Social Media Harms
When Social Media Challenges Are Deadly #thechokinggame #passoutchallenge and now the “Blackout challenge”
The Stories of Mason Bogard and Eric Robinson
The second episode in “The Harms” series of the podcast No App for Life tells the stories of Mason Bogard and Eric Ronbinson who died attempting the social media challenge, the Choking Game (#thechokinggame) also known as #thepassoutchallenge and more recently the “blackout challenge.”
Mason Bogard
Fifteen year-old Mason died on May 1, 2019. His mother, Joann Bogard, describes the day he died as being like any other day. He came home from practice and told his mom and dad that he was going upstairs to take a shower. A short time later his mom and dad heard a noise, which they thought was a shampoo bottle falling in the shower. Mason’s dad went upstairs to find Mason unconscious and not breathing.
Joann Bogard is a thoughtful, caring parent. She and Mason had talked about the Tide Pod challenge and how dangerous it was, after a pop-up screen promoted that challenge on YouTube. Mason said that he understood and would never do anything like that. It never occurred to her that her son would participate in a social media challenge like #thechokinggame nor could she even imagine that online social media platforms would allow postings of a dare or challenge for users to suffocate themselves while recording the incident and then posting that video online.
Why these challenges are so dangerous
Jean Rogers, Director of the Screentime Action Network, stated that many pre-teens and teens do these challenges alone and film them in order to post to social media platforms to get “likes” and additional “friends” or followers. Children at this age think these videos are funny. They cannot see the dangers inherent in doing these challenges. Compounding this misperception is the fact that there are no videos of any users dying while attempting these challenges. She concluded:
“Involved parents, but it [tragedy] still happens”
Eric Robinson
Twelve year-old Eric Robinson died on April 21, 2010. His mother, Judy Rogg, explained that she had never heard of the “choking game” until a law enforcement official reviewing her son’s death told her about it. She was stunned. She had never heard of online challenges and it never occurred to her that Eric would attempt to participate in one. In order to help other parents and children she founded Eric’s Cause, an educational program dedicated to teaching parents, children and educators about the risks of social media challenges.
Hundreds of Families Affected
Judy and Joann found each other through a private Facebook group composed of parents whose children have died participating in the “choking game.” This group is composed of over 200 parents world-wide.
Generational disconnects
Jeremy Edge is a licensed professional counselor from Dallas, TX, who specializes in helping teenagers and adults recover from problematic and disordered screen use. He stated that the digital divide is wide between parents and their children because parents either are not exposed to social media and online games, or experience those platforms differently than their children do.
In the pre-teen and teenaged brain, social media and online gaming creates dopamine surges, resulting in a cycle of a dopamine “high” which leads to a dopamine deficit (characterized by irritability, anxiety, rumination), that is relieved by additional social media use and online gaming.
Edge remarked that social media and online gaming are often referred to as “crack for kids.”
TikTok Denies Challenges are Occurring
In his testimony to the Senate on October 26, 2021, Michael Beckerman, Vice President and Head of Public Policy, Americas, TikTok, stated that:
“ With regards to reports of scheduled challenges on TikTok, as a prominent disinformation researcher who focuses on TikTok recently pointed out: “When I looked into this, I could not find a single TikTok actually endorsing this behavior. All evidence indicates this is a hoax turned into reality by local news and school districts reacting to completely unconfirmed rumors.”
Beckerman’s statement is inaccurate. Twelve year-old Joshua Haileyesus died in April 2021 three weeks after an attempt to do the TikTok “Blackout Challenge”, the newest form of #thechokinggame. Joshua’s death was well documented in mainstream media outlets including the The Charlotte Observer, Yahoo and MSN.
Better Social Media Moderation Results in Safer Online Experiences
Increased moderation by social media platforms is the best way to prevent these heartbreaking incidents. Good content moderation is both labor-intensive and emotionally distressing for moderators. Many social media companies try to mitigate these problems by using artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to perform moderation with poor results. Internal reports released in the Facebook papers, reveal studies by Facebook engineers who estimate that only 5% of hate speech is removed by AI. However, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before Congress that the company removed 94 percent of the hate speech it finds before users report violations.
Regulation is Key
Effective moderation is expensive and directly affects technology company profits. U.S. governmental regulation is the only effective incentive for social media companies to design and build products that are safer for all users.
Contact your U.S. federal elected officials:
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Social Media Harms provides a listing of peer-reviewed studies, scholarly books, and articles from authoritative sources that document the negative effects of social media use. The site also lists links to organizations dedicated to reducing the harms created by social media platforms and other online services. We do not solicit donations, however, we are asking for additions to our lists of peer reviewed studies and authoritative books and articles.
