Sexting

A while back, I made a promise to stop paying so much attention to politics. I find the mechanisms of power fascinating in its mixture of high-mindedness, venality, and manipulations, but the current political culture is so vapid and polarizing in its pursuit of gotya moments that I checked out. However, some events are too ubiquitous to miss, and so I found myself reading up on Anthony Weiner’s sex tweets.

I’m not going to write about the obvious points here, but let me list them for my peace of mind: 1) namely that for someone who is supposedly Congress’ social media expert, Weiner showed a remarkable lack of judgement by not realizing that it was only a matter of time before any picture he sent was discovered, 2) as always, the cover-up is worse than the deed, and 3) you really can’t pick a better name for the politician in this scandal than Weiner. Seriously: you just can’t make this stuff up.

No, what interests me is act of sexting. Given that emails and texting have become so commonplace as to almost become a form of speech, I’m not suprised that sexting is so common. The problem is that these texts and pictures are transmitted in a public domain and can be copied any number of times. In the past, sexy pictures or letters physical objects whose discovery and dissemination was limited at best. But now once a text or picture is out there, it’s free game.

Which is sad. Texting as a form of communication is freeing in a way that emails and even speech is not. I know that as much as I talk and email with my wife, our texts have a completely different feel to them; they’re fun and immediate and – best of all – quick. An instant capture of the moment. I’m not on twitter, but I imagine that the act of tweeting is similar. Now enter sex into the equation and the allure is almost irresistible for people in long-distance relationships, who travel, or even those who like to share the random things that pass through their heads during office hours...

There’s a lot of other things that go into sexting, but Penelope Trunk’s take - How Adults Can Sext their way to Happiness - is worth reading. Among very amusing stories about sexting at 40 and the freedom that it gave her, she notes:

Sending a naked photo of yourself is an emotionally intimate act because of the implied trust you have in the recipient. When you act in a trusting way—like trusting the recipient of the photo to handle it with care and respect—you benefit because being a generally trusting person is an emotionally sound thing to do; people who are trusting are better judges of character.

She also writes that “sending nude photos is so common today that lawmakers are forced to treat it as a mainstream courting ritual and legalize it for all ages.” It’s important to remember that Weiner broke no laws – everyone he tweeted was of legal age – his only fault was lying (to his wife, his constituents, etc. – no small matter, but not illegal). IMO, it would be a better world in which more people spent their time thinking about sex rather than other things – at least it’s healthy! The problem is that at the moment the forms of communication aren’t private, and so the risk of embarrassment and humiliation are high. Until something changes, it’ll be a risk that sexters will have to run. Perhaps that makes it more exciting?