"KIDS' CUFF KINK "
(from the Sunday NY Post)

May 23, 2004 -- A bizarre new kids' sex craze is sweeping the city's elementary schools.
Girls as young as 11 are stacking colorful rubber "sex bracelets" up their arms while their parents are unaware that each piece of the cheap jewelry represents a different sex act, according to a secret-code the kids share.

Some symbolize an invitation to kinky get-togethers, several kids told The Post.

The kids play a game called "Snap" associated with wearing the bracelets. In the game, girls wear the bracelets around their wrists, and if a boy runs up and rips one off, he gets a "coupon" from the girl to perform whatever sex act the color stands for.

A black bracelet indicates sexual intercourse, blue is oral sex, red is a lap dance or French kiss and white is a homosexual kiss - and it gets more in depth.

Green represents having sex outside.

Some of the bracelets stand for specific sexual positions, and there's even a light-green glow-in-the-dark version that means "using sex toys."

Megan Stecher, 11, a fifth-grader who sells the $1 bracelets to her classmates at Holy Child Jesus School in Richmond Hill, Queens, for $1.25 said her teachers are not aware of what they symbolize.

"No one wants to tell them, either," Megan said. "Everyone collects and wears all the colors to school, and all the kids know exactly what every color stands for." "One person tells someone, and they tell someone else, and that's how it spread," Megan said. "I heard about it in the neighborhood."

Megan's mother, Michelle Stecher, 33, originally thought it was an innocent fashion fad.

"I thought it was an outrageous Britney Spears phase, like Madonna used to do in the '80s with the black rubber bracelets," she said.

"But when I found out, I was outraged. I sent her to Catholic school to avoid things like this.

"I thought this could never, ever happen there."

Arial Martinez, Megan's best friend, also 11, said the bracelets became so widely known around her Bronx school, PS 60 in Woodlawn, that the teachers and principal banned the students from wearing them to class.

She said the teachers found out what they symbolize "because everyone was wearing them and talking about them all the time."

Arial said that as her friends find more colors, they try to describe new sex acts.

"I found out from kids on my block, and the word just spread fast," she said. "But I don't think it's right for young kids."

The neighborhood kids are buying the bracelets for a dollar a dozen at local 99 cent stores and beauty shops.

Many retailers are oblivious as to why they're selling the bracelets by the boatload.

"Last week, I had to order extras, so many kids were coming in for them," said Ming Zhang, who works at Aina Gift Shop on Jamaica Avenue. "I don't know why."

Although Megan says that neither she nor any friends of hers are actually having sex, she is savvy to all the graphic sex terms and the corresponding colors.

Megan's mom wonders where this all started and how the kids got so educated about sex.

"I'm just wondering who started this whole thing and how it reached Megan in her Catholic school," Michelle Stecher said. "I mean, I told her about the birds and the bees, but this is too much.

"I want the school to know what's going on with the kids and put a stop to it."

****

I saw an episode of Oprah a few months ago about the kids just performing oral sex all willy nilly. The kids she interviewed said it's no big deal and they view it almost like a good night kiss.

See, thats what happens when them damn young bucks dont learn abtou sex at home, they gonna learn about it in the streets,,,and thats when they get in trouble.

I know what goes around that mess. I remember kids during the 80's playing "freaky friday" but these little kids today are just too fast!!

Yeah, I remember this circulating here in Harlem Public Schools . One of my classmates works as a secretary at one of the schools and she said how she had to send letters out to parents. She showed us the instructions and had some of the bands. My classmates made jokes and all, especially some of the males, but we got into a serious discussion about this.

I mean, you wonder what a child could possibly know about certain sex acts but we are living in different times. It's sad to see children losing their innocense at such an early age.

Who is to blame? Who is at fault?

I don't EVEN want to think about what my little baby is watching in school, back when I was in elemantry school everybody got to know how to "cuss" and the meanings behind every word(and that was 14 years ago) now,,,it scares me to think about what they're learning.

You betta learn from this and keep an eye on your kids and don't cus some of parents think little Tiffany or Junior are SUCH perfect angels and they not only are they gettin down but doing it IN their house...while they're home sleep in the next room!

not good not good at all

dumb kids, they should learn a lesson.

unlucky7 said:

No,,,,dumb PARENTS & SCHOOLS!

Harlepolis said:

yeah, its so sad

"But when I found out, I was outraged. I sent her to Catholic school to avoid things like this.








I'm never having kids.

Snopes looked into this... they said:

"We would happily shift this from the "Undetermined" category squarely into the "False" column save for a small handful of e-mails from youngsters who claim the rumor is on the up-and-up and that they know someone who did it. Quite possibly, those notes amount to nothing more than "I heard the story from someone I trust, so I want to believe it," but we feel we can't dismiss them out of hand. If, however, there have been some actual instances of sex obligated by bracelet-snap, they have been rare."

http://www.snopes.com/ris...acelet.asp

The article says it's from the Sunday NY Post... can we have a link, please? If one exists?

As long as you are open with your children and talk to them about anything and everything, your kids Will know right from wrong. Its up to the parents to make sure that children are educated very early in life about the dangers of drugs, violence, and sex..etc. You cant be with them every single moment of their lives, but you can lead them in the right direction.


In the end, its the child that makes the final decision.....

whoa. does anyone remember a similar thing with coke tabs?? When i was in jr. high the thing was to have those tabs hanging from like a keychain or clipboard... if it still had the little circle intact in the middle that meant sex, the others just meant 1st or 2nd base.... but the only difference is that the GIRLS gave them to guys as an invitation!!! SAD!!!

