My goal is to put pressure on Tumblr to raise their joining age to 16 to protect young adolescents from glamorized mental illness related posts. Tumblr is a blogging site centered on scrolling through the user's 'dashboard', or newsfeed, and looking at mainly images and text posts from people around the world. Many of the post normalize eating disorders, self-harm, and depression. There have been many occasions where I have logged into Tumblr and see posts pushing me to 'make them regret the day they dared call me fat' or by helping me make food choices with "water or cake?" stamped over a boney, half naked woman.

David Luxton, a research psychologist, looked at how these websites desensitizing suicide and self-harm influenced teenagers and is concerned, "that they may normalize and reinforce self-injurious behaviors or cause disinhibition." From posts glamorizing self-harm to photos praising unhealthy dieting, these 'support pages' can really harm someone's mental health. Those who are suffering from depression or any other mental illness turn to these unsafe websites for 'help', but it usually leads to their symptoms growing more serious, and the user believing it's acceptable behavior.

This idea of glamorizing mental illness is spreading to other sources of media, but I believe the best place to start making a change is Tumblr. The blogging site is incredibly popular with adolescents and the normalization of mental illness is becoming a common issue there, which makes it an affective place to start. Tumblr has policies limiting these blogs' content, it isn't enforced to the extent it needs to be.

When someone searches a tag along the lines of cuts or sad, a pop up appears claiming that they are not alone with multiple help lines. Underneath there is a large box that redirects them back to their dashboard, and a extremely small one that allows them to continue to their search results. Also in the Tumblr Health page, there are many help and counseling options and websites they have listed access to. Tumblr is trying to make an honest change and rid its self of the ugly stereotype that’s being created, but a pop up page won’t stop teens from seeing the content. Even if it isn’t searched for, it can still appear in their newsfeeds and dashboards.

Tumblr also contains a plethora of adult, sexual content that is easily accessed. Many parents are unaware of the explicit content on the popular blogging site and how much of it they’re child has seen by just logging in. Raising the joining age by just three years could make a larger impact than most would assume. There is a large difference between being thirteen (usually in middle school) and sixteen (usually a sophomore or junior in high school). Although they may still be considered to young to see certain content, they are older and mature enough to make more of their own decisions.

I believe that raising the Tumblr age to sixteen and putting pressure on Tumblr to make them ensure users are educated on how these blogs can influence their mental health would be a strong place to start in making a positive change. Learn more at http://romanticizinghealth.tumblr.com!

 Photo From:

Tumblr handle. (2014, April 23). Tumblr posts. Retrieved from [tumblr.com/search/depressed.html]