Anonymous Instagram accounts expose students and staff at Bradley

by Delaney Warner

Student Life Editor

Popular TikTok trends seem to repeatedly find themselves in the halls of Hilliard Bradley High School. From devious licks to making dancing videos on the A hallway stairs, Bradley can’t seem to get away from the online social media platform. However, the latest TikTok trend taking Bradley by storm isn’t one necessarily taking place inside of the school, rather on another social media giant, Instagram.

A TikTok showcasing a bad parking account is what started it all. The name represents exactly what it is, an account that devoted itself to showcasing the horrendous parking of students and staff in their very own school parking lot. This gained a lot of popularity and many schools across the nation began to follow suit, creating their own bad parking accounts. In fact, Bradley has its own bad parking account (@bradleybadparking) that has amassed over 750 followers.

Soon other variants of the bad parking accounts began to surface on TikTok. Users saw various school accounts that were used to point out people slouching, sleeping, wearing masks incorrectly, and even a few peculiar accounts that posted people’s shoes as they used the restroom. Bradley was yet again inspired by these accounts and similar ones were soon up and running on instagram. Possibly the most entertaining part of these accounts is the fact that they are all anonymous. In order to attempt to learn more, the Jaguar Times DMed the accounts.

The first account to answer was @maskupbradley. This account posts pictures that are submitted by peers of various people wearing their masks incorrectly. This account not only targets students, but some Bradley staff members have even made the page. When asked why they started the account, they said, “it was just a joke between me and my friends and then i figured it would be pretty funny so i just made an account.” They plan on remaining anonymous because they find it fun and had no idea that 343 people would follow their account. The account added that they “hope we don’t have to wear masks for the rest of high school,” but will “keep it going for as long as i can i guess.”

Next @bradleyslouchers answered with very similar answers to the previous account. They also began running the account as a joke and found the growth of their account “crazy especially with the amount of people who send stuff in.” They plan to remain anonymous, but expect for the account to slowly fade away as whatever the next trend is consumes the student body. Perhaps posting unsuspecting students slouching isn’t an account that can stand the test of time.

We managed to get a response from the original Bradley account, @bradleybadparking. They said that if asked if they run the account they will usually just come clean, however they don’t plan on doing a reveal on the account. They began running the account because they thought it would be a great way to get people to laugh this school year and their large mass of followers seem to agree. The account revealed that they are a senior and are currently unsure if they plan to end the account upon graduation or want to pass it on to someone else.

Although we failed to get responses from @bradleybadposture and @bradley_sleepy_heads, a seemingly new account was willing to answer our questions. The account is called @bradley.musical.ly and appears to find Bradley students’ TikTok accounts and scroll all the way down to the bottom where their oldest videos, and remnants of Musical.ly, the platform that was converted into TikTok, exist. They said they find it “pretty funny to have these old videos we all made in middle school resurface. I mean everyone always said anything you put on the internet is there forever, and we didn’t really listen.” The account said that they actually used to be a different anonymous account and may end up repurposing the account again in the future. They also stated that they used to “run one of those middle school gossip accounts in eighth grade” and were somewhat of a veteran of running these accounts.

Olivia Slominki’s (11) parking job was featured on @bradleybadparkers. Photo by Nina Viggiano (12).

These accounts have been deemed funny by the student body. However they pose a potential violation to the school’s photography and video rules that state not to photograph others without consent. Kaia Lewis (12), who has found herself featured on @bradleybadparking, thinks that “as long as consent is given, I think they’re harmless fun and not really serious only when they’re intended to hurt or make fun of others negatively are they bad.” Malaina Powell (12) adds, “i don’t think these accounts violate any school rules and if someone was actually offended by a post i’m sure the person running the account would be fine taking it down.” Olivia Slominski (11) says, “I have been featured on the bad parking for no reason I’m a great parker.” Although Slominski believes she was unrightly featured, she thinks the accounts are “funny and should continue.”

Only time will tell if these accounts will continue to be active through the end of the school year. Perhaps some will be around the following year too. Rather they stand the test of time or not, one thing can be concluded from all of these anonymous accounts.

They’re pretty funny.