Even my 13 year old son has heard of the sordid affair between Dr. Hayden Kho and Katrina Halili.  We remember the congressional hearings investigating the complaint of the sexy actress that she was videotaped without her knowledge and consent while committing the sexual act with her lover and the videotape was uploaded into the world wide web and was in turn downloaded by so many people for private viewing and some profited from bootleg copies of the file which was burned on dvds and sold in the bangketa in Quiapo.

Well, something good came out of the sordid affair: Republic 9995 or the “Anti-Photo and Video Voyeurism Act of 2009” was enacted.

First, the law defines “Photo or video voyeurism” as an act of taking photos or video coverage of a person or groups of persons performing the sexual act or any similar activity, or of capturing an image of the private area of a person or persons without their consent when that person had a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Second, the law punishes not only the capturing of the image or the videotaping of the act but also of posting it on the internet or sending it through MMS to cellphones.  The law punishes the copying and the reproduction of the images with or without consideration.  And the law punishes also the selling and distribution of the same.

I remember that my son was telling us how his classmates who owned smartphones had downloaded files of Hayden Kho and Katrina Halili and they showed it and copied files of it to the other smartphones of their classmates.

Under this law, those high school boys may be liable.  The seemingly “innocent” act of sharing downloaded files, is suddenly not so innocent anymore.  Put in the context of high school: if a teacher catches a student who was using his cellphone during class hours, and the teacher confiscates the cellphone, if she happens to check the cellphone for its contents and discovers a video or photo file of naked boys and girls or of men and women committing the sexual act, and from the logs of the phone, it is shone that  the student had sent MMS containing the file, that student can face criminal charges.  That student may face disciplinary action and even expulsion from school for committing a crime.

Still in the context of high school, if during computer class, children downloaded files of this nature into their phone or burned them onto a disc, or copied them to a flashdisk, and sells the disc to their classmates or shares them, the same result occurs: a crime is committed.

If, before PE class and the girls are changing into their PE uniforms in the locker rooms, one takes a photo of a classmate in a state of deshabilement, even if she is just in her undergarments and no private part is exposed yet, if the classmate takes a picture and sends it via MMS to other classmates, the person who took the picture and all others who sent it and passed it on to others can be liable for voyeurism.

So, when my husband and my kids picked me up from the MCLE seminar, we discussed this in the car, I asked my kids what they would do if a classmate sent them naked pictures of another classmate or pictures of a classmate as s/he was in her/his underwear, what would they do?

My daughter just rolled her eyeballs and said, “Ewwwwww,mom. That’s disgusting.”  And my boy said, “My phone isn’t that high-tech, ma.”  So I pressed them, but what if…. both of them (to my relief) said that they would delete it and not pass it on.  So, I probed further and asked why they would delete it and not re-send it.  My boy was afraid that if he passed it on, those people to whom he would pass it on would think him a pervert (“maniakis” was the term he used which when translated means “sex-obsessed”) of it were a picture of another guy, that he was homosexual.  My girl said that she wouldn’t because it would be too humiliating for the person who was in the photograph and what goes around comes around and she would die if she were the one photographed.

Perhaps my anxiety has been fed by episodes from CSI or Law and Order.  They have aired episodes where high school kids bully others by taking humiliating pictures of them in the lockers, sending and re-sending them to others or posting the pictures on the internet for all to view and download.  It is every parent’s nightmare if her children who are honor students suddenly become depressed and even suicidal because they have been the butt of such pranks.

The Bible, a document which is 3,000 years old has a similar law in the book of Leviticus.  It is prohibited to “uncover the nakedness” of people.  The law has a limited scope of application because that law punishes only relatives for their voyeuristic tendencies.  Fathers are prohibited from uncovering the nakedness of their female children and other female descendants, brothers are prohibited from uncovering the nakedness of their siblings and female ascendants, and so forth.  This is so because when people live together as families, there are reasonable expectations of privacy:  that is, when people bathe or change their clothes in the house, they can expect not to be exposed to the scrutiny of others.  There is a similarly reasonable expectation of privacy in school or gym locker rooms, in stalls in public toilets, and in dressing rooms in the mall.

The act of “uncovering the nakedness” of another is morally reprehensible by itself.  Modern day science has weighed in on the debate by stating that acts of voyeurism often escalate into more serious acts of lasciviousness, rape or assault. The Preacher in the book of Ecclesiastes was right, after all, when he said that “The eye is not satisfied with seeing…” that is, indulging the eye’s appetite by regularly viewing suggestive photographs tend to whet the appetite to indulge in the acts.

The person who takes pictures of others in their nakedness objectifies that other person, that is, the “photographer” looks at the person as just another object that does not have feelings, or if that person he has photographed has feelings, those feelings are disregarded as inconsequential.  Others, more criminally inclined, know that the pictures they will take of the nakedness of another will be humiliating for the person photographed and it is the “photographer’s ” precise intent to humiliate the person photographed.

Those people who received the naked pictures and re-sent them or uploaded them are equally guilty.  They partake of the morally reprehensible act of degrading another human being by displaying their nakedness.  Proverbs 23:6 cautions us: “Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, neither desire thou his dainty meats.”   Here, the Bible uses the sharing of food and the common appetite for food as metaphors for indulging in lust ( appetite ).

Is the topic in this blog article interesting to you because you are a teacher or a principal or a prefect of discipline or a pastor in a youth ministry in your church?  This and other topics like this will be discussed in the seminar we shall be offering to pastors and pastors’ wives during the Anniversary Week in Project 8 from September 21-25, 2011.  Come and learn with us. Contact Mrs. Jinky Lucena at Project 8 Bible Baptist Church through phone at 454-2912 for more details.