A needcessity

Don’t be fooled by online manipulators

Americans, and perhaps people all over the world, get a kick out of merging two words to come up with a new term.

A portmanteau, done well, blends the sounds and meanings of the two original words to produce a sometimes-perfect (and sometimes not) shorthand.

Pop-culture references get this treatment. Brangelina became shorthand to describe Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s relationship. A fan of Justin Bieber becomes a Belieber. Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez became Bennifer. Arkansas’ most successful political couple were cited as “Billary.” And, of course, the latest movie season was overcome by Barbenheimer.

And there are actual words born out of a need for a simpler way to convey a meaning. A preacher using the power of broadcasting becomes a televangelist. A complicated political issue is simplified, seemingly, into Brexit. And if you get tired of all this but don’t have the money for a big trip, you might consider a staycation.

Not all terminologies bring a smile. An unfortunate case in Northwest Arkansas brought such a word to mind the other day, one that’s an update to the old-style criminal behavior of extortion. Except in this day of social media, ubiquitous smartphone cameras and online manipulators who can whittle away one’s reasonable inhibitions, there’s a sometimes tragic portmanteau: sextortion.

In Rogers, police recently used social media and a case of sextortion as a cautionary example. A 15-year-old boy thought he’d struck up an online relationship with a girl. He sent her nude images of himself. Then the real reason for the relationship was revealed. The person he’d been corresponding with demanded money. If he failed to pay, the schemer promised, the boy’s images would be sent to all of his Instagram followers.

The boy’s parents uncovered his horrible situation when they noticed $200 in charges to their credit card. The boy, according to Rogers police, had stolen the credit card and used it to buy gift cards he used to pay off his tormentor.

People who grew up in the age before smartphones and 24/7 connectivity hear stories like this and can hardly comprehend how anyone ends up in such a mess. But these are kids, purposely targeted.

Homeland Security Investigations is the principal investigative arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The agency reports typical targets are boys 14 to 17 years old, vulnerable to feeling great shame if the activities they were lured into were to be exposed. Some have ended their own lives as a result of their predicaments, HSI officials say.

Naturally, the best weapon against such abuses is knowledge. Parents and kids need to know of these dangers. Young people need to know that wonderful person they’ve been texting with, the one who seems too good to be true, is precisely that.

The FBI offers tips to protect young people. Parents need to bring up the subject because kids never will. Might it be embarrassing? It doesn’t have to be as long as the focus is on protecting young people from being manipulated.

Keep an eye out, too, for sessions by local law enforcement, such as one offered by the Benton County Sheriff’s Office recently.

Most of all, young people need to know no matter how badly they believe they’ve messed up, there is a way out of it. Nothing is the end of the world unless any of us allow it to be.