The guidance counselors at a Mississippi Middle School were apparently so concerned about the body image of their female students that they sent a letter home to parents. The letter read, in part:
“A negative body image may also lead to low self-esteem, which can affect many areas of a young girl’s life. She may not want to be around other people or may obsess constantly about what she eats or how much she exercises. But we can take steps to help our girls develop a healthier body image.”
I bet you’re wondering what kind of help they offered. Did they offer a class on body positivity or body neutrality? Did they offer an art history lecture to show how “ideal” body types have changed over time and help students realize that very few people have whatever shape is considered best at the moment? Did they offer an assembly on the wonders of photoshop and show students that time when pictures of Zendaya—who, with her long legs, flat stomach, and perky boobs, arguably has the current ideal body type—were photoshopped to give her a bigger thigh gap? Did they offer to discuss gender diversity and note that a) not everyone is a girl or a boy and b) body image issues are not unique to those who identify as girls or have vulvas?
Nope.
They offered shapewear.
You heard me, they offered parents the opportunity to get free Spanx for their sixth grader. Okay, I doubt they were Spanx, those are expensive. But the bottom half of the note was a permission slip for girls to receive “literature on healthy body image, shapewear, bras, and other health products if applicable” with helpful checkboxes for sizing.
Yes, the solution to all body image issues is binding our 11-year-olds in super tight elastic so they can look like Jessica Rabbit. Screw shapewear, why don’t we go back to full on corseting—"no one vants ze vaist over 9 inches.”
Internet Filtering Apps Fail Much of the Time
Parents have legitimate concerns about what their kids see online (let’s face it the internet is 97.58% porn) but the answer to protecting young eyeballs probably doesn’t come in the form of a net-nanny app. Tech site top10VPN.com tested the 12 most popular filtering apps in the Google Play Store which account for over 14 million installs and found that they both failed to block some malicious and clearly adult content and prevented users from getting to accurate sources of information on topics like sexual health and LGBTQ issues.
The apps didn’t do what they were supposed to do—in 70% of the tests, they failed to filter internet content “relating to extremism, misinformation, or platforms known for adult content outside of adult sites.” Specifically, they only blocked websites known for spreading misinformation and conspiracies in 10% of the test searches and only blocked those with extreme ideological content in 27% of the tests. Some of the sites that made it through the filters included Breitbart, Epoch News, Trump.News, Conspiracy subreddit, and Infowars (which is known for denying that the Sandy Hook school shooting ever took place).
Porn is probably the first thing parents are thinking about when they install any of these services and the filtering apps didn’t even do a good job at keeping users away from that. Two of the sites allowed users to get to Chatroulette (a site that randomly pairs visitors for webcam-based chats), four let users get to OnlyFans (a site that lets creators post and profit off of their own adult content), and seven let users access Tinder (the “dating” app known for promoting quick hookups).
On the flip side, the apps prevented users from getting to approved sources of information about potentially controversial topics like, say, sex. To test this, top10VPN.com looked at a number of sites that have been recommended by U.S. and U.K. government agencies. All but one of the 12 apps tested blocked at least one of the recommended sites. These included Amaze, Sex etc., and Scarleteen (all sex ed sites created by friends and colleagues) as well as GSA Network and The Trevor Project (sites helping LGBTQ youth and allies).
I remember a couple of days back when the interwebs were new. I was working at SIECUS and we all noticed that email traffic was a little low. It turned out that our ISP had installed new filtering software to cut down on spam and every single piece of incoming and outgoing email was being flagged because sexuality was in the organization’s name. Oops.
We live in an app-based world, and it’s understandable not just that parents would want to have some control over what kids can see but that they’d turn to an app to do it. Unfortunately, these results suggest this isn’t necessarily something you can staff out to AI.
I will not pretend to have the answers for what to do instead. I tend to fall back on communication. Talk to your kids about internet safety. Tell them what you’re afraid they will see or what you’re afraid they will share and why. Tell them to come to you if they’re ever worried about what they saw or shared. Talk to them about sex not just to give them information but also for them to see you as a reliable source of answers to future questions. Asking you is always a better first step than asking Google. Remind them that not everything they see online is accurate and tell them to come to you for fact-checking whenever they’d like.
If you do turn to any kind of software, look at the settings carefully to see if there are ways to get stricter with sites you really want to avoid (like those that spread conspiracy theories) and looser with those that could be useful (like those that give accurate information or provide help to teens in trouble).
What Not to Put in a Penis
A recent issue of Urology Case Reports tells the story of a 45-year-old man who sought treatment when he had difficulty peeing and blood in his urine. He told doctors that he and his partner often inserted things into his urethra to help with erectile dysfunction. Most recently, his partner had inserted a skinny straw that was attached to a can and had “accidentally” pressed the button on the can sending spray weather-proofing insulation into his penis and beyond.
By the time he went to the hospital—three weeks after the incident—the foam was lodged in his urethra and his bladder. When doctors went to remove the foam, they found that his urethra was already narrowed from scar tissue likely as a result of the objects he had inserted over the years. In order to get to the foam, doctors had to cut a hole in his perineum (the area between the scrotum and the anus) and go into the urethra from that direction. He will need future surgery to reconstruct his urethra. In the meantime, he has to rely on a suprapubic catheter and urine bag.
The doctors who worked with him noted that in cases in which people repeatedly insert things into their urethra, mental illness sometimes plays a role and that they would need the patient to have a psychiatric evaluation before undergoing reconstruction.
He is, however, far from the only person who stuck something up (or is it down) his urethra recently. The folks at Defector scour medical literature each year to see what we’ve jammed into our various orifices, or, more specifically, what we’ve had to seek medical assistance to have removed from said orifices. They have a pretty long list of stuff that was taken out of urethras in 2020. It includes tongue rings (blow jobs gone bad?), wire hangers, a stylus, and a marble that had been in place for four years.
Urethral play is something that some people with penises and vulvas enjoy, but it does come with a decent amount of risk and should be done with extreme care. There are sex toys designed for this—short plugs (10 cm) and rods (30 cm) usually made of stainless steel. Experts suggest sterilizing toys carefully, using a lot of lube, and going very slowly. They also advise against using anything other than these toys, such as household objects or fingers, as these can tear the sensitive skin on the inside of the urethra and introduce bacteria into the urinary tract. And, if something does get stuck in your urethra (or in any other hole), please don’t wait three weeks or four years to seek medical attention.