Nude "selfies" reveal lack of self value and respect Young girls are obsessed with documenting every facet of their lives. THESE days the number of times I want to scream out loud "I feel so old!" is happening far more often than I'd like. But I don't. I bite my tongue, suppress the rising urge, because of course I don't want to seem ... well old. But I couldn't help myself while watching an ABC 7.30 story with a bunch of young girls and their committed relationships with their smartphones. We all know that young girls are obsessed with documenting every facet of their lives on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter ... endless indulgent selfies eating breakfast, at school, shopping, I've even seen them at it in the toilets at Chadstone. The Kardashian clan have made the notion of self obsession irresistible, honing the fine art of constant sharing into a lucrative promotional tool that has netted them millions. But just how much this truly delightful, smart group of friends, all around 15 years old, was sharing was more than a little disturbing. Even more troubling was the pressure they were feeling from boys they fancied to share more than the innocent selfies they take getting an ice cream. And they're doing it through Snapchat ... a seemingly smart app that sends photos that then disappear within seconds. Enough of an enticement it seems to bare more than any 15 -year-old should ever be thinking about sharing. I may have been a late developer but, at that age, the mere thought of sending or seeing nude photos of friends would have been excruciating. Not for these girls. Young Coby Skye happily admits to regularly being introduced to male acquaintances that she already knows all to well. "When I play touch football, I often see boys I've never actually met or spoken to but I know because someone has sent me a nude picture of them," she says. I'm screaming again. Coby's friend Alanna Reneman talks about being pressured to send nude or semi nude photos to get the attention of boys they like. "Maybe if I send that picture he might like me more, I just send pictures in my bra," she says. No Alana, quite the opposite. Any boy who does that is not worth worrying your pretty little head about. And then there was this comment when chatting about how the boys con the girls into sending nude photos first. "It's the tits for d--ks!" says Coby as if she was ordering a McDonald's milkshake. But the problem is the boys get the girls to put up first and then don't deliver on their side of the bargain. There's something horribly wrong about this whole picture, even if it is meant to self destruct in nine seconds. And therein lies the major problem. These pictures clearly don't. As we saw recently when hundred of thousands of pictures were hacked into through iCloud. Nothing in the cyber world is safe. The reason Coby gets to see naked photos of boys she's never met, is because before these risqué photos disappear the reality is that the receiver can screen shot them or use another app to save them. And then of course share them with as few or as many of their friends as they feel like. Remarkably the girls" mothers were sitting quietly in the next room, feeling more than a little uncomfortable with what this conversation was revealing. They clearly had no idea what their daughters had been getting up to. Of course at 15, boys and girls are discovering their sexuality and exploring and testing the boundaries, but this is just stupidity not exploration. And we all remember those awkward teenage years not talking about sex with your mum or dad. But wasn't that what today's mums were supposed to have changed. Making sure the open flow of communication means your daughters feel safe to explore these issues with you, before making stupid decisions. As parents, if we're happy to allow them to indulge their smartphone addictions, we still have to provide boundaries and sound advice. Because what the conversation revealed was gorgeous young girls completely desensitised. And that's kind of sad. Its not really about how old you are, its about that hopefully we're here for a long time and that silly decisions at 15 can be hard to shake. Its about valuing and respecting ourselves at all ages, much longer than Snapchat will ever have been a thing. @bevvo14