The Sexualization of Early Childhood

“Children growing up today are bombarded from a very early age with graphic messages about sex and sexiness in the media and popular culture.”

                                                                                      Levin & Kilbourne

Perhaps there has been no time in human history when children, indeed very young children are inundated, dangerously overwhelmed and flooded with explicit sexual messages. From simple advertise messages on products to adverts and programs on TV, to video games, movies, music and even toys children see and get messages that are embedded with sex and sexualized images. Unarguably, the sexual messages that children got from the media is second to if not at par with violence messages.

The media remains a powerful influence that shapes the young ones. From my experience as a preschool teacher, young children got their information about sex mostly from the media. As captured by the Deseret News, "Kids learn from many sources (Steve Thomsen communication professor at Brigham Young University). It's true they learn from parents and other socializing agents like church and school, but they also learn an awful lot from media. They rely on media as a way to learn about their world. What they see is what they assume is normal."

Sexualization is to make something sexual in character or quality.  It refers to the process whereby a person or group of people comes to be seen or interpreted as sexual in nature. Sexuality and sexualization of children is not the same thing. Sexuality in children refers to children developing a healthy curiosity and awareness of their bodies as different from sexualization which occurs when a child sense of value is solely based on his or her sex appeal. The other day a child in grade two was been teased by her friends for not having a boyfriend, she told the parents to find a guy for her as life is meaningless and dull without a boy-friend.  A child in grade 1 as told by a colleague of mine reported that a classmate pull down his pant and “he asked me to do a disgusting thing, to lick his private part!”

The pains and depravations caused by sexualization of children are evident everywhere. Sexualization, experts say, devalues accomplishment, intelligence and character (Deseret News, 2011). Children are been exposed so earlier and are demonstrating sexual interests, behaviors and actions at earlier age. Could the broken homes, unwanted pregnancies, and such that are prevalent in our societies not be the results from sexualization of children?

As a parent and an educator I feel something needs to be done and I am deeply concerned. Sadly enough it seems the adverts, the exposures cannot be stopped. It is case of the fact that you cannot stop a bird from fly over your head but you can stop it from building its nest on your head. If we take it upon ourselves as parents and educators to speak and educate the young ones honestly, with care, love and concern about the sexualized world around them and counter the negative effects of it, we would succeed in not allowing the evil birds of sexualization build their nests on the heads of our young ones.

References:

Deseret News (2011). The end of innocence: The cost of sexualizing kids. Retrieved from http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700180194/The-end-of-innocence-The-cost-of-sexualizing-kids.html?pg=all

Levin, D. E., & Kilbourne, J. (2009). [Introduction]. So sexy so soon: The new sexualized childhood and what parents can do to protect their kids (pp. 1-8). New York: Ballantine Books. Retrieved from: http://dianeelevin.com/sosexysosoon/introduction.pdf