’ sexual exploration. Yana thinks that books have old-fashioned information and some terms only exist online. Internet is an option to educate yourself and to read different opinions. But there is also illusion, such as porn, which creates false expectations. According to Borislava, on the Internet, you have freedom; for Anna, the Internet “liberates many of the processes related to starting a sexual life”.

According to Shishmanova, teenagers read the forum http://www.teenproblem.net/ - a popular teenage forum as the name suggests. She comments that everyone can write their own opinion there and in this way confuse everyone else. There are lots of myths going around that teenagers believe.

“Not everyone has the opportunity and the luck to be able to discuss such topics with their parents’’. The fact that according to Borislava, to be able to talk to your parents about sex is a matter of luck, sums up all my observations regarding parental involvement. It is luck. You either have those parents who would talk to you or you do not. The state of affairs in Bulgaria is not to educate parents, it is down to luck. A few teenagers brought up the issue of shame “I think everyone is ashamed to ask their parents” (Georgi ); “If you are ashamed to talk with your parents, you will find information on the Internet ” (Diana).

Pornography

Most teenagers felt uncomfortable when I asked them if they have watched pornography online and how often they watch it. During the whole interview process, I was respecting teenager’s privacy and their right not to answer any of my questions. Twelve (85.7%) admit that they have watched porn, two (14.3%) claim they have not. According to the Global Kids Online, 71.8% of Bulgarian kids have seen pornographic or erotic material (p.19).

5 (35.7%) of the teenagers watch it regularly or semi regularly. “I have a schedule”, admits Dimitar while laughing, adding “I don’t watch it every day”. It is extremely important for children to have sexual education as they will inevitably come across pornography online explains Apostolov. “Unfortunately, this topic is a taboo in the Bulgarian educational system” (Apostolov). Neither Ivan nor Catherina has ever asked their children if they have watched porn. Ivan’s guess is that his son has.

Pediatricians report an increase in erectile dysfunction among teenagers (Apostolov). This tends to be related to mental health problems and a discrepancy between the expectations which teenagers have, based on the pornography they have seen, and reality. Internet gives rise to experimentation of new sexual practices. For girls, there are cases of infertility, caused by infections, which are caused by the use of non-hygenized objects.

Yana regrets her decision to start her sexual life “that early” and believes that social media and porn had an effect on this. The porn websites especially create subconscious excitement which is then expressed physically too. So teenagers do not cautiously want to have sex but are interested to try it (Yana).

Vanity metrics

“Girls and boys start with normal photos. When they see they receive more comments and more likes, they slowly begin to get perverse and to upload more provocative ones. It is because of the likes.” (Preslava)

The social media platforms provide live metrics on the engagement of an uploaded material which is often visible to all users who can see the post. It is speculated that the

vanity metrics such as likes, comments and shares encourage teenagers to upload more provocative material. According to Anna, teenagers need more attention than other age groups which is why they are more likely to look for external acceptance and appreciation in ‘likes’. Borislava finds it “hilarious’’ when her peers upload sexually explicit posts, says while laughing, and she finds them “extremely inappropriate”. Lots of peers around her have done it. The more likes you have, the more wanted you are, if a girl is more “conservative”, she does not get enough likes even if she is beautiful and “nobody pays attention to her” summarizes Yana.

“To give you one example - if one of my friends uploads a photo of her face, that is 100 likes, if she turns around and takes a picture of her b**t, she makes 200 or 300.” (Momchil) I am astonished by the verb he uses. She makes likes. This is the same verb one can use (both in English and Bulgarian) for making money. It is not simply her friends who “give” her the likes, she earns them with the content she uploads. Thus, social media is a type of market place and the uploaded content is the product. “The peer pressure is there. It is up to your own judgment whether you will succumb.” says Borislava, who unlike others is very well aware what kind of forms pressure can have.

Carolina says she feels indirect peer pressure about uploading sexy photos. She says it is very trendy to show your b**t on a photo and mentions the likes. People who accept more friends on Facebook will have more likes. Her sister is stalking her and acting as a quality control. I ask Carolina if she has ever uploaded a provocative image and she said that her sister would have commented on it, which is why she thinks she has not. Carolina wants to be seen as a “good girl” on social media and to have a “cute profile” rather than a “sexy one”.

According to Borislava the key stimulus for uploading a provocative photo is who is going to like it and how many likes one is going to get. “When you see a more special comment, you immediately want to prove yourself in front of that person, to show a

different side of you and to show that you are better than the rest, to show that you have something more” explains Diana. I want her to expand what “something more” is. While we talk about it, she says: “to see the flesh”. When she talks about that, Diana excludes herself from the crowd, as if those are topics that do not affect her in any way. All the teenagers I talked to were trying to distance themselves from their peers. Interestingly, they were talking as if everyone else does this but not them. They were criticizing the crowd and distancing themselves from it.

Is social media sexualizing?

Experts discuss the presence of early sexualization which children nowadays experience. The causality of Internet is hard to be proven or directly related to the phenomenon. “The age of intimate relationships is decreasing” and this affects teenagers, thinks the school psychologist. The sexual communication can be disappointing and can affect a person’s whole life.

According to Stoyan, the social media have a negative influence on the generation which grew up with it. Borislava does not think sexualization began when the social media appeared, but now the effect is greater, because everyone is using social media but not everyone used to read newspapers and magazines. According to Anna, on Facebook and Instagram- there is not so much sexual content in comparison to Tumblr, for example. Radostina brings up the influencers who, according to her, share predominantly sexualized images and thus sexualize the media. There was an Instagram story shared on a playmate’s Instagram profile with a porn video. The fitness instructors also share a lot of photos of their bodies.

“Everyone wants more likes and nudity is an easy way to achieve this” argues Anna. The LoveGuide expert Zdravkova, on the other hand, believes that it was the same in the 80s when she was a teenager, they were also wearing crop tops. “Such things have

always been present. We just did not have photos for the others to see but more or less, we have also perceived ourselves as sexual objects when wearing a crop top”. What is different nowadays, according to her, is that social media are a “magnifying glass” to that. The early online sexualization does not lead to an early start of the sexual life. Teenagers keep being shy and insecure. According to Zdravkova, it is easy to take a picture in your underwear but this does not mean you feel confident and ready to have sex. “It applies to adults too. It is a fake image building which we create on social media”. Her experience shows that there is no direct link to their behaviour offline. This does not give them higher self-esteem. Their worries are the same as the ones of the teenagers pre-internet. “Classic drama” which has nothing to do with the way they present themselves online.

The psychologist tells me the story of a girl who had a virtual love affair with another girl who after a while moved to the same school. What happened when they were finally together in the offline world is that their relationship “changed completely”. The real thing didn’t happen. She believes that the online sexual communication “starts like a game” and not always turns into reality.

The warriors and the groups

“The group [“Tripe soup”] is created to sow hatred” (Stoyan)

I ask Diana if on her news feed on Facebook, there are any sexually provocative images. She bursts into laughter. Then she starts telling me about the Facebook group “Tripe soup” (“Шкембе чорба”) . She is laughing during the whole time while telling me about it, partly because this is making her nervous and uncomfortable. “Tripe soup” is a Bulgarian Facebook group where sexually explicit photos and videos are exposed. The idea of the group is to mock the people whose photos are exposed. Gradually, it

becomes a collection of sexually explicit material of all kind. Stoyan tells me about the same group and one more, “Iljuiminati”: “Whatever you want, it is there” promotes it Stoyan. He personally has never posted a photo in a group because he says this would make him feel really bad. He makes a very clear distinction between sharing a photo in a group chat which is among friends and posting it in a public group such as “Tribe soup”. Sharing it publicly feels mean. Dimitar says with regret that, when a user uploads a provocative image, “everyone has the right to comment, whatever they like, even if it is a kind of bullying unfortunately”. Here he issue of Internet bullying is clearly present.

There are 3-4 groups specifically created for exchanging material of people from the town they live in. The name of the group “Berkovcharya” is a made up word, portmanteau for the name of the town and a famous page called “Motikarq” which this group mimics. Stoyan has been asked to give a testimony in the police about the dissemination of naked photos of a primary school girl. He says that he has only received the photos which have already been widely disseminated. He received them from “Berkovcharya” - a mystery fake profile who was collecting explicit photos and disseminating them. The police investigated the case but according to Stoyan it remains a mystery who the “Berkovcharya” is. It is obvious that the person or the people behind this profile mirror the style and actions of Motikarya. According to Georgi , there are some private, closed groups too, “it is a whole machine.” Georgi knows the admins who are teenagers, too. Georgi explains that the names of the facebook groups are inspired by the facebook page “Motikarq”. The page was created in 2013 and mocks Bulgarian teenagers for sexually explicit content they have shared, but also general Internet users for their digital illiteracy by exposing their profiles, comments, messages. The Internet archive still has those collections, uploaded on the website www.motikarq.com A lot of the content can be considered child pornography as the images display minors in most of the cases. The website divides the content in sections depending on the type of explicit content. “Motikarq” has bullied and blackmailed teenagers and then published

the chats online. While we discuss online sexualization, Georgi argues that the Motikarq’s mission is “to decrease this process”.

The page “Motikarq” has been reported and banned numerous times, which resulted for the admin of the page to create more versions of his initial page. The admins were arrested on the 18th of July 2017 by The General Directorate Combating Organized Crime, Ministry of Interior (Bulgaria) (The CDCOC) after four years of investigation and the website was seized. The page was also known as the "Wall of Shame" (Btvnovinite) because the ‘victims’ were publicly shamed there, with their real names and faces. The people behind it were nine, all male, four were arrested. After their arrest, they explained that this was their moral cause. The arrest provoked some public debate online. The Bulgarian media who discussed the issue, WebCafe among others, talked about the heroic image given to “Motikarq” for fighting against the moral decay by shaming the girls with no morals - the girls who post selfies with the so called “duck face”, the sexters, the illiterate users. The initiator of the website was also interviewed (Pod Tepeto) and he defends his position continuously. Even after the arrest, the men behind the page have supporters who believe in their cause.

Stoyan, Momchil and Georgi remind me of this. Georgi has forwarded sexually explicit photos. I ask him about his motivations to forward images and he answers that there is no specific goal, it is about “Look at them” and “Look how she embarrassed herself”. I ask Momchil how the photos ended up in his phone. One classmate shared with him that another girl from their class has naked photos. All he had to do was to say “Send them over”. Then he forwarded the photos to other people in a group chat in Messenger. I ask him why and he replies proudly “I want everyone to find out that this girl is not OK to date”. He envisions himself as a warrior saving the others from dating a dishonorable woman, in the same way “Motikarq” does. The responses Momchil gives me are contradictory. On one hand, he sees himself as warrior who spreads the message that those girls are not “eligible” to date because they have been sending

naked photos. On the other hand, when he was sent one directly he felt good because the girl trusted him and he did not consider her to be ‘’easy”.

