Dirty song lyrics can prompt early teen sex
SuzannePjam
Posts: 411
I hope Eddie keeps this in mind when he writes his next song. 
Dirty song lyrics can prompt early teen sex
Degrading messages influence sexual behavior, study finds
Teens whose iPods are full of music with raunchy, sexual lyrics start having sex sooner than those who prefer other songs, a study found.
Whether it’s hip-hop, rap, pop or rock, much of popular music aimed at teens contains sexual overtones. Its influence on their behavior appears to depend on how the sex is portrayed, researchers found.
Songs depicting men as “sex-driven studs,” women as sex objects and with explicit references to sex acts are more likely to trigger early sexual behavior than those where sexual references are more veiled and relationships appear more committed, the study found.
Teens who said they listened to lots of music with degrading sexual messages were almost twice as likely to start having intercourse or other sexual activities within the following two years as were teens who listened to little or no sexually degrading music.
Among heavy listeners, 51 percent started having sex within two years, versus 29 percent of those who said they listened to little or no sexually degrading music.
'Cool thing to do'
Exposure to lots of sexually degrading music “gives them a specific message about sex,” said lead author Steven Martino, a researcher for Rand Corp. in Pittsburgh. Boys learn they should be relentless in pursuit of women and girls learn to view themselves as sex objects, he said.
“We think that really lowers kids’ inhibitions and makes them less thoughtful” about sexual decisions and may influence them to make decisions they regret, he said.
The study, based on telephone interviews with 1,461 participants aged 12 to 17, appears in the August issue of Pediatrics, being released Monday.
Most participants were virgins when they were first questioned in 2001. Follow-up interviews were done in 2002 and 2004 to see if music choice had influenced subsequent behavior.
Natasha Ramsey, a 17-year-old from New Brunswick, N.J., said she and other teens sometimes listen to sexually explicit songs because they like the beat.
“I won’t really realize that the person is talking about having sex or raping a girl,” she said. Even so, the message “is being beaten into the teens’ heads,” she said. “We don’t even really realize how much.”
“A lot of teens think that’s the way they’re supposed to be, they think that’s the cool thing to do. Because it’s so common, it’s accepted,” said Ramsey, a teen editor for Sexetc.org, a teen sexual health Web site produced at Rutgers University.
“Teens will try to deny it, they’ll say ‘No, it’s not the music,’ but it IS the music. That has one of the biggest impacts on our lives,” Ramsey said.
The Recording Industry Association of America, which represents the U.S. recording industry, declined to comment on the findings.
Benjamin Chavis, chief executive officer of the Hip-Hip Summit Action Network, a coalition of hip-hop musicians and recording industry executives, said explicit music lyrics are a cultural expression that reflect “social and economic realities.”
“We caution rushing to judgment that music more than any other factor is a causative factor” for teens initiating sex, Chavis said.
Healthy home atmosphere
Martino said the researchers tried to account for other factors that could affect teens’ sexual behavior, including parental permissiveness, and still found explicit lyrics had a strong influence.
However, Yvonne K. Fulbright, a New York-based sex researcher and author, said factors including peer pressure, self-esteem and home environment are probably more influential than the research suggests.
“It’s a little dangerous to just pinpoint one thing. You have to look at everything that’s going on in a young person’s life,” she said. “When somebody has a healthy sense of themselves, they don’t take these lyrics too seriously.”
David Walsh, a psychologist who heads the National Institute on Media and the Family, said the results make sense, and echo research on the influence of videos and other visual media.
The brain’s impulse-control center undergoes “major construction” during the teen years at the same time that an interest in sex starts to blossom, he said.
Add sexually arousing lyrics and “it’s not that surprising that a kid with a heavier diet of that ... would be at greater risk for sexual behavior,” Walsh said.
Martino said parents, educators and teens themselves need to think more critically about messages in music lyrics.
Fulbright agreed.