IADOREHIM said:

When I was in junior high, we collected the tabs but they didn't mean anything!

ha ha ha

I remember the Coke tabs AND the colored bracelets when I was in middle school.

Yessir, my daughter aint getting nothing over on me

VinaBlue said:

Me neither, Vina.

I dont blame you for not wanting kids,,,
This world is CRAZY!

My son is 16,,& ive Never heard of such nonsence! I cant be with him 24/7,,but I think he turned out pretty dam good~

Im just sitting here shaking my head....

VinaBlue said:

Damn Catholic schools.....

When I was in 5th grade in a rural country school (1981) a girl got hell from everyone in her class because she said watersports was a hobby. It's was like everyone already knew what that meant. It just takes one kid with access to porn etc to tell all the others. I didn't care much back then, but now in hindsight I'm quite shocked.

haven't girls been wearing these cheap rubber bracelets since the beginning of time? when did it become correlated with sex?

IADOREHIM said:

I remember that!!

WTF?

My kids have these bracelets...but, as far as I know, they think it's fashion.

I hope.

Am I the only one who thinks this is a urban legend ?

Nat posted a link; same story surfaced also in 1994..

AlfofMelmak said:

i don't really believe it either.

it looks too much like homosexuals wearing colored handkerchiefs in their pockets.

(i like the grey one )

kids have been wearing those bracelets in the schools i've gone to since junior high, and never have I heard them being related to sex. it IS just fashion, at least where i live. that might b different in other parts of the country, or something. we do have something a little bit similar, though. if you buy a soda out of a vending machine, inside the caps are the little blue plastic disks. you cut out the middle, and stretch it so it fits around your wrist. whoever breaks it gets to kiss you...but not any of that other graphic stuff...hmm. i dunno.

Just another example how frustrated most americans are. And y'all have no problems shooting up peop in videogames.....

dawntreader said:

If thats the case then thats a damn disturbing urban legend

Its really up to you to hide yo heads into the sand or believe it.

Harlepolis said:

Or one might say that it is up to you to be gullible about everything you read or to be level-headed about things..

evenstar3 said:

you could just be unaware that this is going on now...when i was in school they never meant anything, it was just a fashion statement.....but i heard about this a while back and this is exactly the meanings here with the middle and high school kids but its pretty new....i would be willing to bet it is going on there too ...scary!

AlfofMelmak said:

Things, huh?

I have to be, sweetheart! I'm a parent(and a single one 4 that matter) so when I see shit like this in the newspaper(which is old "SOMEWHERE" like someone stated) it ought to makes me paranoid or something other-wise I'm just a brain-dead fool(no offence).

I guess we all see "THINGS"( ) differently!

I haven't determined for myself if it's a valid trend. I mean, I grew up in the 80s and we made up stuff all the time. Used to pass notes, write dirty stories, but there wasn't anything REALLY going on. I'm not saying that people in junior high didn't do sexual stuff, but for the most part, I think kids are buying into the game just so that they don't look out of place. Ever watch "American Beauty"? Remember Mina Suvari's character? Everything she said was a total lie just so that she would seem cool. That's how I remember most of everything like that in junior high: people said stuff, talked shit, but in all seriousness, nothing happened.
But then again, where I grew up, we had a lot of parents involved with their kids, so they all pretty much knew where their children were at at all times.
If my girl was junior-high age, I'd not let her wear the bracelets, obviously. Not because I think she'd have sex at that age (the wife and I will have "the talk" fairly early), but I don't want her conforming just to look cool. Parents are actually a lot more aware of things nowadays because of overhyped media. Child abduction has been on the decline in the last 5 years, but you would never know because of the Amber alert system.

Oh, yeah, I owned a Member's Only jacket. I was definitely not gay.
[This message was edited Thu Jun 3 7:24:32 2004 by pbrite]

ok...this is freakin me out!!!! the day before i read this thread my 8 year old daughter was tellin me all about the braclets for sex and that some boy wanted to give her some.... I am in a suburb of milwaukee- she is 8 years old and damn- i talked to the principal at school and they have banned them. A girlfriends daughter also knows about this and has been involved with this. seriously.... my 8 year old daughter told me about it!! all I can say is that i am thankfull she has the trust in me to talk to me about these things... she did not accept the braclet- thank goodness.
but please... keep an eye out, sometimes as parents we don't want to believe our children could be doin things like this. and due to this GAME i had to choke down the fact that my daughter had already heard about things i did not know she knew at 8 years old!!!!!

I just hope she will always keep the cumminication open... I know I will!

i'm not a parent, but i was once a kid (as were we all), and i can say this - i think it's important to be AWARE of trends like this, but don't get so hyperconcerned that you restrict your children into rebelling against you.

remember that stupid game with the fold up flower/puppet thing that we did in grade school and junior high, and it was supposed to tell your fortune? the question was always something perverted when i was in grade school, and it was typically something we didn't know a thing about. "does jenny have big boobs?" "will johnny french kiss me until i'm pregnant?" stupid stuff like that.

now, on the other hand, kids need to be protected from knowing and doing too much too soon. and as it becomes easier to get all kinds of information, there's a lot more protection that needs to be done. but consider all the kids who were running around saying "fancy a shag?" when the austin powers movies came out. it was "cute" to a lot of people because mike myers made sexuality "cutesy" and silly and harmless with that character.

Another case of "what is the context?", especially when you're dealing with stubborn little creatures who most often respond to "YOU CAN'T DO THAT" by going right on ahead and doing it anyway.