Gender difference and the double standards

“It is like nothing when it comes to boys. It is not perceived in the same way” (Elena)

The teenagers brought up the issue of double standards without me asking a specific question about it. It seems to be a problem that bothers girls, even the ones who have lost the battle and have accepted it. “For the girls it is shameful, for the boys it is not a big deal. That is how it is perceived.” says Elena. She does not question it even when I am asking further. She replies “It is just the way it is accepted to be”. “It should be the same.” says Georgi and talks as if he has just realized this. However in practice “If a girl uploads it, she is a w***e, if a guy does, he is cool.” “which is not right” adds Georgi. Radostina also is annoyed by the double standards. She also comments on the fact that there are girls who have their photos uploaded on social media wearing swimsuits and nobody reacts but if photos in underwear leak, this can turn into a scandal and attracts attention and comments.

Sexting, which will be discussed extensively in the next chapter, is dominated by the naked photos and videos of women. “Women send [photos] way more”. Naturally as a consequence of that, the leakage of photos and porn for revenge happens more to girls. When I ask the teenagers whether photos of boys have leaked, some of them can think of one or two. “For me, this is not normal” says Georgi who is not even interested in seeing them. His response makes me think that if photos of girls leak, this is “normal”.

Role Models

Teenagers are still building their character and role models are important for their development. According to Zdravkova, in Bulgaria a lot of the celebrities and especially the ones popular among the teenagers are not good role models. Closely related to the topic of the early sexualization is the story of singer Geri-Nikol which Zdravkova mentions. She became a star when she was 16 and she is famous for her highly sexually explicit videos and the lyrics of her songs. The Bulgarian State Agency for Child Protection filed a complaint against her video "A girl like me" for a minor who is portraying obscene content. This was rejected by the Bulgarian Council of Electronic Media because of the lack of such binding rules (Vbox). The case also was discussed in a debate on national TV. The focus group also brought up Suzanita and Geri-Nikol as examples of celebrities who sexualize the teenagers.

The early sexualization comes from role models and from chalga music (a musical genre) according to Zdravkova. In her experience with teenagers, she found that teenagers feel pressure about having to look in a particular way in order to find a boyfriend/girlfriend. Boys say that if they do not have money, they will never have a girlfriend. Thus “creating adequate role models” is one of LoveGuide’s goals. “When I was 16 I didn’t know that” is a project by LoveGuide in which celebrities share what they did not know about their self-esteem, relationships and sexual exploration when they were 16 years old. The team behind the project is proud they chose “different” celebrities. “We could film Geri-Nikol, but she is not a role model according to us” says Zdravkova.

The celebrities are role models for the teenagers but their older siblings are their role models too, claims Zdravkova. In her experience, the younger children can get access to explicit content because of their older siblings, which happened with a 12 years old

boy LoveGuide has talked to. His brother is 19 and the two of them often put masks on and watched together an online dating video streaming platform, where people are masturbating in front of their cameras. Even if the platform has an 18+ gate, the children are at risk if the parent has not talked to them, says Zdravkova. What is more, Apostolov explains how easy it is to pass the 18+ gates only by simply confirming you are over 18 by a click or by setting up a fake email account.

Sexting

How widespread is the issue?

“Based on our experience, there isn’t a school which we have visited, without a scandal with someone’s naked photos [...] This is one of the main things we discuss” (Zdravkova)

Elena starts talking about sexting when I ask her if technology has changed the way teenagers flirt and start relationships, saying that sexting “has been very popular lately”. Apostolov explains that a small percentage of the teenagers might do it but everyone is seeing it which is enough to create a pressure.

Long distance relationships are a reason and a factor, comments Shishmanova because sexting is a way for intimate communication. Nowadays, there are more long-distance relationships which also raise sexting as a practice. It is how teenagers building up passion until they meet in person.

According to the EU Kids Online survey, 15 % of the children aged 11-16 have either seen or received and 3 % have posted or sent sexually explicit material in the past year (Livingstone et al, 2012, p.153).

According to the 2016 data in the table above, the experts conclude that sexting “appears not to be spreading among children and young people in Bulgaria, but remains relatively stable, affecting 10-12%.Bulgaria is below the average for percentage of children who encountered sexting and those who were bothered or upset by sexual messages” (Livingstone et al, 2012, p.159)

According to my research, 78.6% (eleven teenagers) have received a sexually suggestive message online. Six respondents specified that this was either naked or semi-naked image. Only 35.7 % of the interviewees have never been asked to sext.

Why stats might be misleading?

When I ask Elena if she has ever sent or received a sexually explicit image, she says no. Then when I ask if she has ever seen such images, she says “Yes, I have seen them uploaded, and I have been sent ones, sent to group chats too.” When asked, Elena admits she has forwarded images herself. Teenagers do not fully realize what they engage with when they forward sexually explicit images to each other. My observation is that they do not perceive it as an actual practice of sexting. If it is not one-to-one, if it is not them or their partner on the image, it somewhat does not count. I have received similar replies from other interviewees. This makes me speculate that the

statistics show a much lower percentage than the actual number of teenagers engaged in sexting.

How often do photos leak?

All of the teenagers I talked to mention a recent occasion of leaked explicit content. It turned out extremely hard to measure how often photos leak “publicly” because of the different answers even the teenagers from the same school were giving. 2-3 times a year photos leaked according to Elena. She also tells me about a classmate whose photos were shared “ in a narrow circle” only, which shows that teenagers define public differently among themselves. When naked pictures leak, they get disseminated to websites, groups, chats. I ask Diana if she knows of someone whose photos have leaked and she replies “Loads. Especially in our town, there are so many.” Teenagers from other towns reacted in the same way. When I asked Apostolov if he finds a difference between the small towns in Bulgaria as opposed to the big cities, he replied that the same practices occur everywhere. According to Georgi, the leakage of explicit content has become normalized because it happens every few months. He uses a metaphor that strikes me. It describes the experiences quite accurately. “It is like the new phones. The new iphone is released. Now the photos of this girl got released”. Rumours are a big part of the scandals. One person has them but everyone is talking about them. According to Momchil, photos get leaked almost every day. It is important to know, as will be discussed later in this chapter, that he has ‘’supplies’’ from other cities too, so the sample is much larger. But also that he might be exaggerating.

What are the channels?

The most common response to the channels is that the explicit material starts on Snapchat and gets forwarded on Messenger. According to Diana, Messenger is the main medium in which teenagers exchange sexts, although they start from Snapchat. Georgi thinks Snapchat is the ultimate sexting app.

The Instagram stories are visible for 24 hours and according to Georgi the girls who share provocative photos there are doing it because they want others to see them, and to screenshot them. Teenagers seem to be aware that on Snapchat, the content they send can always get screenshot.

Sexting practices with adults

Diana used to receive numerous sexually explicit text messages on Messenger from old men, all over 40 according to her. She was 12-13 back then and she was perceiving them as a joke.

Yana tells me a story which happened 2 years ago when she was 15. A guy who was 22 and sexually attracted to her (and expressed this both online and offline) started sending photos of his genitals on Viber which made her block him everywhere and delete her Viber account. It was a worrying experience for her. “It made me feel uncomfortable. That my parents might find out that I am communicating with him; “ashamed too” because although she had watched porn, she was not used to seeing and receiving explicit content. Her story shows that she dealt with the situation on her

own and did not talk to a parent or a teacher. This confirms the EU Kids Online report which argues that children would not contact an expert or share their problem but rather deal with it on their own.

Discussing Consent

Teddy does not see the need to discuss consent with her partner because a sext is not a big deal given they are in a relationship and have sex. When Dimitar was sent a photo, the girl had not asked him explicitly not to forward. Momchil requested a photo to be sent to him directly by a girl only once. Back then, he was flirting with her. I ask him how he felt and he says “Good” smiling and chuckling. What is interesting to note is that even though Momchil tends to share all photos in their private chat, he kept this one for himself. I ask him whether they have discussed consent . “She trusted me. We have known each other for a long time. She knows I wouldn’t send it to anyone”. He didn’t think she is an easy girl but felt good that she trusted him. When the girl Momchil was flirting with sent him a naked photo, she asked him to delete it from messenger, in case someone sees his phone which he did, after downloading it. However, they don’t delete photos in the chat and they don’t discuss where the photos “come from”.

What happened once was that a guy took a photo of his girlfriend while they were having sex and then sent it to Stoyan. The breach of privacy in this example is clear and worrying. It also shows that teenagers do not differentiate between giving someone consent to have sex and giving them consent to record it and/or forward the footage.

Collections

“The boys in our town have a collection of naked photos and it is something like a pride” (Radostina)

Momchil has a collection of naked photos on his phone. He has “screenshotted” the photos of both girls he knows personally and other who he does not. Those are provocative photos which the girls themselves have shared on their ‘stories’ on social media. I ask him what are his motivations to screenshot them, he replies that he looks at them and discusses them with friends. According to him most photos get exchanged in their private Messenger groups. The private chat he is a member of has 10 members, 6 are from the town where he lives, and the rest are from the capital. The guys from Sofia send naked photos from there and in this way, more photos get exchanged.

Stoyan has a collection too. Having a collection of explicit content becomes a “habit” according to him. Exchanging photos is what friends do. They discuss the size of the bra and the body shape, not their intelligence, laughs Stoyan. I ask him how it feels to receive a nude photo. “After the 3rd or the 4th time, you don’t feel anything because you are used to it [...] When you receive a photo for the first time, this makes you feel really cool and it makes you want to share it everywhere. “Look, everyone. I have the naked photo of this girl” You are enjoying it”. Stoyan had 60 photos last year but his phone broke down and now only has 15.

Those boys do not perceive their actions as inappropriate in any way. They talked freely about their collections and they do not feel any guilt about disseminating someone else’s personal information. From our conversation, I get the impression that they have not discussed this practice with an adult .

Trust

My research could not measure how many people have felt “upset” because of sexting because only two people have sexted with their own images. Hasinoff reports that the

majority of teenagers do not feel upset, while EU Kids Online suggests the opposite. Yana admits that she has personally engaged with sexting. I ask her how it feels and she gives a very conflicting answer: “To be honest, I don’t feel safe even though I trust the person but it also makes me glad that in one way or another I have satisfied him sexually”. She is in a long relationship with her partner.

“When you communicate with someone in this way, even if he is your partner, I don’t think it is quite proper’’ says Borislava who is rather critical towards sexting as a practice. According to Radostina, it is not important for a healthy relationship to perform sexting because the live experiences matter more.

“It doesn’t matter for how long we are together, you never know when you will break up and how your partner will revenge, that is why it is not appropriate” says Preslava who knows many stories of “porn for revenge” which made her so cautious.

Porn for revenge

“Porn for revenge” is the term experts are using to refer to the act of uploading explicit content after a relationship has ended or a similar situation has occurred which was provoked a person to disseminate the content. Numerous celebrities have been victims of this phenomena too. The page Motikarya, discussed in the previous chapter, used to be mainly sourced by porn for revenge (Btvnovinite.bg) As it is a widespread e-crime, Facebook is also trying to fight porn for revenge by testing a technological solution in Australia, USA, Canada and the UK (Facebook Safety, 22 March 2018).

Dimitar has never sent or forwarded naked photos but when he sees photos as a third party, first he wonders why the person has done it and then he thinks “I hope it doesn’t get disseminated”.

Next came one of the most emotional moments of my interviews. The brother of Dimitar’s friend, a boy, committed a suicide after his sexually explicit photos leaked online. The photos not only leaked to many people but were also uploaded on a website. His ex-girlfriend disseminated them, and his friends can only guess it was a form of revenge. “Mocking started and he couldn't endure it”. According to him, further measures have not been taken to sanction the girl.

