nude¹ or semi-nude photographs or videos by text message." width="247" border="0" src="/upimg/090830/4_013106_1.jpg" />
A cell phone user sending text messages. In Houston, Texas, thousands of students are returning to school to discover a new rule: no "sexting" -- the distribution of nude or semi-nude photographs or videos by text message.

In Houston, Texas, thousands of students are returning to school to discover a new rule: no "sexting" -- the distribution of nude or semi-nude photographs or videos by text message.

In Houston, one of the biggest school districts in the United States, education authorities decided² to adopt the new rule before some 200,000 students returned to classes after their summer vacation.

"Some principals raised the issue, so we included a provision saying sending, receiving, possessing sexually suggestive messages is forbidden," said Hans Graff, assistant general counsel at the Houston Independent School district.

"They were reporting that it was an issue and may be becoming more of a problem," he told reporters.

A recent study by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy³ found 22 percent of US teenage girls and 18 percent of teenage boys have sent messages or posted images or video online showing them nude or semi-nude.

"A student may be sending pictures to their boyfriend and they break up and he sends it to everybody," said Graff.

Aside from the disruption and trauma⁴ the practice can cause, Graff warns that the pictures potentially violate child pornography laws that ban sexually suggestive pictures of underage children.

"Any pictures of an underage child could potentially be child pornography and we are not really interested in seeing students punished criminally," he said.

"We want to put them on notice that it's just not something that really belongs in school."

得克萨斯州休斯顿的数十万名学生返校后会发现学校又多了一条新规定：禁止发“色情短信”。散播“色情短信”指的是通过短信发送全裸或半裸的照片或视频。

休斯顿是美国最大的校区之一，当地主管教育的部门决定在20万名学生结束暑假重返课堂之前采用这条新规定。

休斯顿独立校区的总顾问助理汉斯•格拉夫说：“一些校长提出了这个问题，所以我们制订了一条新规定，禁止发送、接收或持有具有性暗示性质的短信。”

他在接受记者采访时说：“据校长们反映，现在（学生）发‘色情短信’是一个问题，而且可能会发展成一个大问题。”

“国家预防青少年怀孕和意外怀孕运动组织”近日开展的一项研究发现，美国有22%的未成年女孩和18%的未成年男孩曾通过手机短信或网络发过自己的全裸或半裸照片或视频。

格拉夫说：“有的学生可能是把这样的照片发给了自己的男友，后来他们分手了，男友就把照片发给了所有人。”

格拉夫警告说，这种行为会造成关系破裂和心理创伤，此外，此类照片可能会违反与儿童色情制品相关的一些法律，这些法律禁止传播带有性暗示性质的未成年人的照片。

他说：“有关未成年儿童的任何照片都有可能会涉及儿童色情，我们很不愿意看到学生因此而受到法律的制裁。”

“我们要告知学生，这种事情不应该在学校发生。”

Vocabulary:

provision: a rule or condition 规定