By now everyone will have heard of, or seen, the terrible
pictures emerging from last Saturday’s Eminem concert in Slane – of a young
girl photographed engaging in oral sex with two men. The term ‘Slane Girl’ was trending number one
on Twitter over the weekend, as photos of this very young looking girl
continued to circulate on the social media websites. The initial postings were under the auspices
of her being a ‘slut’, her being an idiot, and her deserving everything she
(socially) got. Yesterday it emerged
that she was underage, and the tone of the circulation took on a different hue –
up until that point it was seen as a joke at someone else’s expense, but
suddenly these pictures could qualify as child pornography. This is when reputable media stepped in and
began reporting the circulation of the photos and the possible criminal
implications for the boys photographed, as well as for those continuing to post
the photos online. The undercurrent of ‘slut-shaming’
remains, though, in the reprehensible idea that this girl behaved in a way that
somehow deserves the response.
There is no doubt about how I felt when I heard of this, and
when I saw the photos themselves – sick to my stomach and so very, very sorry
for that girl. The boys in the photos
are acting like heroes, looking at the camera smiling while people mill around
them, seemingly uncaring about what’s happening. That is how they saw themselves, even as it
was happening, and so they posed for photos and cheered their online
publication. The girl herself, nameless
though not faceless, will be tarred with this moniker and this night. Nobody will ever think she was cool or
outrageous for giving blowjobs to two guys outdoors in full view of others at a
concert. No, this girl woke up Sunday morning
with a probable hangover and a definite looming shame as she remembered what
had happened. We've all been there. Where we haven’t been, or at least I haven’t
been, is online for our drunken mistakes.
I’m not saying her behaviour was standard, because I don’t know anymore –
certainly when I was that age there were things going on that none of our
parents knew about, or suspected we’d be involved in at young ages. However, things have moved on to a point
where these lapses in your own judgement are now recorded for posterity. This girl woke up Sunday thinking she only
had to look at herself in the mirror and face her own reflection under the
weight of a shameful feeling that things got out of control. Instead, she has to face her parents and
family, and in two weeks, she must return to school and walk corridors filled
with peers who know it all.
I think any talk of criminal prosecution takes away from the
bottom line here. We’re not going to be
able to stop our kids from doing stupid things from time to time – granted this
is in the higher scale of stupid mistakes – but what we can do is talk to them
and listen to them on issues of peer pressure and sexuality. That girl should have truly known that she is
worth more than a public blowjob in a muddy field, instead of somehow thinking
it makes her sexually expressive and adult.
The boys involved should feel more worth in themselves than to allow that
situation to arise, and certainly feel that she has more worth than that. Those taking and sharing the photos should
understand the consequences of their actions, that somebody’s whole life can be
ruined for the sake of a ‘funny’ Facebook or Twitter upload. This world is not the world that I grew up
in. Your every action can now follow you
beyond the stupidity of your youth, and our children need to be taught – really
taught – the sometimes terrible power of the internet.
I hope that she is strong enough to deal with what’s
coming. The change in pace of reporting
has meant that she is no longer a general butt of jokes online, but is instead
the subject of a criminal investigation.
This doesn't take away what happened, though, and what she has to deal with. The onus is still on this girl and she must
still bear responsibility, however inebriated she might have been, for her own
actions. She is the one who has to live
with this, and she is the one who will have to find a way to realise that these
actions do not define her or make her less than she is – that she is a complex
being made up of equal parts folly and intelligence, just as we all are. We all make mistakes, and we all act out of
character from time to time. I wanted to
speak about this once and then never again so that I don’t add to a drawing out
of the conversation, because that young girl has enough to deal with without an
endless online dissection. I hope she
can move past this and realise that though the internet can make the world seem
small and on your doorstep, this one mistake should not become her entire world.
Switch off, plug out, and breathe: For this too shall pass.
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