I ask him how this experience has influenced him. “It is exactly because of this. I don’t send photos and I try to stop others from ending up there.”

Another porn for a revenge story made Georgi believe that “If it is a distance relationship, it is not a relationship”. He has such an extreme opinion because one of his female friends had an online affair with someone who turned out to be another female friend of hers who faked a profile of a male and started communication. It was a text-based only affair, they did not have video calls. Turkle (Screen, p.223) discusses gender-bending as one of the ways in which the participants in MUDs perform their sexual exploration with regards to their sexual orientation. This practice of gender bending online is quite different because the motivation in doing it is revenge or “porn for revenge”.

Blaming the victim

“There are plenty of dumb girls and plenty of dumb boys who upload photos like that [naked]” (Stoyan).

Elena describes the people who take naked pictures of themselves as “naive because they believe that they [the pictures] won’t get disseminated”. While with some it was to a

larger extent than with others, all teenagers were judgmental towards the “others” who are engaged in sexting.

According to Apostolov, sexting is not decent or indecent for itself, it is a relation between teenagers, a type of modern flirt. It is perceived in a very calm manner. But it can also create a problem if someone is misusing content for revenge.

“When sexting becomes porn for a revenge, very often the educational institutions and the parents react in the worst possible way- they blame the child whose trust is betrayed. In most cases this is a girl of course…” The educators blame the victim instead of finding out how the story unveiled, according to Apostolov. Less attention is paid to the person who forwarded the explicit material. The sexters, whose photos leak, become a victim twice. In the long term, according to the SefeNet Centre, this leads to emotional problems. Those children have a higher risk of low self-esteem, they are more likely to have emotional deficit and to suffer violence, including domestic violence.

The school psychologist has worked with a girl whose sexual photos leaked and she told her “You are the one responsible for all of this”, explaining that it is because she shared the images. Even the psychologist performs what scholars refer to as “blaming the victim”. She then explains that when she discusses sexting with the teenagers she works with, she is highlighting the risk of threats- “They have to find their boundaries [..] otherwise, they take the risk which comes with it”.

Diana says she thought she knew one person but after her photos leaked, she got disappointed and felt like she does not know her anymore. Almost none of the teenagers I talked to (excluding Dimitar) was disappointed by the people who have sent them the photos. They were all disappointed by the person in the photo. No one has ever been “blamed” for forwarding according to Momchil.

Petar thinks social media is not an appropriate place for images like this. He is blaming both the person who sent the picture and the ones who forward.

I can feel the judgmental tone in Elena’s voice and when I ask if the girl she is telling me about is her friend, she replies “She was”. Again, the distance is present which comes to show she is not like them, like the ones who send naked pictures.

What happens after a scandal?

There has never been a criminal case in Bulgaria when teenagers have been to court because of sexting according to Apostolov. The Centre works closely with the Cyber Security.

A recurring phrase which teenagers were using was the saying that a scandal is “a nine days' wonder”. However, this is the case for my interviewees who have never been the subject of a scandal. Thus, I am inclined to believe that they do not take seriously the consequences for the person whose photos leaked. In comparison, teenagers whose closer friends have been involved in a scandal are much more influenced by the events.

Experts witness an “extremely immature attitude by the adults” in the cases when an explicit photo leaks. Parents encourage their children to stay away from the person whose photos leaked, parents even move to a different town.

Georgi has discussed the leaked photos of a classmate with a form tutor . The teacher defended the ‘victim’ by saying the photos were photoshopped but according to Georgi “The teacher herself is making up excuses” . This shows that the teacher is not ready to face the issue and discuss it with the teenagers but is trying to defend the victim in front of the class by creating excuses which no one seems to believe. This example shows the inadequacy of the teachers which the experts and the teenagers are talking about.

What is next? Recommendations and challenges

To answer the question “How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about online sexualization and sexting”, the teenagers were asked what they want to know about those topics and how they want the information delivered. The experts were asked what policy recommendations should be made and how they should be implemented. The challenges in achieving those are also explored in the following section.

Digital Literacy

In order to educate teenagers about online sexualization and sexting, we need to first equip them with digital literacy skills. Digital literacy education should start in the first 7 years because this is when children start using digital media for the first time. According to the official statistics, children in Bulgaria start using digital technologies at the age of 3-4 (Global Kids, p.2). However, parents start playing children’s videos in YouTube even earlier, comments Kaleynska which is why the education should start very early at home with parents and guardians. The first formal digital literacy skills should be introduced in nursery and later on at school. The NGOs should only perform a 3rd - additional role in educating children. In Bulgaria there is not a standard in dealing with digital literacy. Thus, the same is true for Internet safety – this topic relies on the “consciousness and the initiative of the teachers” says Apostolov. Here we are not talking about IT skills, which are being taught at Information Technology classes but about media literacy, emotional intelligence and critical thinking.

The experts believe that we should not restrict children's social media usage, but we should give them the necessary skills to use it consciously. According to Kaleynska, the way forward is adding social media as an additional method to teachers’ already

existing pedagogical methods. In a similar fashion to Kaleynska’s suggestion, Zdravkova from LoveGuide teaches students how to use Instagram to investigate and expose inappropriate behaviour. She gives the example of using social media as a tool for raising awareness and prevention of sexual abuse with the story of Noa Jansma, a student in Amsterdam who uses the hashtag #dearcatcallers to expose men who have harassed her on the streets (Hosie,2017).

The debate in Bulgaria about sexual education and sexting

“Every practice, either face to face or offline, has concrete specifics depending on the country- on the temperament of the people, on their morals, religion etc.” (Kaleynska)

The experts all share the opinion that there is not a real debate in Bulgaria about sexual education or sexting as a practice. There are occasions of aggression caused after a sexting scandal which the media has written about. She is criticizing the media in Bulgaria for always focusing on the end situation and not on the root cause of a scandal. Media feel competent on the aggression but do not initiate a discussion on sexting as a practice. The media has a tendency to translate international articles on issues which are still not widely discussed in Bulgaria, such as sexting, partly because the journalists are incompetent on them, clarifies Kaleynska. There is no expert in Bulgaria on the topic who can define the process and the measures to prevent the risks. There is no definition of sexting as a practice in Bulgaria which Kaleynska highlights as a gap.

“The Istanbul convention is another big black hole” comment Zdravkova. Apostolov believes that “unfortunately no, there isn’t a debate and there also isn’t a right attitude”

towards sexting because instead of staying “never do it”, we should talk. The Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre works with Bulgarian Fund for Women and discuss this with them the topics of sexualizaton and sexting. If teenagers feel pressure, this is already violence in place says Apostolov. It is sensitive to measure when there is pressure and I found that while doing my research.

Introducing sexual education at schools

“There isn’t a school or even the Ministry itself which would dare to speak up about introducing compulsory sexual education” Apostolov

I ask Zdravkova who is responsible for teenager’s sexual education and she answers with the old African proverb “It takes a village to raise a child”, illustrating the fact that children do not grow up in a vacuum. She believes the conversation should start at the family. It should happen gradually and from all sides – in the nursery, then school, because at home the parent cannot see the child acting in a context with its peers.

As it was discussed in this paper, in Bulgaria there is no compulsory sexual and health education. “And most likely it won’t be any time soon because of political reasons [...] We are not mature enough as a society” comments Zdravkova. However, LoveGuide, as an alternative to the sexual education, becomes more and more well known and she admits that the MeToo Scandal helped their initiative because the topic is hot globally. This demonstrates that talking about sexual education is already a good sign and a step forward. The biggest challenge to introducing sexual education at schools is the lack of focused political agenda according to the experts. “There isn’t a minister of the Education or any other member of the parliament who would dare to say a single word about introducing sexual education at school” comments Apostolov.

However, politics is not the only reason. “Our society is very conservative regarding this matter” says Apostolov. There will always be conservative concerned groups who do not want their children to get “perverse” by talking about sex. Surprisingly there has never been a negative feedback from parents about LoveGuide which can be interpreted as a positive and interesting fact. If they publish an article in the popular media, “Internet trolls and haters” rebel against them but for the team this is not a reference for the public opinion because this type of hate speech happens under any article. This comes to suggest that it is possible that experts are too sceptic and if the need for introducing sexual education becomes a public debate, there will be more supporters than they would expect.

There is no political agenda which is why Zdravkova defines attempts to introducing sexual education at school as “risky”. She argues that the government does not want to ratify the Istanbul convention, let alone for a minister to go out and suggest compulsory sexual education because “the Patriarch will come out and rebel”. Saying this, she refers to past events in the history of Bulgaria when the Church has been opposed to changes, aimed at modernization. But also to the Church’s strong opposition to the ratification of the Istanbul Convention, the “Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence”. The main problem the Bulgarian Orthodox Church had with the convention was the notion of a “gender” because the institution does not accept LGBTQ+ communities and does not tolerate the idea that someone’s gender might differ from the biological sex they are born with. This is another challenge Bulgaria will face if attempts are made at introducing sexual education because even if this becomes a reality, we are “a million light years away” from talking freely about homosexuality at schools (Apostolov). Anna has spotted some LGBT topics mentioned in LoveGuide which shows that the Third sector is not ignoring the topic. The EU Kids Online survey treats Bulgaria as a “middle” group in terms of the religiosity of the population.

Apostolov discussed the Istanbul Convention as a major factor in the state of affairs because it shows “a complete immaturity” and because the intervention of the religious bodies and of organizations with external funding such as Society and Values Association (SVA) took the debate back. The Bulgarian Socialist Party did not support the Convention although according to Apostolov it should have done it. Although the Convention provokes some form of a public debate and having a debate is a positive step, the “We have suffered severe defeats, which will now take years be repaired [...] The debate is closed, unfortunately on the wrong side of the barrier. And the damages are really severe” concludes Apostolov.

How should sexal education be taught?

“If a person waits for the right moment, maybe it will always be late” (Ivan)

It definitely is a parent’s responsibility to initiate a dialogue on sex and online safety. However, “This is not an individual problem but it is rather a societal phenomenon, which is why there is not a way that the society as a whole doesn’t hold responsible” comments Ivan.

Right now, sex education together with other civil education issues and soft skills are taught in the so called “The hour of the form tutor” which is as the name suggests an hour weekly which the students spend with their form tutor, discussing miscellaneous topics. Teddy disagree that the ‘form tutor’ should be responsible for subjects like sex education and online sexualization. A guest speaker, who is an expert should do this in instead according to her. My impression is that pupils sincerely enjoy “outsiders” coming to their school, including me, doing my research, because this is a change in their daily school routine.

Dimitar, whose friend committed suicide is clear that the issue should be discussed to prevent accidents like this happening again. I ask him who should educate teenagers about sexting: “Someone like you” he replies quickly. “Someone young, so we can talk more freely, so we can understand each other”. I received the same response from Yana and other teenagers. Anna agrees that those topics should be taught by young guest speakers because their regular teachers avoid topics like this. According to her, the sexual education needs to be interactive because right now it is a lecture in which the students listen and the speakers “talk about HIV”. The long-term decision is to train teachers, however for variety of reasons, out of the scope of this paper, this is not the current priority for LoveGuide.

