More Videos Pageant mom defends kid's hooker costume Toddlers dressed like hookers? For years we've seen adult sexuality being inappropriately and aggressively foisted on innocent young children, but kids today are being sexualized at younger and younger ages.
A decade ago, parents worried about their teen daughters coming home from the mall with hip-riders. Now parents have to combat marketing forces that are telling their third-graders they need to have a padded push-up bikini top, or their second-graders that they need to have shoes that promote fitness, but are the same shoes sold to adults to tone and shape buttocks and thighs.
Where does it all stop? What have we come to when toddlers, not yet able to read, let alone make decisions for themselves, are getting schooled in dressing and acting sexy for adults? Everyone in society suffers when children are sexualized, but those hurt worst are the children themselves.
In February , the American Psychological Association released a report on the sexualization of girls that found that girls' exposure to hypersexualized media content can negatively impacts their cognitive and emotional development; is strongly associated with eating disorders, low self-esteem and depression; leads to fewer girls pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics; and causes diminished sexual health.
But it's not just our daughters who are being affected by these images. Boys and adult men are also learning to value women only for their sex appeal, which the report says can lead to increased incidents of sexual harassment and sexual violence, and increased demand for child pornography. Executives are not only complicit in the act of sexualizing toddlers, they are unwilling to own up to their role in encouraging this kind of behavior. Some look on in horror at the objectification of little girls in beauty pageants -- perhaps even a form of child abuse.
Who knows what kind of psychological trauma the excessive focus on looks and competition breeds into pre-pre-tweens. Aside from loss of toddlerhood, a new toxicity, this one of a chemical nature, is now rearing its head. These toddlers can't properly compete if their skin tone is not bronzed with a spray-on glow, or so their mommy handlers believe. New analysis from George Washington University is raising concerns that the chemical in spray tan formulations, dihydroxyacetone DHA , is a potential carcinogen because it damages DNA our genetic code and causes mutations.
This is the first step on the road to cancer and most mutagens are also carcinogens. Is this a skin cancer risk? Probably not. On the skin, DHA binds to the layer of dead cells that coat the skin; by combining with proteins in the dead skin layer, DHA creates an orange-brown glow. Yes, our outermost layer of skin which we touch everyday is actually composed of dead cells on their way to being shed. The spray-on tan fades as these dead cells are lost over time.
Just like dead men can't talk, dead cells can't mutate. Once a cell is dead there is very little that DHA can do to it. And since very little of the DHA penetrates beyond the layer of dead skin, tanning creams and sprays have generally been considered safe. But hang on a second. Have you ever watched spray-tanning in action? The subject is fogged from head to toe in a cloud of DHA -- how else can you get that all over tan? Sticking one's head into a cloud of DHA is not a good idea since that is where your breathing apparatus, the nose and lungs, exist.
And while you may try to hold your breath, you can't do it very long and a substantial amount of DHA can be inhaled. This is exactly the concern now being raised by the GWU toxicologists.
The entry of spray-on mutagen into living tissue the lungs is a health risk especially in the very young whose lungs are growing rapidly.
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