“Devious Licks” Trend Wreaks Havoc on Green Hope Bathrooms

The latest Tik Tok trend named “Devious Licks”, where students vandalize bathrooms and steal school items, has reached Green Hope, and its impacts have already been felt. Whether it's broken toilets or spray-painted walls, these “licks” have left the Green Hope community, staff, and students alike, distraught.

While Tik Tok has been known for its dancing or singing, the newest addition to Tik Tok’s long list of trends is vandalism. The trend began in September and took the internet by storm as middle school, high school, and college students would steal something from their school and post it on social media. It has since derailed into vandalism. The trend has since donned its name as a reference to the slang term, “hitting a lick”, which essentially means to steal. With students stealing school supplies, soap dispensers, and even entire toilets, this trend has even gathered national attention.

However, Green Hope hasn't been spared from this primitive trend. While Green Hope boys bathrooms have always been in somewhat of disarray, recent events have taken it up a notch, leaving Green Hope faculty and staff searching for a reason why. One person in the forefront of this issue is Green Hope principal Dr. Hedrick.

“There’s no understanding of this, nobody understands this, nobody accepts this, we're not in a “kids will be kids” frame of mind here” stated Hedrick in an interview with The Green Hope Falcon. The 2017 Carolina PTA Principal of the Year has been in education for twenty-plus years and taught in over ten counties. Dr. Hedrick is no one new to school antics but nonetheless this trend is new to everyone.

With the sudden and strong rise of social media, Dr. Hedrick believes that while Tik Tok is to blame for this new trend to an extent, she attributes multiple factors to the rash of bathroom vandalism, stating, “Clarity in that world (social media) is very difficult to find.” With Tik Tok recently reaching one billion users, that world is anything but small and growing daily.

While there isn't much Green Hope can do to put an end to this trend, Dr. Hedrick believes that a shift in mindset within those that participate in this trend may be the solution. Regarding these solutions, Dr. Hedrick had this to say,“If you don't have focus, if you don't have passion, and if you don't have something that makes you feel good about yourself then that challenge (vandalizing bathrooms) might be interesting to you. That challenge might make you feel good about yourself for a minute.” Dr. Hedrick elaborated, stating, “and I think that is sad”.

While a majority of the population at Green Hope is against the bathroom vandalism, parents and students included, there is still a small minority of people that, in Dr. Hedrick’s terms, “lack focus”. One of which being the GreenHopeBathrooms page on Instagram that posts the various trashed bathrooms with captions like “closing bathrooms 👏”. The Falcon reached out to GreenHopeBathrooms but they declined to comment on the issue.

Thankfully, the next Tik Tok trend moves in the opposite direction and is called “Holy Yields”. This trend is a contrast from the “Devious Licks” trend and involves students decorating, cleaning, or leaving money in school bathrooms. Still, the reason for the bathroom obsession, and whether this new breed of Tik Tok trends is a sign of things to come is unclear, but what is for sure is that it is a step up from Tik Tok’s last trend. Regardless of what is to come, we can only hope that these acts of vandalism come to a swift end and that those who participate in these acts find a greater sense of clarity.