Preslava believes that at their age, the strongest bond and influence is between friends and even if a girl would not listen to her parents or teachers, she would be influenced by her friends. This comment relates to Kaleynska’s recommendation that peer to peer education is the most effective methodology for teaching sensitive topics. Pasquier (2008) explores the impact of the peers as opposed to the authority of the parents.

Apostolov argues that as a society we should teach teenagers that sex is related to emotions and not to physical technology, that a person should feel mature and do it according to their own discretion. Sexual education should include questions like “How to I respect myself?” and “Do I make the decisions fully consciously”. Internet is the tool which the Centre itself uses to talk about those issues. We need debates with teenager, parents and teachers, talking together. There are already successful stories when parents managed to successfully deal with sexting scandals by approaching experts for assistance.

Pedagogical methods

Kaleynska is highly positive when she says that “the emergence of risks can be avoided for sure”. According to her the endless opportunities which Internet provides children with, cannot even be “overshadowed” by the risks. In the same fashion in which we introduce to children the basic rules for offline communication, we should introduce online ones. We should follow the tendencies of the modern world and come up with new methods. Human imagination is endless and can think of new methods to overcome the challenges of this new world. According to Kaleynska, it is a national trait of the Bulgarians to try everything but also the desire to be among the best which is why youth is likely to be open to listen to advice. “Bulgarian youth is really alert” based on Kaleynska experience.

According to Kaleynska, the “impact force” on the children should be taken into consideration when designing methods for teaching sensitive topics. “The family has a direct impact on the child from the earliest age when the primary and most sustainable attitudes for the child’s future life are formed.” Thus on the first place, the state needs to invest in training parents how to discuss topics like sex and internet security with their children. Sexual education and digital literacy education should start with the personal contact (Ivan). The personal contact with parents would have a stronger effect than a school formal training or a regulation, comments Ivan.

Then come the teachers who at the moment, as discussed, lack the preparation to teach the above mentioned subjects. When asked what methods are used to talk about sexual violence, child pornography, the school psychologist said presentations and discussions are the most widely used ones. However, the teenagers disagree with those and demand more interactive methods. On the online teenage referendum mentioned earlier, the majority of the comments mention games as a way to teach

sexual education which is also a practice which has already been tested by the GLOW Association in Bulgaria.

The most effective method would be peer to peer education. “Sexual culture is the easiest to be introduced in a same sex group because there teenagers feel free to share their problems. In comparison to the duo sex groups where the ‘I want to be liked’ attitude builds an invisible wall to the sharing”. According to Kaleynska teenagers will listen to their role models which currently are bloggers, vloggers and podcasters because they directly affect their morals and actions. The most effective approach would be to encourage online celebrities to raise the topic.

Technological vs human solution

“The problem is that focusing on the technologies, the whole world is lagging behind in introducing digital media competencies in the education process from an early age” (Apostolov)

Every platform comes with risks. Unlike other experts searching for a technical and a regulatory quick fix to overcoming the online risks, Apostolov argues that the solution is to focus on the human. The big social media platforms are under pressure by public sector institutions and lobby groups. As it was discussed above, the European Union institutions also try to minimize the issue by restricting the access to certain websites. But the big risk factor is the human factor, contends Apostolov.

“In practice, there is no way we can limit the Internet usage of children” (Apostolov) even the opposite, when we try to create a safe space, in practice we increase the risk. Apostolov gives and example with the so called “Calculators”- an icon that looks like a

calculator on the screen, when you click on it it is a calculator but if you type in the right password, you enter a “secret drive” - images, videos, which are safe from parent’s control.

It is better to teach children rather than to think of technological solutions but “the progress in this area is rather slow”. We can give children the skills and then we can expect from them to have a more responsible consumer attitude which as already noted even the adults often do not demonstrate. The big problem with sexting is that in many occasions the decision to take a selfie or video is not fully personal choice (Apostolov). It is consciously or subconsciously a result of a pressure or an expectation from you to do it. This is what we should discuss with parents and teacher too.

In terms of administrative reforms, Apostolov argues that Bulgaria needs “to eliminate the hypocrisy” from the Criminal code where the definition of pornographic material is too broad, which is also why it does not apply in practice. It is a personal opinion of Apostolov that legalization of pornography and prostitution in Bulgaria would make regulation easier and if something exists, it is better if it is regulated. However, others are of the opinion that this is raising the acceptance and tolerance limits regarding exploitation and pornography is a type of exploitation. A sexual act, an act of masturbation and images on which there are genitals visible are considered as a child pornography in the Centre’s database and in Interpol’s database.

Parental education

The school psychologist sees parental education as extremely hard to achieve because parents are closed but also focused mainly on covering the economic needs of their families and “run away from issues, important for the children”. The opinion of the psychologist can be related to the fact that Bulgaria is the poorest country in the

European Union and the school in question is in the poorest region of the country. Thus, the economic concerns of the parents are likely to affect their attention on broadening their digital knowledge skills or learning how to discuss sensitive topic with their children. In her opinion parents spend less time with their children and do not pay enough attention to them because they are striving for securing them economically.

Test group

As seen from the analysis above, the focus group confirmed the results gathered by the individual interviews and the participants brought up the same topics and issues. Highlights of the discussion were the Facebook groups which aimed at public shaming, the double standards about girls and boys regarding sexual content, and the sex education at school.

Conclusions

This paper presented the research on teenagers’ practices of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria. A theoretical framework, outlining the issue and the academic debates was presented, followed by the state of the affairs in the country in question, Bulgaria. Empirical research was performed in order to answer the main research question and the two sub-questions. The initial hypotheses, compared with the research’s findings are discussed below.

1. All of the teenagers in the data sample started using social media platforms before they were legally allowed to do so, which confirms the starting hypothesis and previous research.

2. Online sexualization is present and is likely to be driven by vanity metrics. Teenagers understand the concept of online self-actualization very differently, thus it is challenging to draw conclusions which can be summarized and generalized from their replies. The teenagers interviewed differentiate themselves from the crowd but claim that their peers are affected by vanity metrics and see a clear causality between uploading a sexually provocative image and seeking attention and more social media engagement in the form of likes, comments, personal messages, friend requests. Thus, it can be argued that the teenagers interviewed do not admit to be influenced by vanity metrics but comment on the presence of the phenomenon.

3. The third hypothesis is slightly more problematic to confirm. The media, educators and the Third Sector in Bulgaria see sexting as risky, indecent and an issue that needs prevention. This was clearly seen by the responses of the school psychologist interviewed. When it comes to the other experts, they claimed that sexting is seen as risky and indecent by the others, but not by themselves personally. This type of response very much resembles teenagers’ responses about “the others” by distancing themselves from the crowd. One can conclude that it is the experts’ opinion that the practice of sexting is generally seen as risky, indecent and it needs prevention, however, they believe that their organizations are treating it otherwise. LoveGuide, for example, promotes abstinence from sexting while Glow Association and the Safer Internet Centre aim to initiate a debate on how to sext safely.

4. Teachers and parents are likely to be inadequate in keeping up with the digital lives of teenagers which poses a challenge to teenagers’ online security. Teachers and parents are behind in keeping up with the latest developments in phone applications and Social Networking Sites among others. They also lack media literacy skills however the direct causality of whether this worsens teenagers’ online security is problematic to determine.

5. The fact that sex education is not a compulsory part of the curriculum, coupled with culture-specific characteristics (such as a lack of dialogue on sensitive topics like sex and sexting) is likely to leave Bulgarian teenagers in a disadvantaged position.

The experts interviewed are concerned about the lack of sex education in the school curriculum and according to them this has a negative effect on the pupils. It is hard to determine whether the lack of sex education has an effect on the number of teenage mothers in Bulgaria as the majority of them are ethnic Roma girls and other factors could be leading. However, it is clear that the topic of sex is still a taboo in the Bulgarian society and teenagers often feel uncomfortable to discuss it with their parents and teachers.

Teenagers’ experiences of online sexualization and sexting in Bulgaria and their attitudes towards digital privacy

All of the teenagers’ interviewed had experienced a sexting scandal in their schools or friends’ groups and had stories to share and an opinion on the topic. None of them had experienced a scandal with their own photos. The findings of the research suggest that the statistics about the spread of sexting as a practice are misleading because the definitions of the practice do not differentiate between sending own photos or photos of someone else. The teenagers are not aware of this and believe that they engage in sexting only if their own bodies are on the photos/videos.

Teenagers are concerned about their online privacy which confirms existing research in other countries. However, they do not seem to know how to protect the privacy of others. When talking about their concerns, they try to solve them only through a technological solution, such as changing their social media privacy settings, rather than by talking with their peers about their privacy borders. Overall, they have the technical skills but lack basic media literacy skills.

Blaming the victim after a sexting scandal is a reoccurring practice. This finding also confirms international research. Teenagers were criticizing openly their peers who are sexting and were describing them with derogatory adjectives, such as “stupid” and “naive”.

According to the experts, sex education should become a compulsory module in the curriculum because this is the only way for all teenagers in Bulgaria to receive the same standard of quality education, the same information and opportunities.

The balance of risks and opportunities

Teenagers predominantly use Internet for their sexual exploration. The majority of the teenagers feel uncomfortable to talk about sex with their parents and teachers. They follow trends and are likely to download an application and to start using a platform if their peers are doing it, regardless of whether they break a rule or not, such as a gate access depending on age. There are clear tensions in the need of keeping up with the trends and the peer pressure.

Educating teenagers about sexting and sexualization

The sex education in Bulgaria is not even an arena for political debate because one is lacking. According to the experts, the society in Bulgaria is not mature enough to realize the need for it. The age of the teaching staff is affecting the dynamics between the teachers and pupils and the topics they can discuss. The fact that teachers belong to an older generation, brought up in a more conservative fashion, affect their understanding of current practices and desires of the teenagers. Although some teenagers claimed that they talk about sex with their parents, the majority do not.

Both teenagers and experts are of the opinion that the teaching staff in Bulgaria is not adequately prepared and trained to teach civil education topics such as sex education and media literacy. The government would not initiate an open debate about introducing compulsory sex education at schools because past events show that the society is conservative and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church has an influence on the population and the government appears to be populist by not risking to oppose the Church.

Sex education in Bulgaria is focusing only on the biological changes in the human body and brings only negative connotations to the teenagers, such as lessons about sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies. The Third Sector in Bulgaria is actively engaged with campaigns but the findings of this research show that their attempts do not reach all the teenagers.

Recommendations

The Ministry of Education and Science in Bulgaria should not rely on the initiative of the teachers for important topics like sex education. A public debate needs to be initiated where educators, parents, children, members of the third and the public sector can exchange their point of the view and create a programme for introducing compulsory sex education in school, starting in nursery with age-appropriate material. Bulgaria should follow the example of Netherlands for introducing children a positive attitude towards intimacy, relationships, respect and consent.

Sex education should be taught in such a way as to respect the religious beliefs of the particular country and its minority groups while providing the students with all the necessary information they need to make an informed decision. The experience of countries like the UK which are culturally diverse shows that this could be rather challenging. Thus, if introduced, sex education in Bulgaria needs to be designed in such a way as to take into consideration the ethic characteristics of all communities in the country.

The issues of online sexualization and sexting need to be brought up in both media literacy and sex education classes and need to be discussed thoroughly, rather than mentioned briefly or presented with an abstinence only, “don’t do it” attitude.

