David Bridges
As presenter in the film, she interviews Molly’s father Ian, noting how, like Molly, she too has seen graphic self-harm and suicide images, directed to her by social media firms’ algorithms.
“I think Molly’s story is awful, an awful story but it’s a familiar one. It would have been really easy for Molly’s story to be one of my friends. It could have in some universe been one of my own,” said Claudia.
Aged 13, Claudia said she’d call her best friends “to make sure they were still there”. She was so concerned about one she would search through her room to check she was not harming herself. “I would see suicide notes on my friend’s phone when she was 13. You think something has to be done, something has to stop.”
She praised Mr Russell for “shining a light” on the problem, which culminated in the inquest on his daughter’s death. In one of the most poignant moments, she tells him, face to face: “What I want to say is thank you to you. She has helped me through you speaking out about it, she has.”
In the film, she undergoes an experiment, where she is shown “happy” then “self-harm/suicide” images while wired up to a machine logging her emotional response. The heartstopping spike in the graph coincides with her seeing “#selfharm” hashtags as if “prepping” herself for the shock of what she is about to see.
Clara Hastings
Cameron Steel
