• Home
  • Buy the Book
  • More ebooks
  • Reviews
  • Ethel Is Hot LOL
  • Free resources
    • For Educators
  • Hot Topics blog
  • News & Press
  • About Us
  • Contact

Exposing 'Hos' on Instagram, the latest Rating Site trend

1/23/2014

1 Comment

 
Picture
Over the last six months, experts have noticed a shift in the way teens are communicating. Tired of of the transparency and parental monitoring of Facebook, many are searching for more anonymous alternatives and are gravitating toward social networking sites like Whisper and Instagram.  New month, different app, that's the way it goes. Parents and teachers can't keep up. (Not surprisingly, by the time they do, that's the cue for the teens to move on.)  Instagram, a photo sharing app that can be registered under an anonymous screenname, is like an underground speakeasy. Adults aren't hip to all the hidden back rooms yet, making it a perfect app to be used as a cyberbullying tool.

Even though Instagram's Community Guidelines prohibit nudity and graphic sexual poses, within two minutes, I was able to find dozens and dozens of pages depicting drug use, slut-shaming women, and graphic, explicit nudity. (Some of these photos I don't doubt are underage, which would categorize it as child pornography).

Yes, this is where a lot of teens have found their new outlet. And to be fair, many teens simply use Instagram the way it was intended, to share photos with friends and be social. I'm not sure why Instagram allows the other photos to stay online given their Guidelines, but just earlier this month, a Napa California police department investigated an Instagram page after receiving multiple reports  that it contained “inappropriate” images of females.

The  images were posted on a page called “napahoezexxposed." Translation: Napa Hoez Exxposed-- an Instagram page dedicated to labeling certain girls and women as whores. This is a combined Sexting and Rating Site tactic where someone uploaded photos of females (allegedly without their consent) in various stages of undress (thus Sexting) with the motive to slut-shame these girls by allowing commenters to rate them (thus a Rating Site). I've seen multiple versions of the so-called "Exposing Hos" tactic on Facebook and Twitter, but, apparently Instagram is the new technological vehicle for the same type of behavior. 

Time Magazine's recent article "What Boys Want" by Rosalind  Wiseman recently featured a fascinating article on why today's teens engage in Sexting, even when they know of the steep risks. The takeway I got from this article is that with this digital generation so used to the casual release of Kim Kardashian-type of sex tapes, snapping a nude pic or photographing a sexually explicit pose isn't as a big deal to this generation as it should be.  Certain teens
(particularly those with low-self esteem) tend to have a careless regard for their own image and reputation and just don't think about the consequences to such actions.  When sending a nude photo to a someone is the only way you'll get his/her attention or keep his/her attraction, there are bigger issues here than the actual photo. The same goes for teens who request the photos as status symbols and insurance (in case of being rejected.)

Regardless, you can now see how the
stage has been set for using these photos as cyberbullying currency. With teenage girls, we must keep the conversation going about alternatives to Sexting, not from a prudish standpoint, but from a reputation-destroying-forever-online standpoint. No girl wants a private "for your eyes only" photo to go virally, embarrassingly public. But, as statistics show,  it inevitably will.  And today, when a lapse in judgment results in being branded a whore on the Internet for all to comment on and judge, this is the time to talk to that teen in your life about that secret photo on his/her phone they hope you'll never find out about.


Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book


1 Comment

The Controversy Over "Slut Shaming" As A Cyberbullying Tactic

1/23/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
A while back, this photo on a Facebook site called "Girls Did You Know"  stirred up one of the latest cyberbullying memes called "slut shaming "in which woman or a girl is shamed online and/or attacked  for being sexual, having one or more sexual partners, acknowledging sexual feelings, and/or acting on sexual feelings" according to Finally Feminism 101.

First, let's get our definitions straight. This photo above, which triggered a Good Morning America segment on the topic of bullying is not cyberbullying any particular target,
It is a parody. The girl in the photo is clearly the author of the sentiment--she is not being targeted herself.

Slut-shaming, a topic we cover in Cyberslammed, however, is very real and while the above photo is not a proper example, all it takes is a provocative self-portrait or a Sexting image/video to get loose on the Internet before a nasty Digital Pile On happens.

Sixteen-year-old reporter Temitayo Fagbenle whose column "Online 'Shaming' A New Level Of Cyberbullying For Girls" on NPR said, "A recent Facebook posting I saw had a picture of a half-naked girl, lying on bed. The boy who posted it tagged the picture so that everyone could see it and go to the girl's page. Within less than an hour, the photo had about 443 likes and 261 comments. Comments like "your life is officially shot LMAO," and "I think she gonna cut her veins when she see this."

People post these pictures and videos and make "smut lists" for their neighborhood or school.

The boy who put up the picture posted a status update saying he received 2,000 friend requests because of the photo; and things like this are a regular occurrence at my school."

And it's not just boys who engage in slut-shaming cyberbullying. As Fagbenle stated, "Talking to a group of girls at my school about this online slut shaming, some of them say they often feel the need to shame other girls for their improper behavior. 'They do it to themselves,' one girl says. 'Half the time we can't even blame the guys.' "

Regardless of who is doing the slut-shaming as a cyberbullying tactic, keep this in mind. Many times girls are photographed and videotaped without their knowledge and against their will (as in the case of Reddit's  Creepshots, i.e. upskirt photos taken of high school girls without their knowledge).

They clearly don't deserve the harassment. Girls who willingly engage in sexting or videotaping their own sexual experiences are horrified to learn this information has been shared (inevitably) when the couple breaks up.  But do they deserve to have a sexting photo or video go viral for the peverse entertainment of others? Absolutely not.

What about the girls who post photos of themselves, clothed, but provocatively posed?

In this digital age age of abuse and misuse, it's vain, narcissistic and just plain stupid for girls to ever post sexualized "selfies", i.e. self-taken photos showing, but that is their choice. (Did I also mention it's incredibly niaive to assume overly sexualized images won't be manipulated and spread around in some way? Of course it will--it's Internet currency.) But girls who are navigating their own sexuality never deserve to be defamed, libeled and ridiculed on such slut-shaming sites as These Hoes Getting Exposed.


Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

0 Comments
    Picture

    Cyberslammed
    Hot Topics

    Cyberbullying tactics in the news, expert advice from contributors and prevention tips for parents, educators and kids.

    RSS Feed


    Blog Comment Rules

    All comments are pre-screened before posting. Anonymous comments will not be allowed. Keep it civil and on topic. No harassing or personal attacks; even if you disagree with something, please do it respectfully.

    Categories

    All
    After School App
    Anonymous Apps
    Anxiety
    Ask.fm
    Bulletins
    Burn Book
    Cell Phones/smart Phones
    Cyberbullying Policies
    Digital Pile On
    Ethel Is Hot (LOL)
    Expert Contributors
    Facebook
    Formspring
    Funstagram
    "Go Kill Yourself"
    Google+
    Hater's Club
    Homophobic Cyberbullying
    Identifying Cyberbullies
    Imposter Profile
    Instagram
    Kik Messenger
    Myspace
    Parent Contracts
    Rating Website
    Sexting
    Slut Shaming
    Slut-shaming
    Snapchat
    Streetchat
    Text Bombing
    Tween Novels
    Twitter
    Videojacking
    Whisper
    Yelp
    Youtube

    RSS Feed

    Archives

    October 2020
    July 2020
    April 2020
    February 2020
    July 2018
    December 2017
    October 2017
    January 2017
    November 2016
    September 2016
    July 2016
    April 2016
    February 2016
    November 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    July 2013
    February 2013
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012