Embarrassing Pics and Videos – A Desperate Student’s Story

Late one Saturday night last year, I received an email from a student—let’s call her Mary. Mary had found out that some kids in her school had a video of her that was extremely embarrassing. She was mortified about returning to school on Monday. She thought this video would define who she was until the end of high school, and she was desperate for advice on what to do.

Mary’s situation is very common. With the proliferation of devices that can capture pictures and videos, the occasional lack of good judgment by students in allowing peers to take digital images of them, and the constant posting of personal content as part of social media culture, embarrassing images are a frequent occurrence. And in the hands of an aggressor, or in a peer group where bullying behaviors are a social norm, embarrassing images can be used quite effectively to gain social benefits and socially diminishing a peer. Social rivals can use the images to launch relational aggression campaigns that can achieve high rates of peer participation. Those with a lower social status can easily join higher-status students as active bystanders in using the images against a target to achieve social gains. And targets can find it very difficult to defend against this type of aggression because the evidence in the digital images is undeniable and the targets can’t help feeling and showing embarrassment. However, the solution to countering this type of aggression is actually quite simple.

I told Mary that the students who would be waiting for her on Monday when she walked through the school doors were fully expecting her to show embarrassment (note: feeling embarrassment and showing embarrassment are two different things). The more embarrassment she showed, the more fun it would be for the other students, the more opportunity for social gains they would have, and the longer the embarrassing video would circulate among her peers. So she needed to embrace the situation. She needed to walk into school with her head held high, admit that the video was embarrassing, and laugh at herself along with everyone else. By showing that she was not embarrassed, and by laughing at herself, she would diffuse the situation by depriving others of any social status benefits they could achieve through her embarrassment and socially diminishing her. Those students with a lower social standing would not be able to feel socially superior or gain the approval of higher status students, and any social rivals would not be able to gain an advantage over her.

In the middle of the following week, I heard back from Mary. She was thrilled and relieved. She had confidently walked into school, laughed along with everyone else, and admitted that the video was embarrassing, but she showed no embarrassment. Before the day was out, her peers had stopped talking about and sharing the video, and everyone moved on. Her social status remained intact, and, I’m guessing, got a boost from how she handled herself. More than likely, her peers won’t bother trying to socially diminish her again should other embarrassing digital images surface. In a sense, Mary has “bully-proofed” herself from this type of aggression. She probably also gained confidence from handling the problem on her own and not having to involve adults such as school staff in the resolution.