Revenge porn big among teens
Gordon Harrison wants legislation amended to account for cyberbullies
CHILDREN’S ADVOCATE Diahann Gordon Harrison says there is a direct correlation between increasing cases of revenge porn among high-school students and the lack of legislation to tackle cyberbullying locally.
“A big thing that we are seeing in the schools now is revenge porn, whereby a guy and a girl have something; he’s in sixth form and she’s in fourth form. They have a sexual relationship and he records it.
“When they break up, she lets it go viral because she’s trying to spite whoever he’s now dating or she lets it go viral because she wants to show the type of girl that she is,” she told The Gleaner.
CHILDREN’S ADVOCATE Diahann Gordon Harrison says there is a direct correlation between increasing cases of revenge porn among high-school students and the lack of legislation to tackle cyberbullying locally.
She made the disclosure during a recent interview with The Gleaner as she sought to shed light on the level of cyberbullying in Jamaica and its potential negative impact on children.
The most recent local statistics on cyberbullying were released in a 2015 survey conducted by the then Child Development Agency (CDA), with support from UNICEF. According to the survey, up to 65 per cent of students had reported being subjected to some form of bullying online.
When asked whether there were regular reports of cyberbullying coming before her office, Gordon Harrison explained that it is usually accompanied by other forms of violation. This has led to the under-reporting
of cases, as the police have confirmed to
The Gleaner.
“So you have, for example, somebody does something – there’s a sexual assault, then an accompanying part of that is the cyberbullying,” the children’s advocate noted.
And while not providing statistics, Gordon Harrison added: “A big thing that we are seeing in the schools now is revenge porn, whereby a guy and a girl have something; he’s in sixth form and she’s in fourth form. They have a sexual relationship and he records it.
“When they break up, she lets it go viral because she’s trying to spite whoever he’s now dating or he lets it go viral because he wants to show the type of girl that she is.
“And so we have that kind of revenge porn being popular among the high-school kids.”