Greg Oden's Indiscretion

As some of you may have heard, Portland Trailblazer's center, Greg Oden, has been captured naked by... Greg Oden (safe for work, barely).  Apparently, Oden had taken pictures of himself for a special friend, who, in turn, seems to have decided to share the pictures with the world.  Oden has since apologized.  No word on if the special friend has apologized.

It'd be quite easy to grab this incident and parade it around for kids to teach them about the dangers of sexting.  We could easily say, 'see, when you take naked pictures of yourself, it comes back to haunt you.'  We could demonstrate our righteous indignation, and let kids know just exactly how wrong it is to participate in sexting.

We could teach them that the natural result of sexting is shame, that they will be shamed; that the world will look down on them in moral self-righteousness; that they will be judged and judged harshly.  We could teach them that sexting makes them nothing more than pornographers.  Unfortunately, we already are.

Who cares that we're teaching children to be ashamed of their bodies (lord knows that's never turned out badly).  Who cares if we're teaching them that sex is inherently dirty and sinful.  Who cares if we're driving them to suicide.  Modesty is a lesson that must be taught, regardless of the consequences.

So Greg Oden apologized, and we, no doubt, are the worse for it.