Imagine walking in a park as a man wearing Meta Ray-Ban glasses approaches you. He asks you your name, whether you’re single and tells you he finds you attractive. You reject him, but he keeps insisting and begins to insult you.
Weeks later, you stumble upon a TikTok video exposing that moment and your face to millions online. To make it worse, you open the comments section and see people tearing you apart over your reaction.
That’s a reality many people, particularly women, have been facing since Meta glasses became popular.
What were these glasses actually designed for?
Mark Zuckerberg has promoted Meta glasses—an eyewear powered by artificial intelligence that allows people to make phone calls, listen to music and record moments hands-free—as a multifaceted tool that will transform everyday life.
He’s not wrong. The innovation is a transformational shift. But in the wrong hands, it’s a clear threat to privacy.
The technology may be new, but the behavior certainly isn’t. Meta glasses have become the latest chapter in a culture built on humiliation and low quality content.
Long before the glasses existed, streamers like Clavicular and N3on built audiences by degrading women in different ways.
Is harassment and ridiculing others a trend now?
The most troubling consequence is the conditioning it creates.
Recently, I was in Brickell City Centre. Out of nowhere, a man walked so close to my face that I barely had time to react. Thankfully, my friend pulled my arm and helped me find my way out of that uncomfortable situation.
Before I could process the fact that a stranger had invaded my personal space and privacy, my first fear was that my friends and I could end up online without ever agreeing to be recorded.
Whenever I tell people what happened, they look at me as though it should have been obvious. “Well, it’s Brickell” they imply. “It’s become Miami’s playground for content creators, and if you don’t want to be filmed, maybe you just shouldn’t go.”
As a woman, I know the problem isn’t the glasses themselves. It’s the incentive of the people who use them.
Harassing women was already a serious problem and now companies are turning a blind eye in the name of profit.
The commercial success of this content exists because platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, Kick and TikTok continue to reward engagement, even when the content raises serious ethical concerns.
When reported by the public, Meta has banned accounts dedicated to non-consensual recording. However, meaningful repercussions haven’t been dealt, which sends the message that the behavior is acceptable.
Could this wave of harassment be enough for Zuckerberg to take Meta Glasses off the market? Can we really control people who actively decide to turn harassment into a profitable business? Could blaming the users who share and react to this content make it stop? Probably not.
If we’ve reached the point where the solution is to avoid public spaces instead of questioning the people recording strangers without their consent, then we’ve lost sight of what the real problem is.
