There are new trends for teenagers every so often, the newest of which are related to personal appearances and what people deem as attractive. These challenges are performed by people on social media platforms and include the don’t judge challenge.
The don’t judge challenge is performed by both male and female participants, most of whom use a current song as background noise, and “transform” themselves.
The “before” stage of the challenge includes people drawing on fake acne and unibrows, messing up their hair, putting on a pair of glasses, coloring some of their teeth black and drawing on facial hair. The person will react to their face while moving to the beat of the song, then reach out and cover the camera.
When the participant takes their hand off the camera they look completely different. They have tamed their hair, taken off all the fake coloring on their face and taken off the glasses. Many people have different views on the challenge.
Some people believe it allows the attractive people to show off the fact they are attractive, while others believe it is demeaning and creates low self esteem issues for people who don’t look like the “after” clips.
Sophomore Eva Shumaker voiced her opinion on this trend stating everyone has acne, and certain people wear glasses.
“It doesn’t make you ugly,” Shumaker said.
Sophomore Noel Domke jumped in and added, “It’s just taking stereotypes.”
https://twitter.com/FanKaFa_/status/649213019243737089
That smile 😍😍 #DontJudgeChallenge #DontJudgeMeChallenges (Vine by DontJudgeChallenges◇) https://t.co/DYN6mu0jJ0
— Serena Noel (@Haza144) October 2, 2015
Fox 5 news shared that some teens don’t like the concept of the don’t judge challenge, and feel the videos mock people who aren’t considered “attractive” and just make the viewer feel worse about their natural beauty.
Time magazine said in an article that the origin of this challenge is still not known, but the best guess is when beauty blogger Em Ford posted a viral video of herself removing all her makeup, and showing off her acne, which prompted viewers to accept who they are and love it. The article goes on to say that the don’t judge challenge is a parody of her video.
The don’t judge challenge is one of the recent trends that brings issues of self esteem into light. Various media formats such as TV, movies, and magazines have an effect on how we see ourselves and are one of the many causes of self esteem issues or lack thereof.
According to The Highlander, at age thirteen, 53 percent of American girls are unhappy with their bodies. This percentage grows to 78 percent at age of 17.
Senior Zane Williams shared that he’s not surprised that people dealing with things such as acne, moles and bad teeth are feeling insecure when viewing things from the media.
“These aren’t the main things causing body issues, but they all contribute,” he said.
Featured Photo Credit: Sarah Kagan/The Foothill Dragon Press
