Curley: Dads, you’re to blame for your daughters’ sexts

Young male students in Bothell may be facing a judge soon after a sexting and blackmail scandal was discovered, along with nude photos of their female peers.

And John Curley knows who to blame for it.

“Guys, it’s your fault,” Curley said, calling out fathers. “If your teenage daughter, your 12-, 13-, 14-year-old girl is doing this sort of thing, it’s your fault.”

“It’s not the mother. It’s you,” he said. “The father’s role with the opposite-sex child is so important. You have to teach that child the relationship between male and female and they are looking to you.”

Curley speaks from his experience with his own 13-year-old daughter, who is the same age as many of the students involved in the Bothell incident.

A total of 11 cell phones were confiscated from students at Bothell’s Canyon Park and Skyview junior highs in the wake of a string of sexting incidents. Students now may face criminal charges.

Nude pictures of female students were sent in some of the messages over the cell phones. KING 5 reports that male students pressured female students to use their phones to send nude photos of themselves. Those photos were used to blackmail the young girls into sending more.

Curley said fathers need to send a clear message to their young daughters; a message that is a warning and imparts an essential wisdom that adults come to know. That message: boys are gross.

“She knows how gross they are,” Curley said about his own daughter. “I point out her brother who is really disgusting. And that’s what we know about him. Can you imagine how gross these other guys are?”

“It comes down to self-confidence,” Curley said. “[If] my child is self-confident, she doesn’t need to look to men – young teenage boys – in order to make herself feel better. If she doesn’t have to seek their attention to feel better, then she is in a good place.”

It’s a valid point. One that Curley’s co-host, Tom Tangney agrees with. But it doesn’t speak to the whole situation, he said.

“It’s not just all boys preying on girls, which I grant you is the biggest concern of fathers of daughters like me,” Tangney said. “But at the same time, girls may want to do this, too.”