A 16-year-old queer teen who identifies as Pranshu Yadav, hailing from Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh, was a self-taught make-up artist. The talented 10th-grade student was an active user of Meta’s Instagram, where the kid had around 16,000 followers. The teen used to post videos of tutorials on make-up and beauty-related content. The last post on the handle ’@glamupwithpranshu’ was a reel wherein the teen appeared wearing a saree and was posted on Diwali. This transition video of the teen went viral, and there were numerous homophobic and hateful comments. This affected the mental health of the kid, as the comments were not removed despite repeated reports. The affected teen finally succumbed and took their life away on November 21st, at their home, with the mother’s shawl, when their mother had gone out.
An Indian LGBTQ+ advocacy group called “Yes, We Exist” called out the people who posted such hateful comments against a kid who had encouraged people to follow their hearts. The group had also registered their dissatisfaction with Meta since this parent company of Instagram had not taken actions to make the page safe for use by the teen population despite receiving repeated reports of cyberbullying and trolling.
Also, it has been brought to light by an ex-employer of Meta that the company fired many content reviewers who were replaced by AI. However, the AI does not prove to be intelligent enough to filter immoral and unethical content, which would violate community morale. However, this inefficiency of AI was brought to the knowledge of Mark Zuckerberg, according to “yes, we exist." The group further added that many of the Indian queer people had experienced such bullying and intense trolling on Instagram platforms despite reporting about the same to the Meta. However, the loss of life of a teen because of the intense cyberbullying has escalated the issue. The group "Yes, we exist" initiated the #JusticeForPranshu online movement that urges Meta to invest substantially in its non-English language services and take cyberbullying seriously.
The hashtag #JusticeForPranshu "has no posts because some violate community guidelines," according to actor Trinetra, who stated that meta-owned websites like Instagram have continually failed to offer a safe space to members of the LGBTQ community.
KS Gehlot, the in-charge of the Nagjhiri police station, said in his press interview that the precise cause of the suicide is yet unknown, and an inquiry is underway.
Arthur Bejar, a former Meta executive who left the company in 2021, alleged that Instagram is "fundamentally misleading" the public regarding the safety of its platform for minors. In testimony given to US Senators earlier this month, Mr. Bejar claimed that young adolescents and children under 13 years of age should not use the platform for their own safety.
(Input from various media sources)
(Rehash/Bharkhavy K V)