The technological solutions and the human education should go hand in hand. Policy makers should not blame only the tech companies for leakage of child pornography for example, when the teenagers themselves have never discussed porn with either a parent or an educator. The important things are actually the conversations because Internet is a real space.

Limitations

To begin with, the biggest limitation of my research is that my sample is too small to be considered representative for the teenagers in Bulgaria. Gathering data from not just one school but students from different cities made the data more representative but only by adding four additional cities to the sample. Many more are needed for a broad picture of the issue. A limitation of my methodology is the fact that teenagers might have felt uncomfortable sharing intimate information. What is more, they might have felt that their practices are indecent and thus would not have admitted them. The same applies to parents who might have felt pressured to give the “expected” answers.

Another limitation if that the data is open to interpretations and since I am the only researcher, there is no testing of the reliability of my interview coding. While I realize that the terms are controversial, I have defined it during my data collection, in order to make sure that my participants understand my questions. However, I cannot guarantee that my participants refer to the same concepts when using terms like sexualization as I do.

A limitation of my research could be considered the fact that as a Bulgarian, I am engaged in the issue personally and I might not have been fully impartial regardless of my best intent to do so.

Suggestions for further research

This paper touches upon numerous issues which could be investigated as separate research projects.

The EU Kids Online concludes that the “public anxiety over sexting is overstated” based on the low percentage of children affected and on the small percentage of those who find it harmful. My research is qualitative, rather than quantitative, so I cannot draw statistical conclusions. However, based on the interviews I conducted, I can argue that in Bulgaria, the number of children who have been exposed to sexual content (who have seen it online) has increased significantly, so a more up to date research is needed which clearly defines concepts like “sexual material”, so that valid results can be drawn. It can be concluded that a low percentage finds sexting harmful but to the ones who do, this can have a fatal end, as one of my interviewees shared.

A more thorough investigation of the online sexualization and sexting practices around the world needs to be conducted, so that Bulgaria can be placed accordingly.

It was out of the scope of my fieldwork to interview journalists and explore further how they reflect on the sexting scandals and whether indeed they refrain from searching for the root causes of the problems as claimed by Kaleynska.

It would be beneficial for this research to seek the point of view of civil service officers, such as representatives of the State Agency for Child Protection and the Central Juvenile Delinquency Combating Commission. It would benefit this research if representatives of the the Ministry of Education and Science of Bulgaria are

interviewed, and the question of introducing a compulsory sex education is posed and discussed. The current European Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society, Maria Gabriel, would likely be able to discuss the issue both as an European expert and as a Bulgarian citizen which would be highly interesting.

Previous studies suggest for future research to look at the difference in sexting behaviour according to social class, religion which this research did not perform. Especially interesting would be to compare the school curriculum for students in private schools as opposed to the public ones and the so called “foreign” schools which are private Bulgarian schools, highly influenced by another country’s school curriculum (American, French and Italian being a few examples).

Conclusion

Bulgarian teenagers, like their peers around the world, engage in practices of online sexualization and sexting which are part of their rights to participation and sexual exploration. Unlike their peers in most of the Western European countries, they do not receive standardised compulsory sex education at school.

New media technologies enable the rapid spread of online content, including imagery which breachers one's’ privacy such as a naked photo, shared without consent. Both technological solutions and human intervention are needed in order to prevent harmful effect on teenagers and online users in general.

Teenagers are concerned about their digital privacy and possess the technical skills to manage their ‘online selves’. However, they lack important soft skills such as understanding consent, privacy borders and respecting the personal information of others.

Bulgaria has a long way to go before being able to design and introduce an effective sex education and media literacy school curriculum but there are experts who are already paving the way to achieving this goal.

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Domain2. International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy, 2013 2(1), 35-49 Lewis, Jane, and Trudie Knijn. ‘Sex Education Materials in The Netherlands and in England and Wales: A Comparison of Content, Use and Teaching Practice’. Oxford Review of Education, Vol. 29, No. 1, 2003, vol. 29, no. 1, 2003. www.rug.nl, doi:10.1080/03054980307431. Livingstone, Sonia, et al. Children’s Online Activities, Risks and Safety. A Literature Review by the UKCCIS Evidence Group. Oct. 2017. Livingstone, Sonia, Haddon, Leslie and Gorzig, Anke. 2012. Children, risk and safety on the internet. The Policy Press. Bristol. Long Live Love [Lang Leve de Liefde]. https://www.langlevedeliefde.nl/docenten/english. Accessed 14 Mar. 2018. Loveguide. [‘Loveguide - позитивно, честно и проверено за любовта и секса’]. Loveguide, https://loveguide.bg/. Accessed 15 Feb. 2018. McGovern, Alyce, Crofts, Thomas, Lee, Murray and Milivojevic, Sanja. ‘Media, Legal and Young People’s Discourses around Sexting’. Global Studies of Childhood, vol. 6, no. 4, Dec. 2016, pp. 428–41. SAGE Journals, doi:10.1177/2043610616676028.

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NSI (National Statistical Institute). Teaching Staff in Vocational Schools by Attained Educational Level and Sex |. http://www.nsi.bg/en/content/4850/teaching-staff-vocational-schools-attained-edu cational-level-and-sex. Accessed 23 Feb. 2018. NDT. Sexting- the Disease of the youth. [Секстинг - Болестта На Младите - НДТ, Добрич, България.] http://www.ndt1.com/article.php/20120706091343306. Accessed 25 Jan. 2018. Oxford Dictionaries. ‘Word of the Year 2009 | Oxford Dictionaries’. Oxford Dictionaries | English, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/word-of-the-year/word-of-the-year-2009. Accessed 1 May 2018. Orenstein, Peggy. What young women believe about their own sexual pleasure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWA2uL8zXPI Accessed 14 June 2018. Pasquier, Dominique. ‘From Parental Control to Peer Pressure: Cultural Transmission and Conformism’. The International Handbook of Children, Media and Culture, SAGE Publications Ltd, 2008, pp. 448–59. SAGE Knowledge, doi:10.4135/9781848608436. Pfeffer, Betsy; Ellsworth, Taylor Rose and Gold, Melanie A. Interviewing Adolescents About Sexual Matters - ScienceDirect. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031395516411405. Accessed 14 Mar. 2018. Papadopoulos, Linda. Sexualisation of Young People. 2010. BPR Publishers. Raymond, Gorden. Basic Interviewing Skills. F E Peacock Publishers, Inc, Itasca, Illinois 9780875813585 Soft Cover - Books N Stuff. https://www.abebooks.com/9780875813585/Basic-Interviewing-Skills-Gorden-Ra ymond-0875813585/plp. Accessed 27 May 2018. Rogers, Richard. Digital Methods. MIT Press. 2013. Sayer, Brett. ‘Why Boys Need to Have Conversations about Emotional Intimacy in Classrooms’. The Conversation, http://theconversation.com/why-boys-need-to-have-conversations-about-emotion

al-intimacy-in-classrooms-54693. Accessed 14 Mar. 2018. Schalet, Amy T. Beyond Abstinence and Risk: A New Paradigm for Adolescent Sexual Health - ScienceDirect. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1049386711000089. Accessed 14 Mar. 2018. Schalet, Amy. ‘Why Boys Need to Have Conversations about Emotional Intimacy in Classrooms’. The Conversation, http://theconversation.com/why-boys-need-to-have-conversations-about-emotion al-intimacy-in-classrooms-54693. Accessed 14 Mar. 2018. Schnabl, Siegfried. Catalogue of German National Library. https://portal.dnb.de/opac.htm?method=simpleSearch&cqlMode=true&query=idn %3D131404563. Accessed 25 May 2018. Seidman, Steven. The social construction of sexuality. W. W. Norton & Company, 2003. Shahbazyan, Luiza, et al. Internet and the Early Sexualization. Applied Research and Communications Fund, Parents Association. Shishmanova, Neda. Personal Interview. 6 April 2018.Society and Values Association (SVA) [Асоциация Общество и Ценности], http://www.sva.bg/english.html. Accessed 18 May 2018. Stiritup. Safeguarding Teenage Intimate Relationships. http://stiritup.eu/. Accessed 25 Jan. 2018. Third, Amanda, et al. Children’s Rights in the Digital Age: A Download from Children Around the World. Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre, Oct. 2014, https://www.unicef.org/publications/index_76268.html. Turkle, Sherry. Life on the screen. Simon & Schuster, 1995. Turkle, Sherry. Alone together. Basic Books, 2011. Vandenbosch, Laura, and Steven Eggermont. ‘Sexualization of Adolescent Boys: Media Exposure and Boys’ Internalization of Appearance Ideals, Self-Objectification, and Body Surveillance’. Men and Masculinities, vol. 16, no. 3, Aug. 2013, pp.

283–306. SAGE Journals, doi:10.1177/1097184X13477866. Vbox. They want from SEM to stop the singer Geri-Nikol. [Искат от СЕМ спиране на певицата Гери-Никол. ], https://www.vbox7.com/play:e0abf741c3&start=14. Accessed 15 May 2018. Wieke G. Dalenberg, Margaretha C. Timmerman, E. Saskia Kunnen & Paul L. C. Van Geert (2016) Young people’s everyday romance and sexual experiences in relation to sex-related conversations with parents: a diary study in the Netherlands, Sex Education, 16:6, 692-706, DOI: 10.1080/14681811.2016.1192026 Whitworth, Dan. ‘Sextortion: Big rise in victims with 'tens of thousands at risk'. www.bbc.com, 24 May 2018. https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-43433015

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Appendix

Appendix 1 Terms of Service

“You may not post violent, nude, partially nude, discriminatory, unlawful, infringing, hateful, pornographic or sexually suggestive photos or other content via the Service.” (Instagram Terms of Service)

“You will not post content that: is hate speech, threatening or pornographic; incites violence; or contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence.” (Facebook Terms of Service)

“You will not post content that contains pornography, graphic violence, threats, hate speech or incitements to violence.”(Snapchat ToS. Section 8).

“We prohibit accounts that promote or distribute pornographic content.”. It is interesting that the guidelines clarify that “Breastfeeding and other depictions of nudity in non-sexual contexts are okay.”

“Never post, save or send nude or sexual content involving people under the age of 18 – even of yourself.This includes adding drawings or captions to a Snap to make it sexual, even as a joke.” (Snapchat Guidelines) (https://support.snapchat.com/en-GB/a/guidelines)

Appendix 2

Appendix 3 Criminal Code

According to the Criminal Code of the Republic of Bulgaria (Article 159):

(3) An individual who displays, presents, offers, sells, rents or distributes in another manner a pornographic material to a person who has not turned 16 years of age, shall be punished by imprisonment of up to three years and a fine of up to BGN 5,000.

(6) (Renumbered from paragraph 5 and amended, SG No. 38/2007, SG No. 74/2015) Anyone who, by means of information or communication technology or otherwise, possesses or provides for himself/herself or to another person pornographic material for the production of which a person under 18 years of age (or anyone who looks like such a person) has been used shall be punished by imprisonment of up to one year or a fine of up to BGN 2,000.

