It must be tough being a teenager with an iPhone.
Not only is your brain melting down to that of a goldfish, but you have to worry about predators trying to get into your pants through virtual lies. The internet is a pervert’s playground. Lock up your profiles, kids.
I was listening to a podcast yesterday called “Small Town Murders.” The episode focused on the story of Herbert James Coddington, an undiagnosed autistic pedophile who kidnapped two young girls.
Coddington would pose as a producer and go to local talent agencies, claiming that he was scouting young talent for an anti-drug commercial. Two elder ladies running a small, private talent agency took his bait. They ended up dead in some trash bags, while their teenage clients were raped for days before the police broke into Coddington’s home. Lovely.
One of the hosts of the podcast told a story about a similar modelling agency scam that happened to his young daughter.
Friends had suggested that his daughter enter into a modelling contest. It seemed harmless, and she could make some great money just posing for pictures. The host’s wife did some research about the legitimacy of the contest, and everything checked out so she said, “What the hell.”
Their six-year-old daughter won the contest. Smiles all around. Then, a few days later, his wife received a strange message from a man thanking the family for being involved in the modelling contest, and clarifying the amount his agency received as a “finders fee.”
The host’s wife was confused, so she Googled the man’s name. Spoiler Alert: the man is a “level two sex offender” who was convicted for the systematic torture and rape of a 12-year-old victim.
Terrified at this news, the host’s wife phoned the company who had sponsored the contest to notify them. The contest directors had no clue that the company they were working with was owned and operated by a convicted pedophile.
None! That is how easy is it for a sex offender to slip through the cracks and back into society.
Sextortion is real, and, perhaps surprisingly, a serious issue for 30 per cent of Canadian boys. In March, the Toronto Sun reported that online sex extortion of young boys has risen 89 per cent since 2014. Reports involving girls jumped by 66 per cent.
Last month, the Canadian Centre for Child Protection launched a new campaign called Don’t Get Sextorted. Along with providing information about what sex extortion actually is (essentially, blackmail) as well as some places to go for anonymous help, the campaign’s aim is to get young boys to send memes of naked mole-rats rather than photos of their junk.
The campaign’s cheeky, cheesy PSA plays along with the pervy adolescent mind, equating the veiny, hairless mole to their own “manhood.” Gross, but effective. The site provides a slew of memes free for download. It’s mole meme to the rescue.
Last December, a creep in Minnesota was finally arrested after years of sextortion. Anton Martynenko, 32, reportedly tormented more than 150 teenage boys, threatening to expose the nude photos and videos his victims had sent him when he posed online as a teenage girl. He would also blackmail the boys into performing sex acts with him. Two of his victims later committed suicide.
Martynenko is now locked up and will remain that way for 38 years. (This is not enough jail time if you ask me.)
I don’t know if the mole meme will work, but it’s an important call to action. Moreover, it’s creating awareness for a problem we normally associate with girls. Although many young women have fallen victim to sextortion, boys are not always the predators, but in many cases the victims.
Bottom line: The world is a dangerous place for everyone, no matter what your gender, and the internet is even worse because it’s full of frauds.
Smarten up. Use your mole meme like a switchblade, boys.
