Child rights activist Szilvia Gyurkó drew attention to the dangers of sexting, that is, online sexual acts, in her interview with WMN. According to the lawyer, the “crazy dangerous game” called sexting should be discussed seriously.
“If there is an abuse or a bad experience, it usually remains without consequences,” said Szilvia Gyurkó, a children’s rights activist, one of the most recognized domestic experts on children’s rights, the founder and head of the Hintalovon Children’s Rights Foundation. WMNin an interview with According to the lawyer, it is an extremely dangerous phenomenon that in the online space children want to look older, and adults often say they are younger, so no one is exactly what they seem.
Among other things, Szilvia Gyurkó talked regarding how
- it is easy to meet people under the age of 18 on online dating sites or messaging apps, which points to problematic regulations.
- In Hungarian society, the desire to truly learn regarding the phenomenon is pushed into the background, which is sad, because it would be worthwhile to talk regarding it in a meaningful and serious way.
- From the age of 12, a minor can have a sexual relationship with another young person under the age of 18 without any problems, and from the age of 14 even with an adult.
- “Although I think it would be more accurate to say that he is of this age [14 éves] adults perform sexual acts with children. Those children who grow up without real and meaningful sex education do not actually have the information they need to make an informed decision.”
- In many families, sexuality is taboo, and in most schools, sexual education does not prepare children for how to come to a balance with their own feelings and desires.
- Since 2021, the sexual education of children in Hungary has been subject to strong restrictions.
- “We should start from the fact that children blindly, pulled by their hormones and “inspired” by all kinds of content found on the Internet (yes, I’m referring to porn and the resexualized content of social media platforms, tailored for adults, but also consumed by children) into relationships.”
- Children, young people, responsible and irresponsible adults, as well as those with particularly bad intentions, are equally present on pages with adult content.
- A child has the right to be looked following by adults even if they do not ask for it.
- “Sexting is the Swiss army knife of online chatter”, which can be used to attract attention, deepen a relationship, turn friendship into love, provoke, strengthen intimacy, or create disgust and displeasure, and break a friendship forever.
- There is a very strange regulation in the Hungarian legal system: a child can have sex, but not sexting.
- If a child sends a picture of himself to anyone, he is not breaking the law, but whoever receives it and stores it on his phone commits a crime.
- Adolescent lovers are free to have sex, but they are not allowed to sext – which is obviously a very strange regulation, given that sexting often precedes sex.
- Legislation does not really help children to make good decisions.
- Legislation would have two basic tasks: on the one hand, it should prepare children for the risks of chatting online and how they can safely connect with others, and on the other hand, it should make adults aware that just because a child looks like an adult, they talk like an adult , like an adult and behaves like an adult, is not yet an adult.
As the Index also wrote regarding, recently child protection came to the fore following the President of the Republic Katalin Novák pardoned Endre K., the criminal accomplice of the convicted pedophile János V. As a result of the case known as the pardon scandal, the Ministry of Human Resources promised to introduce new measures to protect children. We wrote more regarding what measures the decision-makers have introduced so far and what they are preparing for here.
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