Grooming a new generation of victims

Yesterday I attended a family celebration in honor of my little niece’s First Holy Communion. The guest of honor, my niece, is in the second grade and is a beautiful, vibrant child—blond hair, blue eyes with a sprinkle of freckles across her nose. In her white Communion dress, she looked like a little angel.

It was a sunny day and a pleasant get-together. Most of the guests had left when my niece and her friend, another little girl, wanted to put on a “show” for those of us who remained. We, of course, agreed to be the audience.

With a video clip from the Internet providing the music, the girls sang and danced to the song Beggin’ On Your Knees by Victoria Justice.

I was horrified.

Victoria Justice

Victoria Justice is 18 years old. She has been performing since the age of 10, and has acted in several TV shows on Nickelodeon. Without a doubt, she is a beautiful, talented singer and dancer. But she is also selling sex to little girls.

Here’s the video of Beggin’ On Your Knees.

The video is slick, obviously packaged by entertainment executives and corporate bigwigs to appeal to tweens—and younger. It’s set on a seaside amusement pier, with the actors playing arcade games and going on rides. The performers, of course, represent a nice multicultural mix—I’m sure the money men don’t want to miss any marketing opportunities.

So Victoria Justice sings about her relationship with some guy, and how he cheats on her. The chorus goes like this:

and One day i’ll have you begging on your knees for me
yeah, One day i’ll have you crawling like a centipede
You mess with me?
And mess with her!
So I’ll make sure you get what you deserve
yeah, One day you’ll be begging on your knees for me

So my little niece, who a few hours earlier was angelic in her white Communion dress, was shaking her body and crawling on the floor as she sang along to Beggin’ On Your Knees.

She, of course, had no idea what the words meant. But the messages are there for anyone to see: Girls achieve success by attracting good-looking boyfriends. Good-looking boyfriends cheat on their girlfriends. When cheating happens, girls take revenge.

Gee—when I was my niece’s age, I watched Shirley Temple sing Animal Crackers in My Soup.

Cheerleaders

This isn’t the first time I was struck by the blatant sexual messages being communicated to young girls. A few months ago, friends were in Atlantic City to watch their daughter perform in a big cheerleading competition. They invited my husband and I to join them.

This girl is a senior in high school and has been cheerleading since she was young. Approximately 3,000 girls were participating in this competition, ranging from high school age to girls my niece’s age—or younger.

As I walked around Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, I could not believe my eyes. All of the girls, down to the youngest ones, were parading around in cheerleading costumes that featured off-the-shoulder tops, bare midriffs and extremely short skirts. They all wore heavy make-up.  They were all being taught to strut, show what they’ve got, and smile.

Abusive dating

I, in the meantime, am preparing to talk to another group of high school students about Sociopaths and Abusive Dating Relationships.

Part of my message is that sociopaths use sex to trap their victims. If you’re lonely, you are vulnerable. And when you have sex, you form a psychological bond that makes it difficult to get away if the person turns out to be an abuser. This is how domestic violence starts.

Yet according to the constant bombardment of messages directed towards young girls, their success depends on how sexy they are, and whether they can attract a hot boyfriend. Any girl without a boyfriend, therefore, will feel lonely, and will be vulnerable to the abuse of a sociopath.

So how do I compete with overwhelming, lifelong marketing? How do I tell these high school students that sex may get them in trouble when they’ve been fed a steady diet of “sex sells” since they were little kids?

Girls are being brainwashed by marketers out to make a buck. I don’t even know how parents can protect their kids from the onslaught—they’d have to raise their daughters in a cocoon. As a result, so many little girls are probably ripe to become the next generation of victims of sociopaths.