(7) (New, SG No. 74/2015) The punishment under Paragraph 6 shall also be imposed on anyone who, by means of information or communication technology, has intentionally accessed pornographic material, for the production of which a person under 18 years of age (or anyone who looks like such a person) has been used.

Appendix 4 Interviewing the teenagers. Ethics

The teaching and admin staff of High School “Dr Ivan Panov” in the town of Berkovitsa assisted in the recruitment of the volunteers and the research itself by informing the students about the research and providing logistic support. The school psychologist from the same school participated in the research in her role as an expert and a teacher. In order to make the scope of the research more representative but also to see if there will be any patterns present only for the group in the town of Berkovitsa, teenagers from other towns and cities in Bulgaria were interviewed.

I volunteer for an NGO in Bulgaria which gave me the advantage of having a good network of volunteers, experts and third sector organizations in different regions of the country who contributed to my research directly or by referring me to experts.

Being a youth trainer since 2009, I am experienced in working with teenagers. I have worked with girls aged 14-18 during Leadership Academy GLOW, I have worked with international youth trainers on various projects and I have coordinated a “Gender Training Seminar for Youth Workers”. My background gives me an advantage of knowing how to approach the object group.

I started training teenagers when I was a teenager myself in the peer-to-peer education method at GLOW Association Bulgaria. The aims of the association are to empower the youth in Bulgaria but also a main way to do this is to fill in the gaps which the Bulgarian

Education systems leaves, which means to teach the subjects which are not taught at school. As a youth trainer, I have noticed that teenagers take active part in our Sex Education sessions. This lead to the need to research further what are teenagers’ behaviours and what is the state of the issue in the country. Thus, it is worth acknowledging that based on my previous experience I do not start my research without any expectations. I expect teenagers to be highly interested in their own sexual exploration and I expect that they have not had many opportunities to discuss those in person.

To follow this and to try and minimize the discomfort, I met the students in class while they were in their comfort zone, introducing myself. Also at the beginning I started with very general questions slowly leading towards the intimate ones. I let them speak by only guiding them with my questions.

Consent Forms

In doing my research, I have complied with the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Scientific Practice. Fact sheet was produced detailing all the important information, including contact details. Consent forms were produced and signed in both English and Bulgarian. All translations were made by the researcher and consulted with an expert translator. If a teenager volunteers to take part in a research interview, their parent or guardian needs to sign a Consent form and the teenagers themselves signed one. All experts signed a Consent form too. The participants in the focus group also signed a Consent form but since the discussion was performed during their school time and I had the permission of their teacher and the Head of the school, their parents did not need to sign Consent forms. The Consent forms and the Fact Sheet can be accessed via the following link: (For personal data protection, the link is not accessible publicly.)

As the data is highly intimate, I took all necessary measures to conduct an anonymized and careful research. I have kept participants’ contributions to the research confidential unless the subjects who are over 18 years of age (the experts) have agreed otherwise. The anonymity of all children has been safeguarded. In the cases of direct interview quotations, nicknames are used to ensure confidentiality. The experts were asked to indicate in their consent form whether they prefer their answers to be anonymized in the research thesis.

In my attempt to conduct an impartial research, I realize the fact that I am a former student of the school where I am conducting my research. However, I have been away from the group for enough years to not know any one of the teenagers. I met my participants for the first time and I do not have any prior observations. I also have not met the teenagers who took part in the video call interviews. They were recruited with a public Facebook post.

It is unethical to ask participants to show a researcher sexually explicit material (Hasinoff) which is why this has not been done.

Appendix 5 Experts

Margarita Kaleynska. Since 2015 she is a lecturer in the University St Cyril and Methodius in Veliko Tarnovo in the faculty of pedagogy. Besides that, she is an international expert on soft skills, Chair of NGO GLOW and Director of Leadership Academy GLOW. Margarita has an extensive experience working with young people - boys and girls. In her work experience, she has been an expert consulting the Sofia and Varna Councils. She has worked with ‘risk groups’’ testing interactive methods to improve sexual education and prevent addictions with minority and risk groups in Bulgaria.

Kaleynska has consulted the publishing of a forthcoming book on methods of presenting the topic of online security to teenagers. Themes include privacy settings set up on Facebook and Instagram. She highlights the fact that the experts who are working on the publication of this book work abroad because those topics are popular there. “We will do our best to implement them here” adds Kaleynska, full of positivity. She consulted the development of an interactive game for sexual education in 2016, created by girls, aged 16 with the assistance of experts. I interviewed one of the creators to find out more.

The game provided basic sexual education in five local schools using theme rounds which give teenagers information on a broad range of topics such as sexual practices, safety, attitudes. In 2018, the Bulgarian Fund for Women which is part of the Global Fund for Women financed the running of campaigns in 12 different towns in Bulgaria. The unique feature is that adolescents decide how to run the campaign. The format is chosen by the teenagers and how they want to present the information. The campaign is supported by the Internet Safe Center who have experts to consult the teenagers. As part of the campaign, there is an online “Teen Referendum” (a Facebook post) where teenagers vote whether they need sexual education at school and write as comments how they want to be taught.

Nadya Zdravkova, co-founder of LoveGuide. The motto of the project is “LoveGuide, for the sex- positive, honest and reliable”. In 2015, Nikoleta Popkostadinova, the founder of LoveGuide created a website, thinking this will be enough. Then the team started meeting teenagers to show them the website. Listening to their feedback, their found out that teenagers don’t like reading, they prefer watching videos. What is more, the real meetings were highly beneficial and interesting for the teenagers. LoveGuide

has recently been endorsed by Bulgarian celebrities sharing their personal experience of things they did not know when they were 16. “Teenagers live in YouTube” says Nadya. October 2016 they started the YouTube channel which at the moment is their strongest channel. Their channel is growing but Currently they are not making money out of their youtube channel. When they are invited, they attend schools. They are considering other options at the moment to reach more teenagers, such as an app.They won a Project of the Year. They are registered as an NGO, they apply for grants. They are both journalists and as experts in communication they transform complex topics in a language teenagers can understand. Teenagers ask honest questions like “Is it too bad if I masturbate 3 times a day, would something happen to me”. Relationship advice is the most popular request on the LoveGuide chat. Children are ready and open to talk about it reports Zdravkova. The older teenagers ask less in face to face meetings and prefer to chat. Most of the issues are explained in an easy to understand way in a video format and also as articles on the LoveGuide website. However, teenagers prefer to ask their questions in a chat. The personal contact cannot be replaced by any digital communication, says Zdravkova. Children do and always need to talk about the changes in their bodies. The need for a channel like LoveGuide comes from the fact that talking about sex is still taboo in Bulgaria. Their experience shows that the drug store sales assistants in some small towns would not sell condoms to teenagers who are really young which is why teenagers feel ashamed to buy condoms.

Georgi Apostolov Coordinator of Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre

INSAFE is a European network of 30 national centers working on raising awareness about Internet safety and responsible Internet usage amongst the young people. 46 hotlines in 40 countries are members of the International Association for Internet Hotlines (INHOPE). Every center works with the national police and all together they work with the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL). The Bulgarian

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Safer Internet Centre was established at the beginning of 2006 and now has 12 years of experience.Georgi Apostolov is a coordinator of the centre. The Centre has a Public Council consisting of IT companies, the three biggest telecommunications and internet service providers in Bulgaria, Microsoft and members of the public sector. The Centre is also consulting with its Youth panel which consists of adolescents who as an age group are also the main target group of the organization.

Appendix 6 Interview Questions

In the creation of the interview questions, I consulted various studies such as Livingstone, Hasinoff, I got inspiration by their interviews and questionnaires in order to create my own one. The order of the questions aims to start broadly and then zoom in and focus on the practices of sexting and sexualization. As the sample is not big and my aim is not to draw statistical conclusions, but rather qualitative insights, the socio economic status of the teenagers and parents interviewed was not a question I have asked.

Despite the age limits that exist for the use of platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, studies show that children often ignore those. It appears relatively easy for an individual to convince certain platforms that they are over a certain age. Facebook for example requires one’s date of birth to confirm that they are over 13. Thus, anyone can enter a date of birth they want.n the UK, three quarters of 10 to 12-year-olds use social media, 49% use Facebook and 41% use Instagram” (Jamieson). This is why at the start of my interview, I asked the participants when did they start using those platforms and was it before the age of 13. What is more, since Tinder is a dating application which can also be used for sexualization and sexting, I am interested to find out if they are using it, despite according to the Terms of Service, the user needs to be above 18 to register.

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As it was assumed that some of the participants are still exploring their sexuality, they were not asked directly if they identify as male, female or other and what is their sexual orientation. However, during the course of the conversation, those questions were aimed to be brought up naturally and indirectly.

Hasinoff suggests a digital lock on a photo as an alternative way to ensure privacy. A question testing this suggestion was added to the interview question to find out if they have ever heard of it or if they have used it. A number of initiatives organized by the Third Sector in Bulgaria claim to reach out to the Bulgarian teenagers and educate them about sexual education and also about media literacy. To test whether the participants have ever heard of those initiates and the organizations, they were asked questions about them. Even though the participants in this research are not a representation of the whole country, their responses are a way to check the spread of the information offered by the Third Sector. Teenagers are also asked if they have discussed digital privacy with their parents.

A different set of questions was prepared for all the different experts with some main questions being present in all of them. The interview questions for the experts vary depending on their expertise and aim to understand what is the state of the affair in Bulgaria from the point of view of the organization they represent. The interview questions for the parents are also inspired by previously conducted research and aims to find out how concerned and informed parents are on the topics discussed, what do they discuss with their children and how do they approach the topics.

The questions can be adjusted according to the participant.

Interview questions: Teenagers

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Section 1: General Information:

1. How old are you? 2. Are you studying in a public (state-run) school? 3. Do you have social media accounts? 4. Which ones of the following platforms/services do you use and how often?

YES/NO How often? Facebook/Messe nger Instagram Whatsapp Twitter Viber Snapchat Tinder An email account

5. Do you use any other ones? 6. When did you join those platforms? At what age? Were you above 13?

Relationships and Communication Practices

7. Have you ever been in a relationship?

IF YES:

8. How do you communicate with your partner? A. Face to face B. Messenger C. Instagram D. Snapchat

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E. Text messages F. Phone calls G. Other 9. Can you order them according to which one do you use the most?

Sexual Education

1. Have you ever been given sexual education and what kind of topics did it cover? 2. Was the topic of sexting and sexualisation online ever mentioned? 3. Have you ever heard of the campaigns “Rano Mi e” and “Oblechi se”? Do you know what are they about? 4. Have you ever heard of the website and Youtube channel LoveGuide? Have you ever read publications/ watched videos?

Digital Literacy

1. Are you aware of what are the risks online? 2. How would you describe your attitudes towards digital privacy? 3. Have you ever been given digital literacy education and what kind of topics did it cover? 4. Have you ever discussed in school topics like online privacy? What did you discuss? 5. Have you adjusted your privacy setting online? (what you share with friends, what is public) 6. Do you know what a digital lock on photo is? Have you ever used it? IF YES 7. How does this affect the trust between you and the person you send the picture to and how? 8. Are you concerned with your online privacy? In what ways?

