“Your breasts are like those of a cow.” This was one of the nasty messages directed at a teenage girl on one of the local WhatsApp channel groups that have allegedly infiltrated schools.
Children are added to the groups without their consent, and they end up being body- or slut-shamed.
The “cow” message on the platform was accompanied by a picture of the girl and led to the Digital Law Company approaching the Johannesburg high court last week with an urgent application to have the channel shut down.
On Friday, the high court ordered that Meta Platforms and its WhatsApp business must, to the extent that is “technically feasible”, remove the offensive profiles and channels. Meta Platforms, the owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, was also ordered to release information about who was behind the accounts.
Speaking to Sowetan, a 15-year-old Ekurhuleni boy who was in the same WhatsApp group as the girl, said that while not everything shared on the group was always true, it did push some children very far.
“In the group, they send people’s sex tapes, nudes ... like they are exposing people, and many have attempted to kill themselves.”
The teenager said the group he is on has long existed; however, as of last week, many groups have been deactivated.
“The groups are getting reported. I would say they no longer exist. I think owners delete the groups because some are now known, and most of the owners are getting beaten,” he said.
According to the boy, the posts are always accompanied by an image of the child, their names and the name their school, and widely shared on the groups that have up to 20,000 followers.
Sowetan understands that to join the groups, the children have to be sent a link, but only the admin can post, while members can only react or reshare the posts.
The Digital Law Company’s Rorke Wilson told Sowetan that a grandmother had reached out to the firm and told them that she was keeping her granddaughter on suicide watch after she was shamed on the platform.
“While we don’t have clear evidence as to who is behind the accounts, but looking at the patterns, [and] content, we can see it’s a South African schoolboy, probably between 12 and 18,” Wilson said.
While we don’t have clear evidence as to who is behind the accounts, but looking at the patterns, [and] content, we can see it’s a South African schoolboy, probably between 12 and 18
— Rorke Wilson
Wilson’s colleague, Emma Sadleir, added that while they have not been able to keep track of the number of complaints, it has been a mixed bag of parents, schools [predominantly independent schools], and children reporting as of last week.
“It all started going down last Monday,” she said. “I probably had 20 schools calling within an hour, but it was independent schools because state schools were still on holiday.”
Sadleir added that most of the complaints came from children.
“What we find is they were trying to keep this away from their parents, as they have conservative parents,” she said. “The idea of their naked pictures circulating is a big taboo, and when contacting us, they are saying the worst thing that can happen is their parents finding out, instead of going to them for help.”
The department of basic education and the National Association of School Governing Bodies said no such reports have been brought to their attention.
Basic education spokesperson Elijah Mhlanga said: “The challenge begins in the home when parents and caregivers give their children smart devices. Access to these technologies without education on the harmful effects of abuse or access to bad material is the real issue.”
Matakanye Matakanya of the school governing bodies association said they were not surprised at the reports as they had long been calling for policies to not allow cellphones in schools, but the department was dragging its feet in the process.
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