Be wary of sexual predators

The unfortunate recurrence of Ghanaian young women appearing in virtual pornography has given us the cause to return to the subject, albeit with deep regret.

That these young women – yet again students of higher learning institutions – have fallen prey to the trappings of youthful exuberance is most unfortunate.

In the latest bizarre tale as captured in our lead story, the young women fell for the financial and/or material baits from men, and opened themselves up for both sexual pleasure and the accompanying ‘reward’.

Unknown to them, the recordings of their private rendezvous – perhaps made with the full consent of the women – were mining concessions for the men who have since procured financial advantages of the audio-visual materials from international porn site operators.

It doesn’t appeal to us to describe the victims of the porn scam as ‘unsuspecting’, as it has proven in many instances that they willingly lend themselves to such ventures. We do not seek to question the decisions they make regarding their sexual lives; instead, we think they must accept their share of responsibility in the unfortunate spectacle.

As expected, two of the young women are reportedly traumatised by their non-consent to their participation in the porn movies circulating across the World Wide Web.

It is heart-rending how these young women trade their private wares and dignity for unrestrained pleasure and material showoffs only to reap the wind and emptiness! In the end, they sacrifice the names and reputations of their families, ridicule their heritage and bring shame to their families.

After all, this is no longer a rare occurrence. The catalogue of similar private sexual escapades, including self-videoed pictures that have gone viral, courtesy social media, are now too familiar with the average person.

In the current case of the pornographic recordings of the students in Tamale, the Daily Graphic finds it too painful that students of higher learning failed to exercise good judgement that matches the standards they have attained in the academic space.

Like the many similar cases of leaked sex tapes, they appeared too drowned in the potential windfall from willing sex clients and neglected other potential dangers of unbridled sexual pleasure, including the potential of contracting the dreaded HIV/AIDS. This attitude, we must say, is no different from the ‘sakawa’ activities of con guys.

It was our expectation that young women would by now guard themselves against the lure of cash and material items in order not to suffer the fate that undid others in the past, since not all that glitters is gold.

Be that as it may, we think that these victims need the best of counselling and care from relevant institutions, including families and religious bodies, to control the impact of the shocker on their minds.

Indeed, much as such actions cannot be excused, the society, including fellow students, lecturers and neighbours, should be mindful of their actions and utterances in order not to jeopardise a potentially fragile situation regarding the mental state.

But this should be a lesson to other growing women and youth who seek the shortcut to riches and fame. It has hardly worked to perfection in any life.

The consequences have always proven more injurious than the rewards that originally accrued to the supposedly smart persons.