Cyber Hell

The mother could see that somebody else's daughter was in trouble.

The teenage girl was standing in front of a school in an affluent neighborhood on Cleveland's east side. The mother was sitting in a parked car, waiting for her own daughter. Even with her car windows up, sitting 30 feet away, she could hear the girl screaming into a cell phone.

The woman lowered her window, concerned that the girl might need help. For 10 minutes, she listened with growing horror as the girl begged a boy to leave her alone.

"I was driving in my car!" she shouted. "I couldn't answer any of your text messages because that's not safe! You kept texting; you kept texting; and I couldn't answer!"

Over and over, the girl pleaded. "Please stop. … Please stop. … Please stop."

Weeks later, the mother can't shake what she heard. She doesn't want to be identified, because she wants to protect the privacy of her own daughters, but she doesn't want to remain silent, either. She's read recent coverage about girls being humiliated — and sometimes prosecuted — for distributing naked photos of themselves (it's called "sexting") to boys' cell phones. She also knows, from listening to her daughters' friends, that some boys lure girls into cyber hell by monitoring their every move through texting.

"It's a new stress for girls," she told me, "and parents are real reluctant to talk about it."

Two recent surveys of teens back her up. A 2007 Teenage Research Unlimited study found that about one-third of teens say they have received text messages 10, 20 or 30 times an hour by partners wanting to know where they are, what they're doing, or whom they're with. A study last year by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy reported that 51 percent of teenage girls said pressure from guys is the reason girls send sexy messages or images; 18 percent of teenage boys said the pressure comes from girls.

Pew Research reports that about 70 percent of teens talk daily with friends on cell phones; 60 percent send text messages daily; and 54 percent send instant messages. Nearly 50 percent send e-mails daily over social networking sites, such as Facebook and MySpace. Fertile ground, indeed, for what some researchers call "digital abuse."

Too many parents, though, are clueless, which is why that mother called me. "When I tried to bring it up with other mothers, some of them were shocked," she said. "They'd never heard of such a thing."

A new ad campaign might help to change that.

The Ad Council has joined with the Family Violence Prevention Fund and the Department of Justice's Office on Violence Against Women to launch That's Not Cool (www.ThatsNotCool.com).

In addition to the interactive Web site, a television public service ad has begun running across the country. You can view the ad online at www.prnewswire.com/mnr/adcouncil/36936 (or below). It's worth the 32 seconds of your time.

In the ad, a teenage girl is followed from morning till night by a boy talking at her through a giant cell phone that beeps and vibrates with each new message:

"G-morning, sunshine. … Wakey, wakey. Text me. … Are your parents home later? We can hang. … L-U-V love you. … JK. … Holler back. … Holler back. … Holler back. … Are you with your friends? That's lame. … We're in a huge fight right now. … X-O-X-O. … What'd you dream about? … Is it something I did? … Are you on the way to the mall? … I'm lonely. … Nude pix, send me some. … Text me."

Many parents may watch this ad and feel increasingly twitchy as they consider the teenagers in their own homes constantly fidgeting with cell phones. All that reading and typing, reading and typing. How often do mothers or fathers look at what's scrolling across the screens of those parentally funded phones?

"A lot of parents hear about this and, just like with traditional domestic violence, they never think it's happening with their daughter," spokesman Brian O'Connor said. "We're committed to helping their kids build healthy relationships. This will be a two-year campaign, and we're going to constantly refresh it."

While it would be nice if parents stepped up en masse to educate their daughters, O'Connor said that it's more likely that kids worried about friends will send them links to the Web site.

"Kids tend to turn to each other," he said.

Especially when parents turn away.

Connie Schultz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and the author of two books from Random House: "Life Happens" and "… and His Lovely Wife." To find out more about Connie Schultz (cschultz@plaind.com) and read her past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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