The Blue Whale Challenge is perhaps the darkest social networking phenomenon till date. The Blue Whale game reportedly exists in several countries and is said to be consisting of a series of tasks that are assigned to the players by administrators over a time period of 50 days,the final challenge requiring the player to commit suicide.
Originated in Russia,this game has claimed hundreds of lives across the globe within the last two years all of them being teenagers or young adolescents.
What is making children fall into the trap?
A lot of people have been considering that monitoring of social media behavior of the children by their parents can prevent this mishap. But that is partly true. It is important to acknowledge the psychological issues related to this phenomenon. According to Dr. Harsheen Arora, a psychologist in Delhi, at the already complicated age of adolescence, teenagers are exposed to a lot of information through social media that they are yet not able to handle.
This overwhelming pressure combined with the emotional stress and conflict,particular to their age, makes them vulnerable. Those already going through emotional turmoil,serious mental health issues or physical abuse tend to find such a game,which is designed based upon the principle of self-harm,as a medium of theoutlet.
Similar to the idea of bloodletting,the children feel harming themselves will numb their pain otherwise.So,perhaps along with all the spying,now is the time to let go of the stigma related to mental health and openly talk about it.