“A healthy home atmosphere is one that allows a child to investigate what pop culture has to offer and at the same time say ‘I know this is a fun song but you know that it’s not right to treat women this way or this isn’t a good person to have as a role model,”’ she said.
Dirty song lyrics can prompt early teen sex
Degrading messages influence sexual behavior, study finds
Teens whose iPods are full of music with raunchy, sexual lyrics start having sex sooner than those who prefer other songs, a study found.
Whether it’s hip-hop, rap, pop or rock, much of popular music aimed at teens contains sexual overtones. Its influence on their behavior appears to depend on how the sex is portrayed, researchers found.
Songs depicting men as “sex-driven studs,” women as sex objects and with explicit references to sex acts are more likely to trigger early sexual behavior than those where sexual references are more veiled and relationships appear more committed, the study found.
Teens who said they listened to lots of music with degrading sexual messages were almost twice as likely to start having intercourse or other sexual activities within the following two years as were teens who listened to little or no sexually degrading music.
Among heavy listeners, 51 percent started having sex within two years, versus 29 percent of those who said they listened to little or no sexually degrading music.
'Cool thing to do'
Exposure to lots of sexually degrading music “gives them a specific message about sex,” said lead author Steven Martino, a researcher for Rand Corp. in Pittsburgh. Boys learn they should be relentless in pursuit of women and girls learn to view themselves as sex objects, he said.
“We think that really lowers kids’ inhibitions and makes them less thoughtful” about sexual decisions and may influence them to make decisions they regret, he said.
The study, based on telephone interviews with 1,461 participants aged 12 to 17, appears in the August issue of Pediatrics, being released Monday.
Most participants were virgins when they were first questioned in 2001. Follow-up interviews were done in 2002 and 2004 to see if music choice had influenced subsequent behavior.
Natasha Ramsey, a 17-year-old from New Brunswick, N.J., said she and other teens sometimes listen to sexually explicit songs because they like the beat.
“I won’t really realize that the person is talking about having sex or raping a girl,” she said. Even so, the message “is being beaten into the teens’ heads,” she said. “We don’t even really realize how much.”
“A lot of teens think that’s the way they’re supposed to be, they think that’s the cool thing to do. Because it’s so common, it’s accepted,” said Ramsey, a teen editor for Sexetc.org, a teen sexual health Web site produced at Rutgers University.
“Teens will try to deny it, they’ll say ‘No, it’s not the music,’ but it IS the music. That has one of the biggest impacts on our lives,” Ramsey said.
The Recording Industry Association of America, which represents the U.S. recording industry, declined to comment on the findings.
Benjamin Chavis, chief executive officer of the Hip-Hip Summit Action Network, a coalition of hip-hop musicians and recording industry executives, said explicit music lyrics are a cultural expression that reflect “social and economic realities.”
“We caution rushing to judgment that music more than any other factor is a causative factor” for teens initiating sex, Chavis said.
Healthy home atmosphere
Martino said the researchers tried to account for other factors that could affect teens’ sexual behavior, including parental permissiveness, and still found explicit lyrics had a strong influence.
However, Yvonne K. Fulbright, a New York-based sex researcher and author, said factors including peer pressure, self-esteem and home environment are probably more influential than the research suggests.
“It’s a little dangerous to just pinpoint one thing. You have to look at everything that’s going on in a young person’s life,” she said. “When somebody has a healthy sense of themselves, they don’t take these lyrics too seriously.”
David Walsh, a psychologist who heads the National Institute on Media and the Family, said the results make sense, and echo research on the influence of videos and other visual media.
The brain’s impulse-control center undergoes “major construction” during the teen years at the same time that an interest in sex starts to blossom, he said.
Add sexually arousing lyrics and “it’s not that surprising that a kid with a heavier diet of that ... would be at greater risk for sexual behavior,” Walsh said.
Martino said parents, educators and teens themselves need to think more critically about messages in music lyrics.
Fulbright agreed.
