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A Florida mother was horrified to discover cartoon showing children how to kill themselves. Hess, a pediatrician, said she found the shocking cartoon on Youtube Kids, the family friendly platform where most parents let their kids spend time on.
According to her, the clip which was hidden in the middle of a cartoon, had a man signaling at his hand and giving advice on how to slit the wrists perfectly in order to get results.
"It was a simple, innocent cartoon – until it happened. Four minutes and forty-five seconds into the video, a man quickly walked onto the screen, held his arm out, and said Kids, remember, cut this way for attention, and this way for results, before quickly walking away" she posted on the pedimum blog.
Following the uproar and outrage from the public, YouTube removed the clip.
Another version of the same clip was spotted last year, but reportedly wasn't removed until a parent directly contacted a Google employee.
The controversy comes a year after Google owned YouTube was forced to scrub the Kids App clean of disturbing videos dubbed Elsagate. The videos featured popular cartoon characters taking part in violent and sexual activities. Parents were also concerned about inappropriate adverts running in between the videos.
It normally takes five days for supposedly child-friendly content like cartoons to get from YouTube to YouTube Kids. Within that window it is hoped that disturbing content is flagged.
YouTube apologised, admitting that they needed to do more
'Over the past few months, we've taken a series of steps to tackle many of the emerging challenges around family content on YouTube, including: tightening enforcement of our Community Guidelines, age-gating content that inappropriately targets families, and removing it from the YouTube Kids app,' said a Youtube Spokesperson.
Parents are urged to keep a close eye on the platforms content, by ensuring that the restrictive measures such as disabling search button are enforced. If you notice inappropriate content, you can flag it by clicking the ‘report’ button on the video.
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