Section 2: Sexualization

1. Is social media important for your self actualization? In what ways?

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2. Is Internet important for your sexual exploration? How? Why? 3. Did social media change the dynamics between teenagers’ regarding their intimate relationships? 4. Would you say you feel peer pressure regarding uploading provocative images and text online? 5. Would you say that likes and comments encourage you to upload more provocative and sexualizing images? 6. Have you ever posted online (public/private) photos, videos or text with sexual suggestions? 7. Can you show me photos from your social media accounts can you can classify as sexually suggestive? (which you have posted online) 8. Have you ever watched online pornography? 9. Do you regularly view online pornography? 10.Do you consider social media to be a place where teenagers get sexualized? What about other media, such as newspapers, magazines, advertisements?

Sexting

1. Have you ever heard of the word sexting? Do you know what it means? 2. How would you describe your experiences of sexualization and sexting?

Sending sexts

3. Have you been asked to send a sext? 4. If you are in a relationship, will the duration of the relationship affect your decision (whether to send a sext) and how? (dating for a week, a month, a year)? 5. Have you ever sent a sexually suggestive message online? (of yourself or otherwise)

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IF YES carry on, if NO, go to next section:

6. In the occasions when you have sent a sexually suggestive message:

Was it text-based only?

Was it involving emojis, GIFs, stickers, photos?

IF YES carry on, if NO, go to next section:

7. Have you ever taken a sexually suggestive photo of yourself?

IF YES

8. Was it naked or semi-naked? 9. To whom? (ex. A partner, someone you were flirting with). Have you ever sent a sext to someone who was not your partner? 10.How did sending a sext make you feel? 11.Have you ever sent a sext (text, emoji, or a photo etc) to someone above 18? 12.Have you ever sent a sext to someone who you only know online? (someone you haven’t met in person)

Receiving sexts

1. Have you ever received a sexually suggestive message online?

IF YES:

In the occasion(s) when you have received a sexually suggestive message:

2. Was it text-based only? 3. Was it involving emojis, GIFs, stickers ? 4. Have you ever received a sexually suggestive photo? (of the person you are communicating with) 5. Was it naked or semi-naked? 6. Have you ever received a sext (text, emoji etc) from someone above 18?

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7. Have you ever received a sext from someone who was not your partner? 8. How did receiving a sext make you feel? 9. Have you ever received a sext to someone who you only know online? (someone you haven’t met in person)

Privacy and Motivations:

1. What were your motivations to engage in sexting? 2. Did you discuss consent? 3. In the occasion(s) when you sent or received a sext, was the message/picture shared with anyone else? 4. Have you ever seen/ have you been sent a sext (involving a nude/semi-nude picture of someone you know) where you acted as a third party? Has a friend ever forwarded one to you? 5. Have you ever felt pressured to send a semi/ naked photo of yourself? 6. IF YES, did you send it and why? 7. Does the duration of the relationship matter in making your decision for whether to send a sext or not? 8. Does the duration of the relationship matter in creating your privacy expectations concerning your trust in whether the person will share/forward it?

Interview questions: Parents

1. Would you say you are concerned with your child’s digital privacy? 2. Are you aware what kind of risks there are online? 3. Have you ever discussed what is risky online with your child? What did you talk about?

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4. Have you ever confiscated the mobile device/laptop/computer of your teenager? Why? 5. Did your child have a social media profile before the age of 13? Does your child have one now? 6. Do you monitor what they post online? 7. Do you regularly safeguard what your child watches/ does online? Which applications they use on their mobile phone? 8. Have you checked your children’s search history? 9. Have you ever filtered content? In what way? 10.What are the tensions between the balance of risks and opportunities online? 11.Have you ever discussed sex and your child’s sexual exploration? Is sex is a topic that is encouraged or avoided at home? 12.Have you ever discussed whether your child watched porn? 13.Do you know what is sexting? Have you ever discussed this? 14.Are there any tensions between the balance of risks and opportunities online in the context of sexualization and sexting? 15.Do you see sexting as indecent? 16.Did social media change the dynamics between teenagers’ regarding their intimate relationships? 17.Who is responsible for educating children about digital privacy? 18.Do you think that sexting and sexualisation are topics which should be discussed at school?

Interview questions: Psychologist

1. Teenagers aged 14-17 are children but they have the same access to new media platforms (such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp among others) like adults. Which affordances of those platforms do you consider potentially risky?

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2. What are the tensions between the balance of risks and opportunities (in the context of sexualization and sexting)? 3. Do lifestyle magazines promote sexting? 4. How should topics such as child pornography, grooming and sexual abuse be discussed? Where? (at school, online, at home) 5. Is children’s digital safety and digital privacy something you are concerned about? Do you take any measures regarding it? 6. Did social media change the dynamics between teenagers’ regarding their intimate relationships? 7. Do you see sexting as indecent? 8. What is your opinion on promoting abstinence with regards to sexting? 9. How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about sexting and sexualization?

Interview questions: Third Sector

1. Who is responsible for educating children about digital privacy? 2. What are the tensions between the balance of risks and opportunities (in the context of sexualization and sexting)? 3. Do lifestyle magazines promote sexting? 4. How do you balance risk and opportunities online? 5. Is children’s digital safety and digital privacy something you are concerned about? Do you take any measures regarding it? 6. Do you see sexting as indecent? 7. What is your opinion on promoting abstinence with regards to sexting? 8. Do you think that sexting and sexualisation are topics which should be discussed at school?

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9. Can you think of initiatives that have been done to encourage a discussion on the topic? 10.How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about sexting and sexualization? 11.Is there a debate around sexting and sexualisation? IF YES Is it focused on digital privacy and safety online or on promoting abstinence?

Interview questions: Educators 1. Is sexual education being taught in your school? Who is teaching it? 2. What about media literacy or digital privacy? 3. Have you discussed in school topics such as child pornography, grooming and sexual abuse? 4. What are your experiences in teaching these subjects? 5. Is there a debate around sexting and sexualisation? IF YES Is it focused on digital privacy and safety online or on promoting abstinence? 6. How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about sexting and sexualization? 7. How should we balance risk and opportunities online? 8. Is children’s digital safety and digital privacy something you are concerned about? Do you take any measures regarding it? 9. Do you consider sexting a danger? 10.Do you think that the age of the school staff affects in a way the talks on sensitive topics like sexualisation, sexting? 11.Do you consider the teaching staff to up to date with technology and digital literacy to be able to engage in a discussion with students? 12.Do you see sexting as indecent? 13.What is your opinion on promoting abstinence with regards to sexting?

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Interview questions: The Bulgarian Safer Internet Centre 1. Do lifestyle magazines promote sexting? 2. What is your opinion on promoting abstinence with regards to sexting? 3. Is the debate around sexting and sexualization focused on digital privacy and safety online or on promoting abstinence? 4. How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about sexting and sexualization? 5. Is children’s digital safety and digital privacy something you are concerned about? Do you take any measures regarding it? 6. Do you consider sexting a danger? 7. Do you think that the age of the school staff affects in a way the talks on sensitive topics like sexualisation, sexting? 8. Do you consider the teaching staff to up to date with technology and digital literacy to be able to engage in a discussion with students? 9. Can you tell me more about your campaign, financed by the EEA and Norway Grants 2009-14 #облечисебе (#dressup) where teenagers are encouraged to post selfies dressed up with as many clothes as possible as an antidote of the early sexualization online? 10.Do you see sexting as indecent?

Interview questions: Loveguide (Bulgarian YouTube channel about sex, targeting teenagers)

1. Why there is a demand for a YouTube channel teaching teenagers about sexual education? 2. What are your experiences in teaching these subjects? 3. Have you ever focused on topics such as child pornography, grooming and sexual abuse?

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4. Is there a debate around sexting and sexualisation? IF YES Is it focused on digital privacy and safety online or on promoting abstinence? 5. How should we, as a society, educate teenagers about sexting and sexualization? 6. How should we balance risk and opportunities online? 7. Is children’s digital safety and digital privacy something you are concerned about? Do you take any measures regarding it? 8. Do you consider sexting a danger? 9. Do you think that the age of the school staff affects in a way the talks on sensitive topics like sexualisation, sexting? 10.Do you consider the teaching staff at schools to up to date with technology and digital literacy to be able to engage in a discussion with students? 11.Do you see sexting as indecent? 12.What is your opinion on promoting abstinence with regards to sexting?

Appendix 7 Audio files

All audio files can be accessed on the following link: For personal data protection, the link is not accessible publicly.

The table used to record and analyzed the responses can be accessed on the following link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cZ0guZ697JaPJlxp6PvKQbr3UiyvBBg-QIaccqRvUC0/ edit#gid=600917257

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Appendix 8 The Stories of Sexting Practices

What is on the sexts?

There are all sorts of photos: naked photos, photos of girls masturbating. Normally they take selfies in front of the mirror says Stoyan. I ask Momchil to describe me what the photos and videos and vidoes look like. He says the standard ones are photos of girls which they took on the mirror, naked. The word choice Momchil uses is “quite ordinary”. He was seen so many, and some of them, from his stories, are way more intriguing and full of action, that a naked photo of a girl, posing in front of the mirror is not a big deal anymore. Normally, the photos are taken either at home or in the gym. One of the videos in the group is taken against the will of the girl. According to him, on the recording, the guy takes the video and the girl shouts “If you show it to anyone, I will ruin your life” and the video has been widely spread apparently. He has seen all types - just posing, touching themselves, masturbating. He has downloaded sexualized photos uploaded on girls profiles too and would share them with his group.

Personal stories

● Students have been expelled from school, moved to another school because of sexting. Those stories do not make it to the media though, comments Zdravkova. She then starts telling me about all the possible scenarios which the teenagers themselves also told me about. One of the girls who volunteers for LoveGuide has a personal sexting story which she shares with teenagers as part of the LoveGuide talks. She sent a nude photo to his partner while they were living in

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different countries. Someone hacked his computer and started blackmailing her with the image, threatening her that they will show it to her parents.

● A girl, who is Borislava’s acquaintance moved to live in a new town. The police investigated the case. Others have changed their behavior and were not so open about meeting new people after their photos leaked. One if Preslava’s classmates had a leaked photo in primary school. According to Preslava she expected to have a new start when coming to high school but in a small town, this is impossible because everyone knows about them.

● Elena’s friend was in 6th grade when she sent her boyfriend sexually explicit photos. They leaked with students from grade 5 and they showed them to the teacher. After that the teenagers, together with their parents, went to the police to deal with the issue. “The teachers were shocked because this is a child in 6th grade” however most of her girl friends defended her.

● Momchil tells me he was a hidden folder in Snapchat where he keeps sexually explicit screenshots. I ask him what is the criteria what to keep for yourself and what not. “To have a more beautiful b**t” he replies. I ask him if this is a type of a hidden treasure and he says that all of his friends have such “hidden folders” because they have discussed them. On one hand, they are best friends and they share the ‘treasure’, but on the other, they keep the gems to themselves and this is ok. I ask him if they discuss those photos with criticism. He laughs and says “no, there is no criticism”. This is a group where mostly photos are sent. He downloads only the ones he likes. He also has photos of girls who are over 18+. A treasure he now has is a video of a girl who knows who is masturbating (she sent it to 1 person only).

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● Dimitar shared that he is changing his social media passwords every single week because he is really concerned about his digital privacy. He was added on Skype by a profile who suggested a sexual video call but he refused, thinking it is someone who wants to collect explicit photos of boys.