“A healthy home atmosphere is one that allows a child to investigate what pop culture has to offer and at the same time say ‘I know this is a fun song but you know that it’s not right to treat women this way or this isn’t a good person to have as a role model,”’ she said.
"Where there is sacrifice there is someone collecting the sacrificial offerings."-- Ayn Rand
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
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www.myspace.com/jensvad
I agree to a certain extent that music does influence children, but if it has more influence than the parents than that's a parent that isn't doing their job.
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
Yea anyway, that may be something to do with it aswell.
Pretty damn weak, i would say.
Hail, Hail!!!
I know...my generation had Madonna and whatnot....but it's a cumulative effect (not just music, I'm saying) on kids like my younger sister these days. I swear to god I was watching headline news the other day and the newscaster (the newscaster!) cut back after a story on breastfeeding and said, "Well, I love seeing boobies whenever I can."
Sorry, this post sort of makes no sense but I get enraged over seeing "performers" that sell sex to younger kids. (That song "Promiscuous?" How does this stuff get on the air!?)
ps. I'm the exact opposite of overly sensitive and stuff. I think it's really more of a disbelief that someone thinks it's cool to make money singing about how they're a whore, which in turn influences young girls to have a lower self-worth for themselves.
You are right, some of it goes overboard. But for myself, I like Tenacious D's "Fuck Her Gently" it's a good song. It's funny. I like Outkast and a lot of their music is borderline. But not like Sisqo "Thong Song" I don't care for that music at all. Or LL Cool J "Girls" it's a good tune, I was playing it in the car while driving my ex-girlfriends mother and she commented on how much she liked the music, she was serious too.
My specific point is... how can the Black Eyed Peas sway your child on the moral values you have instilled on them for the past 10 to 14 years? The ones who are swayed usually havew a weak foundation to begin with.
And... where do kids get these records from? Santa? I mean, who gives their 10 year old a Snoop Dogg CD, just because he asks for it?
Hail, Hail!!!
I was buying records at 10. I'm 15 now, and I'm one of the few kids that I know buys records (vinyl and cds) constantly.
Where did you get the money to buy the CDs at age 10? I'm guessing it wasn't from working the graveyard shift at the local 7-11, was it?
The reason why I ask is that I believe.. that if I had kids... and I gave them money... I would want them to:
A. Earn it... so they do not get the feeling that they are entitled to it.
B. Learn the value of it... by either saving it and seeing how, after time, the total amount increases OR
C. Purchase goods wisely.
And I would be interested in their purchases. Like, "Nice bong you got there little Johnny"... or "Boy... little Suzi, that 'Niggaz Wit Attitude' CD you've got there is really neat... I especially like the songs about killing cops and raping beeeeotches" or "Hey, Princess... that's a very nice pair of low... VERY LOW rise jeans. Where'd you get them... 'Whores R' Us'?"
Hail, Hail!!!
We're changing as a culture constantly, and right now there's a lot of sex in music, esp. pop music, which means kids are thinking sex is cool and are attracted to both the act and the music that talks about it. And sex has always and will always be cool, so it's not going away. (that + hormones = young people fucking
Which, by the way, is why we need to EDUCATE children, not isolate them and feed them that abstinance only shit.
http://www.wishlistfoundation.org
Oh my, they dropped the leash.
Morgan Freeman/Clint Eastwood 08' for President!
"Make our day"
I got the money from doing odd jobs around the house (allowance) and later on umpiring games and babysitting. And, my cd purchases were originally pop shit, then it became Aerosmith, Zeppelin, AC/DC, Beatles, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Van Halen, etc.... I got into classic rock, so my Dad supported my purchases. Now money goes to CDs, Concert Tickets, and Gear.
That's good... it sounds like you are doing just fine.
Now... just because John Bonham believe in the Occult... it doesn't mean you are going to be sacrificing black cats to Lucifer, right? Why? Because it sounds like you parents have instilled a base set of moral standards that you have bonded to.
