You may find this hard to imagine but I did not thrive in high school. I know – total shocker. I could barely stand it to be honest. If I wasn’t so afraid of “getting in trouble” with any authority figure, I would have skipped it all together. The kids were nasty and poorly behaved, and hormones make even the most well brought up individual do stupid, impulsive things, without much concern for the implications on their future. I was in school when MSN and MySpace were your only forms of social media. I can only imagine the toxic environment that exists now within those cheap cologne scented locker lined halls. Teens; I am praying for you daily!
As many of you may know, I desire LOFT to be relevant not only to the parents who choose to bring their children to us, but also to the older students who could be anywhere else, but who also choose to come see us each week. I do not take this responsibility lightly. I love to eavesdrop on our students’ conversations in our lobby, listen to what new app they are doing with their friends, seeing what fashion trends they follow, and of course, visually supporting them by following on their personal social media accounts. And I am pretty sure that, based on some of the comments I have witnessed them writing, that they have either forgotten that I (being an old prude) am following them or they assume I only know how to double tap things and do not comprehend the complexities of following a thread.
First I would like to address the emoji’s. Parents – did you know that the Canadian Court System is currently working on an official translation of emojis and plans on recognizing those images as a symbol-based language? Boom! Teens everywhere will be able to write on their future resume that they speak two official languages: English and Emoji. Now the resume part is obviously Joanne sarcasm but the fact of making these little characters into an official and legally recognized language is not. Parents – do you know what the eggplant emoji symbolizes? No? I was curious when I saw it continually popping up in many different conversations. I typed “what d” insert autofill. I didn’t even get to type the rest of it in. Now I am going to tell you what it means because maybe I have one of my teen friends reading this blog and as long as I don’t actually type it out we all kind of pretend like it is no big deal to through a decorative eggplant in the comments of a friends feed.
People prepare yourself – if you are Scarlett O’Hara or some other woman with the disposition of a fainting, turn of the century maiden – shield your eyes.
The eggplant emoji is representation of male genitalia.
“The eggplant emoji is frequently combined with other emoji. When paired with the mouth emoji, it can suggest oral sex. When compared with the peach emoji, which people liken to a butt or female genitalia, it can mean anal or vaginal sex. Coupled with the sweat droplets emoji, it can represent ejaculation.”
-Nylon.com referencing dictonary.com new emoji dictionary
Now I recognize that this content is lude and quite different than the blogs I have written in the past. I also recognize that our children are throwing around sexual innuendo, perhaps without fully comprehending the inappropriateness of their comments. They’re just pictures after all and maybe her favorite fruit is a peach and eggplants are purple and that is her favorite colour. My concern is that maybe she/you know exactly what you are saying but don’t have the maturity to understand the kind of vibes you’re throwing out to the hopefully gentlemen/ boys who are also your friends on Instagram, or worse, maybe your uncles or your friend’s older brother from church. By openly talking about and making sexual references, you are saying that you are thinking about sex. And even though you may totally never ever wishing for or are interested in that kind of relationship right now, by putting it out “there” in this way, you are essentially illuminating a big “we are open for business” sign above your head.
Now I feel the importance in mentioning that unsolicited attention and things like sexual abuse and rape are never the victim’s fault – that is totally not the point I am trying to make. I am merely stressing the importance of comprehending the meaning of the information you are releasing about yourself onto the internet. We could almost reference the Emoji language as the new cleavage of the internet. Young girls and boys are throwing images out and having pretty specific sexual conversations while all along a majority of us just think they are having a food fight or figuring out what to pick up next week at the farmers market.
Before I could drive my mom drove me everywhere and because I was co-pilot I had control of the radio. This meant top forty for sure. Once the van got moving at a pace that was no longer safe enough for me to hurl myself out of the car, my mom would turn the music way down and say “do you know what that boy is saying he is going to do to that girl”. Oh the pain and disgust she could inflict with just the simple definition of the slang and innuendo. I don’t remember what was worse. The fact that the words that now seemed so tainted had only moments before had exited my mouth or the fact that my mom knew exactly what they all meant. Now I am thankful for her assault on my beloved Gwen Stefani or Justin Timberlake.
We need to stay current. We need to stay connected. I don’t mean we all have to jump on the minimalist bandwagon or that all of us need to eat gluten-free everything. I am simply saying that we need to care enough about our next generation to understand how to help them negotiate the dumbest and very important time of their lives. I hope I was the mom driving the van to some of you today. I write this out of desperation for your virtue and my love for you. God made you perfect and beautiful and shocker – sex is not bad. However; I urge you to consider what message you are allowing others to assume about you based on the way you talk about yourself.
Dear Lord,
You know how much these teens are loved by their parents and many people around them. I pray that you would give them the mental clarity during this difficult and hormone driven time of their lives. That they would look at their own bodies with respect and knowledge that they have been made precious by you and that they would be honest with the words that they are saying about themselves.- AMEN!