One of the best things about Snapchat, and an area in which is stands out from other social media platforms, is the filters that users can add to their snaps. Whether they are user generated filters, geo filters, sponsored or ones created by the Snapchat team, filters allow us to add some zing and tell people how we’re feeling.
During the recent Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Snapchat created a number of filters available to all, but altered appropriately by location, that allowed users to cheer on their team and celebrate their success. In those two weeks of sporting glory and general excitement, my feed was full of snaps of people swimming, running, rowing and holding themselves on gymnastics rings. People added filters, highlighting where their team was in the medal table (go TeamGB!). It was all incredibly positive and a fantastic way to create content.
So it’s with huge disappointment that I find that Snapchat hasn’t put the same amount of effort into celebrating the Paralympics currently taking place in the same city just a few weeks later.
I’m not going to patronize anyone with a disability by talking about ‘superhumans’ and ‘overcoming the odds’, but this is one of (if not the) biggest sporting event in the world for disabled athletes. In fact, since London 2012, the profile of disability sport has skyrocketed. Watching the games from a distance here in the UK, it strikes me that the Brazilian population is getting behind the Paralympics in a way that they did not the Olympic Games - ticket price being a big factor of course.
For me, this is an equality issue. The participants of the games are athletes, pure and simple. It’s a big worldwide event; it’s a shame that Snapchat hasn’t taken the opportunity to help push the agenda forward by affording the Games the same buzz on its platform as the previous event just a few weeks before. It would hardly involve much effort: the existing filters made no specific reference to any of the prohibited Olympic references and the medal table feed must surely be from the same source.
I love Snapchat and am usually quick to defend it. They haven’t done anything wrong per se, but the Snapchat team need to get out of their bubble and take the opportunity to promote inclusion in an increasingly fractious world.