Bring home a bong, a Jenna Jameson DVD or a set of matching bra and panties from Victoria's Secret... for you to wear... and I'm guessing ol' Pops is gonna have a little sit down, 'Man to Man' talk with you. right?
That's my point... parenting trumps 'Parental Advisory' CDs, if parent is respected by child... who is shown respect by parent.
Hail, Hail!!!
Exactly. I have lots of stickered records (NIN, VR, In Utero, etc...) but my parents don't really care. Hell, my dad has taken me to almost every show I've been to. (VR, Aerosmith, Pearl Jam x2, U2, Austrailian Pink Floyd x2, Bonnie Raitt)
the band Garbage is reallllllllly great to have sex too
http://www.wishlistfoundation.org
Oh my, they dropped the leash.
Morgan Freeman/Clint Eastwood 08' for President!
"Make our day"
Leave me in my vacuum
Blood on all the pistons
Running my transmission
It's always been there... just now it can happen safely. Maybe that's why it's becoming more common at younger ages.
Which is what we have to promote safe sex..
Rejecting those hormones is just going to make things worse..
Educate the hell out of kids.
http://www.wishlistfoundation.org
Oh my, they dropped the leash.
Morgan Freeman/Clint Eastwood 08' for President!
"Make our day"
That's probably because your Mum and Dad knows you aren't stupid... you KNOW what words they are 'beeping' out in the lame-o Wal-Mart self-righteous versions, right?
There's not a song or CD or band or genre of music that is going to make you sway from your base moral beliefs... maybe, as you get older, you'll come to question some of the logic or rationale behind those beliefs... but, listening to 'Body Counts', "Cop Killer" isn't going to make you go out a shoot a cop.
Hail, Hail!!!
How about promoting values and common sense (I guess you can't teach that)
There is too much pressure on kids to have sex now, younger and younger. I walk down the street here and a third of the girls are pregnant, because there is nothing else to do up here but screw.
Leave me in my vacuum
Blood on all the pistons
Running my transmission
But values get skewed by the people who are sending them..
Good values (that i think you're talking about?) like..
- Sex is not joke, take it seriously.
- Promiscuity can give you a lot of problems, esp. if not done safely.
- There are a lot of emotional issues involved, don't take it for granted
etc..
Send those through a population and school system that is Christian by a mindblowingly large majority and you get things like..
"No sex ever until you're married!"
BTW don't take offense at that Christian thing, it's true. Most modern (as in, younger) Christians would agree with the education approach I think. The Bible is like the consitution.. some parts aren't applicable in our society in the way they were originally written.
http://www.wishlistfoundation.org
Oh my, they dropped the leash.
Morgan Freeman/Clint Eastwood 08' for President!
"Make our day"
for rest of board members, if your child or sister is out "bangin" folks who may be atleast 7 years older, do you consider it against the law? do you think that a person who is over 18 or even 21 should do time and have their faces plastered on megan's law website for being with a minor who lies and says she's over 18? how far do you take this? uh...uh... i mean, latest edition of statutory rape laws has been translated to consentual sex with a minor with parental permission still sends someone to jail and on felony probation for at least three years and a prison sentence for up to three years in state of california...if a girl is having sex in her home and male has to go down for her lies, becasue parents are oblivious to situation, shouldn't parents get a bit of the burden? this is an important topic, especially for males who like to forget that they didn't get their high-school prom queen.........
a derivitive of nature.
nature is god
god is love
love is light
Bingo. I want the music the way the artist intended to put it out. I am still one of the few kids I know that BUYS CDs on a regular basis. My parents respect my taste, even though they may not like it (i.e NIN). Its a mutural respect. I respect their music and try and learn, and they do the same. If it weren't for my dad I wouldn't like Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Aerosmith, Zeppelin, Floyd, SRV, Hendrix, The Doors the list is endless. He exposed me to all these bands and got me into guitar. I can't thank him enough for that.
Excellent post, very much on point!