Warning: I am rating this post PG13 for (some) explicit language contained in the last image (at bottom). There are no graphic images.
So last night I noticed via Carson Daly (who I follow for all things behind the scenes Voice related) that it was Blake Shelton’s birthday. When I tried to post my comment, I received this curious message from the vigilant people at Instagram…
Wait, what? Moi? Well, yes Instagram, I do think you’ve “made a mistake” and I am happy to tap “tell us”. Here’s what I told them:
Instagram’s site’s basic terms of service indicate that users “may not post violent, nude, partially nude, discriminatory, unlawful, infringing, hateful, pornographic or sexually suggestive photos or other content.”
If we are to believe the above statement, why does a search of the hashtag #cutting return over 2 Million post results and #secretaccount returns over 24,000 (up 1,000 from yesterday) – both depicting extremely graphic and disturbing images from profiles like this one? Surely Instagram, now owned by Facebook, has a group of employees monitoring these images? My silly birthday message is blocked, but these types of profiles and their content are okay?
I chose this image to highlight the chosen profile name and the concerning hashtags associated with this post. I will not share any graphic images here as I understand there is a fine line between perpetuating and raising awareness. It is never my intention to offend or sensationalize.
I have researched several accounts and many of them belong to young people under the age of 18. These “secret accounts” seem to be a “secret” from only one group of people- parents. The profiles themselves are public.
Something is broken Instagram – please fix it – you might save a life! And yes, I’ve seen your pop-up warning for graphic images after searching the hashtag #cutting… I’ll refer back to the above quoted terms of service and ask what is wrong with this picture (pun intended)?
I can hear many of you. “Why do you care?” “It’s not your kid, so leave it alone.” “I just don’t want to know about it.” “Why are you wasting your time with this?” “No one wants to hear about this!”
The biggest problem parents face in today’s digital world is that all of this amazing technology takes us out of the equation.
In the same way that “Private” is not the default setting on most social media applications, neither is “Parental Guidance”.
I care because I see these things and think, this is someone’s child.
As always, thanks for stopping by,
xo Jen
J. J. Cannon 