I remember when I was a teenager and 'Hot or not' was a big thing. People would either do livestreams on social media and judge random classmates, or they'd upload your photo and people would vote on your rank. Yes, really. It was a pretty toxic webpage.
If you found yourself tagged by the page, it meant someone had ranked you. I remember logging in one day to see a photo of me - all glammed up since I'd dressed up for the school play.
I remember thinking 'That's a controversial take' because I'd been voted a 7. Which was kind of funny to me because let me tell you - I was bullied a lot of being unattractive. Maybe the 7 was a joke. Like many teenagers, I had an awkward phase.
Especially when I had one particularly bad haircut. A mean girl at school spread an unflattering photo around on social media and I remember it having two hundred or so likes. I was devastated at the time and the comments were as cruel as you'd expect.
Of course I could just turn the computer off but the teasing still continued at school.
That kind of bullying does stick with you and it makes you doubt people who genuinely show interest in you later on. It makes you cynical. You turn around and say 'Haha, very funny, that's a good one'.
I remember when someone I was friends with admitted that she used to have a crush on me and that she used to ask her friend for advice on how to talk to me because she thought I was intimidating. That stuck with me because the thought that I could be seen as intimidating...that's still bizarre to me.
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25. Near the spectrum but not on it.