Webster Confessions is the new Instagram account taking Webster by storm. It features a Google form in the bio where one can fill out a “confession,” and it will be posted anonymously.
Although this might have seemed like a harmless idea, it is causing more harm than it is good. It has received severe backlash from high school students over what is being posted. It features all sorts of negative commentary about staff and students, with little to none of it actually being true.
The account seems to be hidden and is difficult to find if one isnt following it.
“I think it’s an anonymous excuse for cowards to be mean to other people for no reason. It’s a way for bullies to say mean things and get away with it,” an anonymous student said.
According to the PromotePrevent website, a nonprofit organization established in part to prevent bullying, “Bullying is a repeated aggressive behavior where one person (or group of people) in a position of power deliberately intimidates, abuses, or coerces an individual with the intention to hurt that person physically or emotionally.”
This account is doing just that.
“I think it’s bringing people down. I feel like there’s a lot of stuff being said, and people don’t know how to defend themselves just because it’s so absurd,” another anonymous student said.
A different student agreed.
“What’s disturbing to me is that people feel empowered to say just the most shocking things about people who have developmental disabilities, people who are incapable of defending themselves, and people who have no idea about what’s going on. We don’t need all this,” the student said.
The majority of things being posted on this account have enraged the students here at the high school. It has spread out so that nobody is safe from the bullying happening on this platform. While some items posted are relatively harmless, such as “Ryan K is the best swimmer on the team,” a majority of the posts are not.
Many of the posts are sexualizing people at the school, especially women and those with disabilities. The same people have also been targeted over and over again on this account. The account owner has also recently added polls to their story asking followers to pick between two girls which one looks better.
On top of sexism and ableism, homophobia is also a big problem on this platform. Students are constantly trying to “out” other students as gay, just because they feel like it.
The ECHO staff agreed that the majority of stuff posted on this account was too objectionable to include in this story.
Due to the fact that it is anonymous, it is difficult to tell what people are sending versus what the person running this account has made up. This account also has a few “signed” posts, but it is unclear whether these people actually sent in the confession, or if they are being impersonated.
There have been attempts to defend people on this platform, but they are overshadowed by the amount of hateful comments that are being shared.
“I just think it’s not a good face for Webster. Having the name Webster Confessions on it and then saying that stuff isn’t a good look for the community,” a third anonymous student said.
“This is going to spread outside of Webster,” one of the anonymous students said.
This account has already been seen by students from other schools in the Saint. Louis area.
“The Webster High Confessions page in my opinion, and the opinion of many of my peers, contains a lot of spread misinformation and rude comments on student relationships. I don’t know if the goal of the account is to belittle fellow students, but I find it crude and simply unnecessary to say the least for a little laugh,” an anonymous student from a surrounding high school said.
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