“Devious Licks Challenge”
Dangerous TikTok trend: Students intentionally set fire to toilets
A burnt-out school toilet at a facility in Frankfurt
© Rafael Bujotzek / Meanwhile / Picture Alliance
There are currently more and more cases of arson in school toilets across Germany. Authorities are checking whether a TikTok challenge is related to this.
Motif TikTok Challenge? Cases of vandalism and arson are currently piling up all over Germany, in which students are said to have intentionally set toilet paper or towels on fire in school toilets. In several cases, this caused such a large fire that the fire brigade had to put it out. In some cases, the arsonists put themselves and other students in great danger. The motivation could be the TikTok trend “Devious Licks”: Children or young people film themselves in the case of property damage or arson in school toilets to brag about the videos on the social network.
There was high property damage
A nine-year-old boy is said to have set fire to an elementary school in Hanau. The result: damage to property amounting to 30,000 euros. A fire in a Frankfurt school caused property damage of 25,000 euros. In another case in Dreieich, two people were injured, a police spokesman said. After the fire, the caretaker and the deputy headmaster suspected smoke poisoning. In this case, the property damage amounts to 50,000 euros. In one such incident in Würzburg, seven students were injured, one girl so badly that she had to be treated in hospital.
Is TikTok Challenge related to this?
It is now being checked whether the TikTok challenge “Devious Licks” is related to the fires. The trend was started by a TikTok user who stole a school sanitizer dispenser. In fact, he filmed himself and published the video, which has since been viewed millions of times. Videos followed of copycats also filming themselves destroying school property. In the meantime, the trend has gone so far that students even set fires. Numerous videos are circulating under the hashtags #toilet paper or #toilet paper roll. Some schools are now posting supervisors in the toilets or rationing toilet paper to avoid such incidents, as Stern reported in a previous article.
Swell: FNP, inFranconia