Essena O'Neill's Anti-Social Media Stunt

Submission 18,332

Overview

Essena O'Neill's Anti-Social Media Stunt refers to former Australian model Essena O'Neill's public denouncement of social media for promoting false depictions of reality in late October 2015. While many praised O'Neill for her statements about unhealthy social media practices, others speculated that the stunt was a disingenuous viral marketing ploy meant to promote her new website.

Background

On October 31st, O'Neill launched the blog LetsBeGameChangers,^[1] containing posts about the dangers of social media and a "Support Me" page for viewers to provide donations. The first post on the blog featured a Vimeo video in which O'Neill announces that she is "quitting social media" (shown below).

On November 2nd, O'Neill uploaded a video to YouTube titled "Why I Really am Quitting Social Media," in which she emotionally rants about how deceptive social media practices gave her low self esteem and other mental health issues (shown below). The YouTube channel was subsequently deleted.

[This video has been removed]

Meanwhile on Instagram, O'Neill removed 2,000 photos, renamed her feed to "Social Media Is Not Real Life" and changed the captions of several photos to various behind-the-scenes anecdotes (shown below). Within 48 hours, the Instagram page was deleted.

Notable Developments

Hoax Claims

On November 3rd, 2015, the NinaAndRanda YouTube channel uploaded a video titled "Essena O'Neill Quitting Social Media is a Hoax," in which two of O'Neill's friends from Los Angeles criticize her anti-social media stunt for being disingenuous and factually incorrect (shown below, left). Additionally, they claim O'Neill did not have any issues with social media prior to an emotional break up with her boyfriend. The same day, YouTuber Word From Willie uploaded a video refuting several of O'Neill's claims made in her videos (shown below, right).

[This video has been removed]

O'Neill's Response

That day, O'Neill responded to NinaAndRanda's video, asking them to please refrain from talking about her "personal life" online (shown below).

Meanwhile, O'Neill uploaded a video titled "Let's Talk About Something More Important Than Me, Please?" to Vimeo, in which she urges viewers to discuss things other than her personal life (shown below).

4chan Raid

Also on November 3rd, a 4chan user submitted a thread about O'Neill, referring to her as an "attention whore" and urging viewers to raid her website's forum. That day, her forum was temporarily shut down after being flooded with posts.^[2]

News Media Coverage

In the coming days, several news sites published articles about the stunt, including The Guardian,^[3] Time,^[4] Today,^[5] Elle^[6] and BBC News.^[7]