Posted on 02/21/2011 10:29:38 AM PST by Gena Bukin
Regardless of whether a judge or jury finds Evan Emory guilty of a sex offense for creating a lewd video with schoolchildren in the background, the case has highlighted a cultural divide between the so-called Millennial Generation and pretty much everyone else.
Many of the Millennials — mostly young adults without children — wonder what all the fuss is about. So Emory made a video with Ravenna elementary children in the background looking surprised and smiling a lot. They say since Emory sang a harmless “Lunch Lady Land” song to the children during his actual performance and subbed in lyrics with sexually graphic references afterward, before posting the video to YouTube, that no harm was done.
These Millennials see the video as a joke and comedy, and even if some admit the video was in bad taste, they believe no crime was committed. This kind of thing is on comedy shows and MTV all the time, they reason. And it’s certainly on YouTube, the social networking site that allows anyone to post a video of almost any kind for the entire world to see.
They are outraged that Emory, who was a good student himself at Ravenna and never got into any trouble, is facing a 20-year felony charge of manufacturing child sexually abusive material. They can’t fathom that Emory, if convicted, is facing the possibility of having to be on the sex offender registry the rest of his life when he didn’t actually “expose” the children to anything.
Then there is the opposite spectrum — those who are horrified that someone would find humor in using children as a backdrop for a sexually explicit song. Whether the children actually heard the lyrics or not is beside the point, they reason, because it was the children’s innocent faces that were shown smiling and giggling when Emory’s nasty words were heard by hundreds and perhaps thousands of people before the video was removed from YouTube.
The parents of the children on the video are especially horrified, and as a parent, I can’t blame them. It would make me sick to my stomach to see one of my children placed in a situation like that. Many of them think the charges fit the crime, though it’s pretty clear that a 20-year felony for something like this is way over the top.
Still, the Muskegon County Prosecutor’s office wants to make an example out of Emory so they went after the “big” charge. And Ravenna Superintendent John VanLoon probably echoed the sentiments of many folks when he said: “If you think that’s something funny, you really need to review and look at your personal values.”
Which brings up a bigger challenge in this age of technology. There was a time when you could limit the kind of garbage kids are exposed to — a time when TV programming didn’t allow even partial nudity and there weren’t hundreds of cable channels from which to choose, smart phones, the Internet and social media. Today there is no place to hide and despite the best efforts of parents, kids are influenced by all these contraptions they can access almost anywhere, anytime.
According to Wikipedia, the Millennials have been shaped by the rise of instant communication technologies and are “peer-oriented.” Reality TV, MTV, YouTube and the like have helped to desensitize teens and young adults to the difference between right and wrong.
Many young folks seek the instant gratification and star quality so prevalent in society today. And they seek it without considering the consequences.
Which, at least, might explain the cultural divide this case has highlighted — even if it doesn’t provide a good way to fix it.
Either way, Muskegon County Sheriff Dean Roesler said the video is disturbing and a “family member” of one of the students immediately alerted school officials to the video.
School officials then alerted police, Roesler said.
These are the lyrics that he dubbed to the video of 1st grade children.
This is PORN. And he USED 6 year olds.
Defending some sleaze who thinks it’s funny to use children as a prop in a video laced with disgusting lyrics is Conservative to you?
Get a grip. Anyone doing that to my children better be armed.
In case you hadn’t noticed, child pornography advocates are in the minority here. There were only a couple of you on this thread, and the other one has been zotted. So just maybe I was right about the direction Jim Robinson is going with this site.
Where was there sexual abuse of children?
No evidence of any of that.
A guy said some sick stuff and edited in approving faces of children. Am I right?
And you think this is sexual abuse of children?
You must not be concerned about REAL sexual abuse of children, if you want to equate the 2.
And others are so concerned about the trauma to the kids that you’re talking about this nationally. The parents never shoulda gone to the cops. Now the kids are in the newspaper. It wasn’t a story until the cops were involved.
Unless I missed the partt where the parents asked the guy to take the clip off youtube and the part where they threatened to sue him if he didn’t take the clip off youtube. (And I may have, definitely not saying I didn’t)
“Wrong” and “Illegal” are different.
Those laws would be on the state level, not the federal level.
So now you’re saying it was the parents’ fault for finding out about it? You honestly believe it’s okay to feature children in pornography, as long the parents don’t find out? And if the parents do find out, they should sell their children into the sex trade? What the hell is wrong with you?
Conservatives seek to PROTECT children, NOT exploit them.
No it isn’t. If anything its the ultra .... of the right.
And states rights, and wanting to limit the power of fedgov is not the same as libertarianism.
You might consider explaining why I’m wrong, and not with the insults.
When asked by a TV reporter if he regretted making and posting the video, in which he appears to sing a vulgar song to first-graders, Emory answered it would depend on “how many views it gets on the Internet.
he was charged last week with manufacturing child sexually abusive material, a 20-year felony, in a case that has attracted international attention.
The end product was a pornographic video featuring children who were recognizable. It’s disturbing that anyone would defend that.
And now we know that the kids weren’t there. And I would disagree with “once it’s out, it’s out”. Why would someone save this? It sounds like we’re talking about a dirtier, more offensive, less funny version of a Whitest Kids sketch. The article wasn’t clear about how popular this was.
Yes. It is. AND to believe THEY are taking the high road.
Don’t we make fun of liberals by saying “but it’s for the children”?
You believe that exploiting children is conservative? You think it’s ok?
Again you lie. The children were there. He went into the classroom and video taped them. He did not draw cartoon pictures of children. He used real children. He put their actual images on You Tube. The children he abused are not cartoon characters. They are real.
Only a liberal would think that means conservatives like to harm children.
It’s done in movies all the time. A character says something risque or commits a violent act and it’s edited to make it look like children were there when it happened.
LIBERALS exploit and use children. CONSERVATIVES protect them.
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