People are only slowly awakening to the reality that Instagram is being increasingly used for beauty contests. A service which began as a means of sharing photos of general or common interest is now being used to judge contestants many of who are barely in their teens.
The girls competing against each other, many times only due to peer pressure, appear in various poses and with different outfits. Once the competition opens, voting is open to all of Instagram’s users which are estimated to number over 30 million. The voters can post comments. The contestants getting the maximum adverse comments are eliminated by boldly superimposing an ‘X’ or ‘OUT’ on their picture.
While in some cases the comments are acceptable, often they can be derogatory and can cause deep psychological damage to the contestant. An adverse comment itself can be hurtful. The mode of elimination is also hardly dignified. What is most baffling is that the organiser of the event can choose to remain anonymous.
Child safety advocates and parents are concerned that youngsters may unknowingly be putting themselves at risk and can be exposed to predatory attacks from disruptive adults. The whole issue demonstrates how much the latest technologies have become interlinked with the lives of young people. The rapid changes in technology coupled with the ability of young minds to assimilate these new technologies, leave teachers and parents struggling to grasp, monitor and control such activities.
Meanwhile the popularity of these contests can be judged by the hits that turn up for the relevant keywords. Similar contests have also sprung up on other sites like Snapchat and Tumblr.
The recent acquisition of Instagram by Facebook has also complicated the issue as Facebook does not have a strong record when it comes to the issue of allowing underage users on to its site.
Users can keep their identities secret by choosing various usernames and keeping their personal details secret. However in such contests they release their photographs that make them easily identifiable. Besides that some other details also inadvertently turn out to be clues about the person like a school uniform or the neighborhood in the background etc.
The young people who engage in these activities for getting a feeling of acceptance or of being liked, should not end up being scarred for life only due to their ignorance of the risks involved. While privacy rules for children have been strengthened in December by the federal authorities, these may not be sufficient unless they are updated constantly as social media is very dynamic.
