Because I am a girl...I wear jelly bracelets???



A quick search of the terms "the snap game" or "jelly bracelet" on google will bring you to the following instructions to play this "game":
"Things You'll Need: * Two players, at least one wearing bracelets
1. Familiarize yourself with the meanings of each colored bracelet: Yellow—give a hug; Purple—give a kiss; Red—perform a lap dance; Blue—perform oral sex and Black--have intercourse.
2. Choose the bracelet that represents the acts you are willing to perform, if you are a girl.
3. Choose the girl who is wearing a bracelet that symbolizes acts you’d like to perform, if you are a boy.
4. Boys try to grab a bracelet, one at a time, and pull on it hard and quickly in an attempt to break it.
5. Perform the act represented by the bracelet “snapped” with the boy who snapped it."



I was attending a round table discussion that the NGO Plan canada had convened last week to talk about girls and Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) and the research that's been done around young girls' access to ICTs - the risk and the opportunities they bring. Plan has a campaign to empower young girls called "Because I am a girl."
So, it is at this conference that I learned about the term "jelly bracelets." I was taken aback to hear that girls, as young as 9 years old, are engaging in these "games." I remember that when I was a teenager, wearing multi-coloured jelly bracelets was just a fashion statement not an invitation to performing sexual acts. The feminist in me cringes at the thought that young girls are playing these submissive and risky "games." Talk about a new form of pressuring young girls into decisions they may not be ready to make.



That being said, I researched it some more, and some websites say this "snap game" is all together an urban legend and that it has been overblown in the media.



Whether or not the "shag bracelets" are all the rage with young kids, what we should be asking is, why are we allowing young girls to not have enough self-confidence and information to make wise, clear decisions to deal with sexual pressures? Why is it that girls and boys are still not being given proper sex education in schools? Why is it that "we" (adults) start panicking and running in circles when we hear that young girls and boys are curious about their bodies and sex? Why are "we" (as a society) choosing to play the ostrich game, instead of empowering young girls to say "I can wear what I want and you can't pressure me"?

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