We call on Instagram to stop providing a platform for normalising the eroticisation of children

Content warning: discussion about child sexual abuse material and paedophilia

Collective Shout quoted in 10 Daily article

10 daily forwarded several photographs of Australian Instagram models aged between nine and 15 to Collective Shout. It's a grassroots campaigns movement against the objectification of women and the sexualisation of girls.

“I searched for a couple of images and found them on porn sites. It’s likely the majority of them are on porn sites and others are in a chat room with inappropriate sexual comments about a primary school aged girl,” campaigns manager Caitlin Roper said.

10 daily has viewed and can confirm that these images were shared on a porn site and other chat rooms.

But who should be held accountable for where these pictures are ending up?

Michael Murchie was the man behind the camera for at least one of the child photos Roper found a porn site. He told 10 daily all clothing in his shoots belong to the models.

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When questioned about the age-appropriateness of the photos of teen and pre-teen girls such as the images above, Murchie said:

“I never take revealing photos of minors. I merely take the photos requested of me by the clients, their parents."

But Roper doesn't buy it.

“Is that an excuse? If a parent wants to exploit their kids then its OK from a photographer to make money from it?”

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Girls and women's advocate Roper said modelling decision being made by parents could be damaging to their children in years to come.

“Do they not understand the implications for their child or do they not care? Is it about fame ahead of their child’s rights and safety?” 

Read the full article at 10 Daily

We recently shared an article detailing a mother’s experience with her teenage daughter and an online swimwear company. 

The mother, Tania, had written to Collective Shout after her 16-year-old daughter received a g-string bikini in the mail, a prize for a “last comment wins” competition on Instagram for a company called “Makana Swimwear”.

The g-string bikini was accompanied by a card which encouraged her daughter to tag herself in any photos she shares on Instagram of herself posing in the swimmers.

The mother went on to have a difficult but necessary conversation with her daughter about the swimmers and why she could keep the top, but not the bottom. At the same time she was alarmed that anyone would think it appropriate to send this item to her daughter. So she contacted Collective Shout. Read more about what the mother had to say here.

Following publication of our article, we were alerted to a post that appeared in a closed group from someone speaking on behalf of the “Makana team” making a series of factually incorrect claims.

As a result of this post, Collective Shout began receiving comments from hundreds of people defending the business. Almost every comment made the same specific claim, that competition terms and conditions "clearly stated" entry was for over 18+” and therefore it was the 16-year-old girl’s fault for entering against the rules.

Upon visiting Makana Swim’s website, we found a link called ‘competitions’, which included terms and conditions, including a requirement that entrants be aged 18 and over. However, a google cache search found that this section of the website did not exist before March 15, one day earlier. It appears that the owner only published terms and conditions after the mother’s complaint and then edited old Instagram posts to cover her tracks, while making misleading statements that resulted in hundreds of hostile comments blaming a 16-year- old girl for breaking the rules and claiming the mother was unreasonable to complain about the business for her daughter’s actions. 

Pic: How Makana Swim’s website appeared up until March 15 (see left hand sidebar, with no competitions section)

Pic: How Makana Swim’s website appeared after Collective Shout published the mother’s article (see ‘competitions’ section added to left hand sidebar)

Pic: Instagram photos as they appeared before March 15, with no reference to terms and conditions.

Commenters, many of them adult women have called the 16yr old girl a liar, sneaky and naughty among other things. They’ve claimed the mother is an incompetent, inattentive and irresponsible. Both have been mocked mercilessly. 

At the time of writing there are over 600 comments on our fb page and volunteers have struggled to keep up with moderating the abuse against the teenage girl her mother and Collective Shout. We are now receiving messages via our website, which include accusations and threats to disrupt Collective Shout’s operations in various ways. Staff have had to take time out of their weekend to attend an urgent situation as a result of Makana fans making good on these threats. 

All because a business didn’t want to cop to making a mistake and instead decided to go with a cover up and portray themselves as the victim.

This is taxing on our volunteers and staff, but our biggest concern is the 16 year old girl who played by the rules presented to her at the time and who according to her mother leaned towards defending the company and yet is still subject to a barrage of nasty abusive comments from adults who should know better. 

Adults running a business should have known better than to allow a 16-year-old girl to participate in an 18+ competition. Adults should have known better than to try and cover it up and lay blame at a 16yr old girl’s feet. 

Hundreds of other adults should know better than to gang up against a teenage girl with such vicious name calling and mockery. 

On top of being the most bizarre behaviour Collective Shout has observed for some time, what is also striking is how unnecessary this all is. 

How different it could have been if they had posted a statement with something like “thank you for bringing this situation to our attention. We apologise to the mother for this mistake. This was a serious oversight on our part and because of this we are now taking measures to prevent a similar situation occurring again.” 

The company has now issued an apology and stated it will close indefinitely. We can’t speak to whether that was a wise or necessary decision to make. We can only hope that if the owner/s do decide to re-establish, that they commit to doing better in future, not only in relation to how they manage ethical age restrictions, but also in how feedback or complaints are managed. 

Women deserve better than social media pressuring to look a certain way. 

If you’re a woman, Instagram usage may negatively influence your appearance-related concerns and beliefs.

New research from the University of NSW and Macquarie University has confirmed what many of us have known intuitively for some time: there exists a link between body image concerns and viewing images of seemingly flawless women via photo-sharing social media platforms.

In fact, the research, which surveyed 276 Australian and American women aged between 18 and 25 years, has found that spending as little as thirty minutes a day on Instagram is enough to prompt a woman to self-objectify, fixate on her weight and appearance, and value her body for its appearance above its health and physical functions.

We have a saying at Collective Shout:

"Silence is the language of complicity, speaking out is the language of change."

And recently Melbourne mum, Melanie Sheppard, refused to be silent after discovering that her daughter had been sexually exploited on social media.