[imagesource: CEN/ @sarahkeihl/ Magazine Features]

There are a couple of champions out there doing their bit to raise money for COVID-19 relief.

For example, in South Africa, Superiate has been working hard to collect funds to keep children fed during the lockdown.

Then there’s Captain Tom in the UK, a 100-year-old war veteran who asked for sponsorship as he walked the length of his garden every day, and in doing so raised a staggering £32 million to help healthcare workers on the frontlines of the pandemic.

Now, on to influencers – the scourge of social media.

It was only a matter of time before one of them launched some kind of ill-advised campaign to attract followers, disguised as COVID-19 charity.

Over to W24:

Indonesian influencer, Sarah Salsabila, who goes by Sarah Keihl online, reportedly made the offer in a video on Instagram where she said she was willing to auction off her virginity with a starting price of more than 100 000 GBP (about R2,1 million).

Image: sarahkeihl/ Instagram

She said in the video, “A pretty tough decision in my life. Maybe some of you understand this, but I’ve decided I’ll do so to raise funds to help those affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.”

She said the proceeds of the auction would go to “frontliners” and those impacted financially by the pandemic.

However, before the auction started, the influencer faced a backlash from users in Indonesia, a Muslim country, and has now said the auction was not real but just a piece of “satire” aimed at people not taking coronavirus seriously enough.

Explaining the stunt, she says, “I’m sorry for creating the controversy. In truth, the virginity auction was my idea of satire for those who aren’t sensitive to the situation.”

That’s not how satire works.

Sarah and her family have been attacked on social media, and she has now offered to pay for 1 000 packages of grocery aid as a way to apologise for the “satire”.

“I’m really sorry for all the inconvenience caused. I didn’t mean to come up with such a degrading post and I didn’t even mean to sell off my virginity in the first place,” Sarah says.

However, a leaked conversation between Sarah and a friend on Instagram reportedly shows her saying that she had staged the stunt with her manager. It also appears as if an apology had already been planned.

As a publicity stunt, this will be archived alongside the influencers who thought it would be cool to glamourise Chernobyl.

Please stop…

[source:w24]