I am, by no means, what I would consider a prude. I believe love and sexuality of all kinds should be celebrated.
However, when it comes to children you can go ahead and call me the biggest prude to ever exist.
One boring night this past month I got carried away searching YouTube videos. About a half an hour into my mindless journey of watching the nom nom kitty and Charlie bit my finger, I came across a video titled “7 year olds going hard on single ladies.”
What I watch appalled me and made me sick to my stomach.
The video of what is obviously a dance competition portrays seven year olds wearing not a costume but lingerie. Their dancing resembled more gyrating than actual choreography.
Yes, the girls were very talented, but what they were wearing and how they were dancing was incredibly age-inappropriate.
What is it with society and its desperate desire to sexualize our children? Why can’t kids just be kids? When I was in dance at seven, my costume was a poodle skirt with tights and I danced to “Rockin’ Robin”. But these days, I feel like we’re shoving sexuality in kids’ faces before they need to even be aware of that yet.
That’s my problem with stores like Abercrombie—recently it received a lot of attention because the company was selling push-up bras in its children’s section.
Also, in the French Vogue last year Thylane Lena-Rose Blondeau-a ten-year-old model, was photographed in high heels completely topless with her hair and large necklaces being the only covering she had.
What the hell?
No matter where you look children are being confronted with sexuality, and then we wonder why a generation of girls seems to think that their sex appeal, physical appearance and appeal to their preferred sex is the most important thing to them. How does this type of reinforcement NOT give that impression?
There is no reason I can possibly think of why a seven year old girl should be dancing in a bra and short skirt to Beyonce. A seven year old should be more concerned with Disney princesses and dreaming of being an explorer or whatever she wants. She should believe she can do anything she wants to do.
We’re heading down a very dangerous path if we continue to let the generation behind us to grow up like this. According to the Justice Department, there has been a recent internet child pornography boom and I don’t think it’s farfetched to say it can be attributed to the sexualizing our children that puts even more appeal out there to pedophiles.
We need to teach our daughters better values than appealing to the opposite sex. We need to teach them to dream, learn, be independent and think for themselves- not to simply exude sex appeal.
When I have a child someday, that will be my No. 1 goal—to let them be a kid for as long as they want. The world pushes you along fast enough, why are we forcing our kids to grow out of the most carefree, innocent and wonderful time of their lives to cater to our desires? That’s disgusting.
