Tanith Carey posted this picture of her year-old daughter, Lily, onto the social media site Yellow and was shocked by the responses she received. Welcome to the seedy world of Tinder for teens — as Yellow has become known since its launch last summer. Users make a profile, posting a selfie photograph or video, then flick through all the other people on the site. What I saw truly horrified me. Night after night, as I scrolled past thousands of fresh young faces — many still plump with baby fat and downy top lips — I found an unedifying meat market where children are reduced to little more than sexual objects, there to be scrutinised and objectified on demand.
It was so depressing. Getting onto the site was shockingly easy — another terrifying discovery.
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To sign up to the 13 to 17 section, all I had to do was make up an age — in this case that of my year-old daughter Lily, who agreed to let me post a picture of her on the site in order to help me understand the pressures her generation are facing. I had to send my phone number in order to get a code to make a profile.
In her profile picture, Lily is turned away from the camera. Her face could barely be seen. All that was visible was her hair plaits. There was nothing remotely sexual about it. Yet within five minutes of posting the profile on the site, a stream of messages had arrived saying her picture had been liked by boys. Yet, without any prompting, it quickly became transparently clear what a giant sexual fishing exercise this website is. Swipe on a few more profiles and you will find Joseph, For his profile picture, he has super-imposed a filter on his baby-faced features to give him a puppy dog nose and floppy pink ears.
Yet, at the same time, he is naked from the waist up as he gazes down at the camera. A message super-imposed across his chest makes the reason why he has joined obvious. It reads: Like Mark and Joseph, many boys do not bother to sugarcoat the reasons why they are here. A profile belonging to a man called Harry that Tanith came across during the two months she spent monitoring the activities of youngsters on the site. Rory, 15 but who looks 11 , poses for his picture in his school blazer, white shirt and stripey tie. A few minutes later, I get my first direct request on the chat feature from Jonathan, It simply reads: Josh is equally direct but without the kisses.
The picture he posts is of a headless, bare, ripped torso complete with impressive six-pack. Clearly, if that is his picture, he is not. And who is hiding behind it?
In another conversation, I ask Jacob, who is pictured in uniform with his feet up on the desk, why he has asked me for naked pictures. All conversation here is cursory and quickly directed by boys towards the sexual. We only exchange messages for a few minutes when out of the blue he volunteers that he had been pleasuring himself. Users can choose from a huge library of symbols on Yellow, including the notorious aubergine — which I now know is shorthand for male genitalia — and is used by boys as an offer to send an intimate picture of themselves.
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But in case I am having problems deciphering the code, George, 16, sends me a dictionary. This reveals numerous other meanings, including how the picture of a cat with a surprised face means: The young people here come from every conceivable background. However, one of the more modest profile images shows a boy in a suit presenting a speech to the Model United Nations at one of the most famous public schools in the country.
Another shows a boy on a horse, about to take part in a fox hunt. For children so young, there is also a wide range of sexual preferences expressed here, with both year-old girls and boys presenting themselves as bisexual, gay, lesbian and even pansexual not limited in sexual choice with regard to biological sex, gender or gender identity.
So young? Aged 13, I barely understood what those terms meant.
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Does any sane parent want their child sexually categorising themselves at the tender age of 13? And it is not just sex that the teens on this site seem so flagrantly nonchalant about. Every single night, I saw videos of under-age boys ostentatiously smoking spliffs, blowing what appeared to be marijuana smoke into the camera or using bongs. Clearly, they do so because they feel able to act how they like and even openly break the law in a virtual world where no adults — except, of course, paedophiles — are watching. Children are left to their own devices so much that they are operating in an adult—free Lord Of The Flies universe.
This is a place where no rules apply.
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The stigmas attached stuck with me. This is British bullshit. The men I have dated are men I have approached. I know how to have a conversation and I know how to walk up to someone. Why should I feel about guilty about it?
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This question is something I had to finally confront. And as someone who was raised to keep everything private, public acknowledgement of such behavior sometimes feels more of a burden than it needs to. I always find it very dubious and I don't really trust people who deny human instincts. I know from experience that if I want to have sex, I can. Without even the slightest hint of shame.
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He told The Guardian:. And marriage for many is an end goal to our app.
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