It’s super dark.
Originally created as a way to empower the female body, the challenge of the TikTok silhouette is being discouraged by women, who warn that the trend is being used by men to gawk at naked women. Since then, their PSAs have gone viral on social media.
The original trend is to put a red filter over a clip of a person turning naked or half-naked to make it look like their shadow is dancing seductively, like an animation in the opening credits of a Bond film. However, social media opportunists figured out how to remove the filter, thus revealing the poster’s naked or partially clothed bodies, BuzzFeed reported. They also posted tutorials on YouTube and elsewhere showing fellow voyeurs how to do the same.
“This is happening readily on social media with little response from community breach via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat or TikTok,” wrote a Facebook Samaritan enraged about the blatant privacy violation. They added: “When reminded that this is disgusting, scary and without consent, men respond that women are always finding ways to become victims and should not be naked on the internet.”
“This is a major violation of consent and @Youtube you must remove them as soon as possible, ” tweeted Ej Dickson, a cultural writer for Rolling Stone.
In another PSA with almost 100,000 likes, a TikTok user warns participants of the challenge to “be aware of what you are wearing before doing all the editing of the final product”. The self-proclaimed photographer also posted an accompanying video in which she refuses to demonstrate the challenge of the silhouette and instead posts comments from outraged commentators.
Fortunately, it appears that the anti-meddling brigade’s pleas have not fallen on deaf ears. A subreddit about peeking behind the digital red curtain, called r / SilhouetteUnfiltered, has been suspended, while Twitter scrapped multiple accounts who were editing TikTok posts and embarrassing participants.