● Georgi thinks teenagers should talk more with their parents about sex because Internet is not enough. Diana has discussed this with her mum and they both believe you should not have sexually explicit photos on the first place. “I am very close to my parents and constantly share with them” says Dimitar who also comments on the fact that they have never discussed consent at school.

● Diana has been asked to send a sexually explicit photo by people she hasn’t known for a long time but she wouldn’t do it. Diana tells me the story of a friend who sent her a naked photos of a girl. When we talk about the leaked photos she is certain that “Of course he will disseminate them, that is why he is texting”. According to Diana, her acquaintance probably does not know that so many people have seen her pictures, she might believe only a couple of people have seen them.

● Georgi says that some girls send photos to attract attention.

● Borislava says that for many of her friends, sexting on Snapchat is normalized because it is mutual, both sides send nude photos.“I am afraid”, says Borislava. “I have recommended to my friends to not do it’’. According to Georgi, if a picture gets forwarded even once, then “everyone” will have them.

● Georgi says that the whole point of forwarding sexually explicit images is for them to be sent to people who know the person on the photo. “I personally know everyone whose photos I have seen”

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● Yana has forwarded photos herself. Even if you don’t forward it, you show it to your good friends clarifies Yana. Radostina has received forwarded photos numerous times but she never forwards them herself. Radostina says boys have group chats. I ask her what do they discuss when they see a leaked photos and how do they feel. She replies: “Outrage”. The outrage is always towards the person on the picture.

● I ask Dimitar about the time he has seen a photo as a third party. He refused to talk at first saying “It happened on Messenger but it is very personal, I took it very deeply because it happened to someone I know and we are together every day because the person is in my class [...] I didn't feel good and I asked them to stop” . They were naked photos sent individually to people, not in a group.

● “Sex is an important part of a relationship” says Stoyan, commenting on the long-distance relationships which hugely rely on the exchange of explicit content. “Those things should happen offline, which is why I don’t feel especially pleasant.” comments Dimitar who is also critical of sexting.

● Receiving sexts made Dimitar feel “Quite strange”. A girl added him on Facebook and started flirting on Messenger. “We have met but I don’t know her much.” explains Dimitar. She asked for naked photos and sent him hers without him requesting them. According to him, she was expecting a trade-off - for him to send some too. He deleted the photos to avoid “psychological damage on the person” if they get seen by others.

● The best way to react after a sexting scandal would be for the parents and teachers to contact the Safer Internet Centre and fortunately a lot of people do it. When parents contact the district police stations, most of them signpost them to

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The Safer Internet Centre and they resolve the case together without going to court. When the Safer Internet Centre gets contacted, number one thing to do is to eliminate the content from the online space, comments Apostolov. There is no digital differentiation between and big and small cities in terms if internet usage. The way teenagers interact is the same and the problems they face too.

● Stoyan starts talking about fake news. First, he gives me an example of a fake news article but he is much more excited to talk about his next example. In his words, he “really wanted” to watch videos with explicit content of the singer Suzanita which were uploaded. It turned out that the girl on the video was actually not Suzanita, but a different girl but the video was advertised in this way to get more views “If it was Suzanita, wow”. Suzanita is another role model who is a singer, currently 15 years old and is also famous for provocative and obscene music videos.

● The next story Momchil tells me about is classic - one of his classmate (a girl) was in a relationship, then they broke up and her ex boyfriend sent her private photos to a guy from their class, who then forward the photos to Momchil.

● Dimitar does not have a collection of girls’ photos but he knows of many. He has also read online about people who sell naked photos. Georgi says that he knows of a person who was selling a photo.

● According to Zdravkova, the peer pressure might mislead teenagers. Even if teenagers have had a proper conversation with their parents, if the rest of the classes is not educated enough, the whole environment is not healthy.

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● According to Dimitar, the person who took a picture of themselves made their own decision. “They had their own goal with the pictures. But those who forward and discuss them, they are to blame [...] It is not acceptable to forward images which are private to other people”. “They [the sexters] have the right to do whatever they like. But they don’t have right to forward those private photos to random people”

● Diana is in a relationship but does not sext with her partner. According to her, if a photo you do not want public leaks, “your dignity will be impaired”. Stoyan and his girlfriend have a special kind of trust. They have exchanged the passwords for their Facebook profiles. “She knows of all the naked photos I have on my phone. I have even given her the password to my computer” adds Stoyan, illustrating the level of trust between them. He has told her that they do not mean anything to him and she is the only one who matters.

● According to Apostolov, for teenagers Internet often becomes a refuge for a problem in their real world - a family problem or a struggle at school. According to the expert the problem is not in the high internet usage, it is in the content to which they are exposed online. He gives as an example teenagers who spend a significant amount of time preparing for chess competitions online who are not considered a risk group.

● Radostina has received a lot of snapchats with explicit content, mainly from person she doesn't know (boys who have added her on Snapchat). Boys share photos . Radostina has never done screenshots.

● Diana tells me the story of a 13 year old girl who took naked pictures in the gym which ended up “in the whole town, everyone had them”. According to Diana, “she was glad” that people have seen her photos.

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● There is a conflict between two girls in one class and one of them disseminated her leaked photos to other towns too. Preslava did not forward it

● Preslava told me the story of a girl her age who had many explicit images and someone created a facebook profile with all of them with her own name and “the little whore” next to it. “Really nasty”

● A classmate of Preslava was pressured to send naked photos by her boyfriend who then forwarded them

● As a revenge, her partner sent her photos to her mum. Preslava says she wants to “protect herself by not trusting anyone fully even her partner.

● A girl we will call Nia, borrowed Yana’s classmate (we will call Alex )phone to use gmail while they are together at a summer camp. Nia forgot to log out from gmail and after a while, the phone ended up in the hands of Alex’s father who found a sexually explicit video in which she is masturbating.it made a back up in Google photos. Which is who the father saw it . According to Yana, the video has not further disseminated but a lot of people knew about the accident

● Yana has been a third party in receiving the dick pic of a classmate

● Elena - once someone logged into a girl’s profile and found explicit images and they quickly got disseminated.

● A girl (let’s call her Iva) was browsing the photos on her friends’ phone when she spotted a naked photo (of the owner of the phone, lets call her Vanya) and then she sent the photo to herself while Vanya wasn’t watching. Iva then forwarded

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the photos to Anastasios. He hasn’t discussed this in person with a girls whose photos he ‘’owns’’. It all stays online.

● It is important to start with sex education from nursery and to talk to children about how do you interact with your body. Nadya tells me the story of a boy aged 4, who has a sibling, who is a baby. So the family members all give cuddles to the baby and kiss it everywhere, including on the baby’s b**t. The boy then kisses a girl in the nursery on her b**t because he assumed this is normal. Her point is that we should talk to children from a very early age and explain what limits we have when interacting with our bodies. Discussing touch is crucial point to be discussed at nursery.

● A girl only sent a sext to his boyfriend, then they broke up, and he disseminated them. Stoyan, on his side, also shared them to friends, including two girls. “There are girls who are also interested in porn” comments Stoyan, highlighting the fact that it is not only guys who exchange naked images. Stoyan has never uploaded photos on a website. “When I am sent a sext directly, I wouldn’t forward it”, however, he would show it to a friend on his phone. Friends of Georgi have shown him naked pictures of a girl from his school, but only on their phones because they strictly mention that they wouldn’t send it. A month later he received them though. “You see them but you have no proof. You can’t forward them” says Georgi and I can feel the pity in his voice. According to Alex, it is normally an ex who disseminates the photos

● According to Zdravkova parents give their children phones to keep track of them, but do not equip them with the needed skills about how to stay safe. The parents are not ready for this huge responsibility. Adults do not understand the terms of service which leads to a “widespread illiteracy” for the usage of platforms (Apostolov). The Safe Center appeals to the parents to talk with their children but

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the parents themselves have never read the platform’s terms of service and do not know how to adjust their privacy settings. It is common that parents create the first account of the child with a false, 18+ age. This takes away the protections which are in place for minors who use social media, such as restricted adult content. What is more, if the account is owned by a minor, external search engines cannot find it which gives the child an extra security. The default setting are different for children’s accounts and parents take this away by choosing a random age for their first profiles. Thus, parents are putting their children at risk twice.

● The teenagers talk about newspapers as something archaic, “there used to be naked photos of women in the newspapers”, and Momchil used to look at them when he was little. Elena says that nowadays “nobody is going to buy a newspaper or a magazine” which is why she doesn’t believe they have an effect on the sexualization.

● For Borislava social media is “an effective way, not necessarily to assess someone, but to build a primary idea about them’’ based on what (s)he had said (s)he likes. Diana is of a different opinion, arguing that in social media one is a “completely different person” in comparison to their offline self.

● Carolina uses Instagram for photos but only the ones which are “cool” and “beautiful”. If she has a “crazy one”, she would think about whether to upload it and most cases she does not. When giving a talk, somewhere in between relationship and sex questions, Zdravkova also talks with the students about the employers who would stalk their online presence when they start applying for jobs.

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Appendix 9 Platform Usage Results

Yes Never had Used to have it but currently does

Platform it not

Facebook/Messenge 14 (100%) - - r

13 - 1 (7.1%)

Instagram (92.9%)

2 12 (85.7%) -

Whatsapp (14.3%)

Twitter 5 (35.7%) 9 (64.3%) -

Viber 8 (57.1%) 4 (28.6%) 2 (14.3%)

Snapchat 11(78.6%) 1(7.1%) 2 (14.3%)

Tinder 1(7.1%) 12 (85.7%) 1(7.1%)

An email account 14 (100%) - -

Global Kids Online 2016 Current Research

Platform 2018

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Facebook/Messenge Facebook - 71.7 %, Messenger - 53.6 100% r %

Instagram 29.9 % 92.9%

Whatsapp 11.9 % 14.3%

Twitter - 35.7%

Viber 50.1% 57.1%

Snapchat 16.2 % 78.6%

Tinder - 7.1%

An email account - 100%

Appendix 10 Third Sector Initiatives

One of the older but still well known campaigns, already discussed in the theoretical framework of this paper, is #dressup (#oблечи се бе). The idea of the backwards striptease come from the teenagers in the Safer Internet Centre Youth Panel and it aimed at provoking attention. A debating club in Sofia approached them to organize a public debate on sexualized selfies where the freedom of expression is a big point of discussion.

The Bulgarian Red Cross organizes once a year a sexual education lesson in Shishmanova’s hometown and they talk about diseases. Amongst the students, this is “the day when they will give away condoms” says Shishmanova. Nobody is focusing on

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the core of the subject. Other topics like sexing have not been mentioned. However, the school should not rely on external organizations, according to Shishmanova.

Carolina attended Leadership academy Glow and she found this really helpful and also educational. Girls were divided in teams. The highlights for Carolina were a game “If you could create a pharmaceutical product for a woman, what would it be?”. They also talked about facts and myths about sex. Carolina felt ashamed she did not know where the organs of the reproductive system are but she also defends herself by saying they went through those topics quickly at school and the teachers did not pay enough attention to them. This confirms Shishmanova’s observations that teenagers lack the knowledge although this is one of the few topics studies at school. Thus, the effectiveness of those classes can be questioned.

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