Cover art by Lucy Jeffers
Thirst trap culture on social media contributes to ongoing objectification
By Hilah Brekhus-Lavinsky
A “thirst trap” is a type of social media post intended to entice viewers sexually. A thirst trap on TikTok, for example, may include a shirtless male or a girl wearing a promiscuous outfit singing along to a song with sexually suggestive lyrics. The comment section of these videos is typically filled with a series of sexual innuendos that would never be acceptable offline. These inappropriate comments are often objectifying and uncomfortable.
Adolescent psychologist and former Tamalpais Union High School District (TUHSD) counselor Stacey Rodgers believes that there is one reason why people continue to post these videos daily: they like the attention.
“[Social media] is created to be addictive. Like gambling, it manipulates the brain's reward system. If you are getting likes or comments or followers, you get dopamine hits, which creates a dopamine loop,” Rodgers said.
While scrolling on a girl’s Instagram feed, bikini pictures tend to have more likes and shares than the wholesome pictures with their dog. While this picture might be inappropriate, accentuating or even editing certain bodily features, the male attention received from that picture often justifies the self-objectifying post.
“It's normalized to post all of the bikini pictures and videos because that's what the guys want you to do,” Rodgers said.
"It's normalized to post all of the bikini pictures and videos because that's what the guys want you to do," Rodgers said.
When posting on social media, it is common for individuals to edit their photos and videos to make themselves skinnier, clear their skin, whiten their teeth and fix their hair.
“Girls are being manipulated [through social media] to present themselves in a certain way by altering themselves, but it's not reality. Boys are now thinking that that's what girls should look like,” Rodgers said.
Of course, men and women presenting themselves in a sexually suggestive way or simply trying to look marvelous is not a new phenomenon. But it is an evolved one. In the pre-social media world, this experience was extremely different.
“When I was younger, we had magazines with supermodels in them, but those were magazines. We couldn't present ourselves like that or [post] pictures of us like that,” Rodgers said.
With the creation of social media, people also began to have digital footprints. Teenagers are often warned to think twice about what they post on social media out of fear that the post will impact their future lives, but these warnings fall on deaf ears.
“Teenagers are desensitized to knowing what’s appropriate to post or what’s inappropriate to post or what is something that you shouldn’t be putting out in public,” Rodgers said.
Similar to a drug, the dopamine felt after receiving another like or comment keeps drawing users back to social media, leading to a harmful cycle of objectification of men and women and an overall lessening in value of our appearances.
Beyond the screen: Gender expectations
By Jamie Glennon
Beyond the Screen, intimacy can be tricky to quantify, and the digital world can complicate the norms for developing balanced relationships. When it comes to social media, “it’s not real, but I feel like you can’t trust what you see,” says Opaline Vigery, a sophomore who is not alone in feeling like social media distorts human relationships. Dive deeper into a round-table discussion of how social media has influenced teens’ perception of what relationships look like beyond the screen, hosted by Jamie Glennon
Redwood students react to minor exploitation via TikTok
By Leina Khan and Isabelle Davis
Posting on Instagram and TikTok has become a very lucrative business. Parents have recognized that they can use their children to enter this market and profit. Sometimes, what may feel like an innocent video or photo to a parent can be viewed drastically differently by the wrong audience. In many instances, minors have been oversexualized by grown adults through their social media posts.
One example is TikToker Wren Eleanor. She has thousands of people save her content, specifically videos that have been sexualized by some of her audience. What’s more, Instagram does not allow children under 13 to open up their own accounts, so parents have full control and micromanage their lives. In Wren’s case, her mom created and ran her TikTok account before all her content was wiped out in July of 2023 in response to the hate and concerns from their viewers about potential minor exploitation.
Research from ‘Disrupting Harm’ shows that as much as 20 percent of children in some countries were sexually exploited and abused online in 2023. This outstanding statistic exemplifies this recent trend, and in this video, students reacted to situations like this, including the exploitation of toddler Wren Eleanor and teenagers Izzy and Mary.
The law is still loading for 'kidfluencers'
By Penelope Trott
In today's digital landscape, there are endless possibilities to shape opinions and share experiences. Platforms like YouTube, TikTok and Instagram allow content to reach a constantly growing audience. As influencers expand across various platforms, one group stands out in visibility and vulnerability: child influencers. Commonly known as “kidfluencers,” child influencers amass large followings, sometimes before they can even read the comments on their own posts. As the number and reach of child influencers grow, the legal protections for these children are struggling to keep up, leaving many “kidfluencers” in a legal gray area similar to their child actor predecessors.
Historically, child actors have often struggled to receive their earnings, as parents took control of all compensation. However, in 1938, child actor Jackie Coogan sued his parents for money they had taken from his earnings from acting. Although he was only paid a fraction of what he was owed, California passed the Coogan Act in his honor. It states that 15 percent of a child actor’s earnings should be placed in a trust until adulthood. This law was amended in September of 2024 to cover child influencers in California. Additionally, Illinois, Minnesota and Utah have introduced their own legislation to protect child influencers’ earnings.
Senator of Illinois Dave Koehler is proud of the new legislation in his state, which he believes gives child influencers a new opportunity to protect their earnings.
“Many parents have taken this opportunity to pocket the money while making their children continue to work in these digital environments,” Koehler said in a press release.
Former child star Alyson Stoner is also using their platform to encourage states to increase the legal protections for kidfluencers.
“Taking steps to safeguard a portion of child influencers’ earnings and their right to privacy is a crucial step in minimizing the harm that hundreds of thousands of children have experienced across traditional and digital media,” Stoner said.
While some states have taken steps to protect child influencers, more must recognize the importance of expanding or creating legislation to protect “kidfluencers.” Many states have laws protecting child actors that could be extended to cover these child influencers. Refer to the infographic below to further understand lawmakers' changes to preserve child influencers.