For my university project, I had to pick a study and design an academic poster about the topic. This is basically a colourful illustration of the findings of the experiment with charts, illustrations, and huge headers. You know, teachers forcing us to do something "fun" and creative between a 1,500 word lab report and a 4,000 word essay.

The poster was about altruism in animals in lab conditions using encaged rats. They wanted to see if one rat would satisfy its survival instinct which is the beneficial option and would go for the piece of chocolate, the reward; or would free its encaged mate and would share the food and would promote the survival of the species instead of serving a self-sustaining goal, which is the less cost-efficient option. Well, ladies and gentlemen, turns out, rats are better than us.

I'm probably not the only one who in her adult life had slowly discovered that the biggest trash slowly engulfing the Earth is in fact, human beings. Empathy is all but dead and we keep breeding little psychopaths expecting them to care about the previous generation who also did not give one fuck about them. This led me to the realization that it is more likely that I would jump in front of the car at rush hour for a kitten stuck in the middle of a motorway than I would for a human of any kind.

I have put my inherent and undying trust into non-human animals because, let's be honest, even if animals could screw us over, they wouldn't. A cat or a dog does not mean to hurt you to hurt your feelings, reduce your salary, or crush your future prospects.

To refer to the experiment, animals treat animals better than humans treat each other. Ironically, we want to base our behaviour on models they have employed forever and that we slowly but steadily forget about. I'm talking about the majority of humanity.

The thing is, humans aren't just cruel towards each other, we destroy everything we can and then dance on the remnants of a once peaceful, well-constructed world.

It started with slavery, being owned, like an unfeeling thing, like someone's dirty tissue they won't throw away cause it's not spilling over with snot yet and owning it might serve them well the next time the land needs harvesting.

Slavery is abolished; it is illegal. However, there are many forms of legal slavery—you know unpaid jobs? Apprenticeships? Work experience?

The modeling and creative industries are ripe with that sort of thing. If you don't possess the power or the fame they will walk all over you.

It has made news when Balenciaga and Marc Jacobs we're both accused of keeping models in dark rooms during castings, for 14 -15 hours. If you wanted to get in, you waited.

You must've seen that brilliant series of image about what people in the creative industry face. They'd rather not pay for your time and the effort it took to learn your skills. They'd rather you did a favour for them or showed Carol from accounting who went and did a Business Degree how to work the Adobe Suite, then you shut your mouth and went away without screaming for any money. You know that thing people live off of.

I have recently accepted an internship at a startup that sells beanies. I am the social media intern(unpaid) therefore my job is to post all the pictures and spread them on social plaforms. As, you know, a creative within the company.

I am all for crediting people for their work when you use their creations or likeness as a tool for advertising. Unless, of course, you can't track down the source.

We have incorporated the models' name into posts before and have tagged the photographer as well. However, I found that just because my manager had no time or inclination to look the name of the model in question up, she will remain anonymous and uncredited. Even though she is representing the brand by giving her face to it, she is vicariously selling the product by making it attractive to other people.

I don't know whether she got paid for the shoot or whether it was just a fun favour she did for others, but she dedicated her time to making these couple of snapshots and I believe she deserves to have an identity. Not to mention the potential marketing opportunity of tagging models who have a following. Chances are, since she was up for representing beanie hats, it is not unheard of in her community to wear them? Buy a couple? Just talk about how she participated in a fun shoot with this brand?

As someone who dabbled in the world of modeling for a brief time I know that if I saw my image somewhere uncredited I would be upset. Moreover if one gave permission to use their likeness one should do the common courtesy to one, ask if they want their name to be featured; two, obviously feature her name if not their social media accounts. Especially if they cannot pay the model in actual money.

It's hard for me to not feel the secondhand embarrassment that I contribute to the progression of a company that communicated that the brand is important the person isn't. To be honest, it is a behaviour that promotes what is currently going on in the fashion world.

My friend Annika, a model working for Next Models, who is also a friend of mine, told me with a heavy sigh that there's a lot of unpaid work in the industry. She never mentioned uncredited work. Where people work for a whole day and get nothing after it.

My first job was a shoe commercial and although travel costs were paid and exposure was promised the dude did fuck all at the end. The video was done but none of us were credited. Obviously the guys making the video, who were amazing btw, totally got paid. Us, the products? Nope.

After half a year passed, I downloaded the video and posted it on my account. If they want it, they can take it. I got my payment this way. However, exposure won't pay anyone's rent.

You know, the day before my manager actually talked about how it's a family brand and we're going to connect to local artists. The question instantly arose; are we only doing that if they're relatively well known? If he considers them artists? Or integral enough content that they would be credited?

He had asked me to make artwork for the boxes of the hats. Was he not going to credit me either? Personal identity doesn't matter if the work has been done to promote the brand itself, right?

Wrong. This is the mentality the model industry adopts to. As long as you're not famous enough, you're replaceable. Moreover, they can just walk all over you because if you want to get the next job, you will shut your mouth and let the adults exploit you. This is the mentality that brought on #Metoo.

Your name that you are proud of by the day you were born because it's yours only, is stripped away and you're left with a pretty face that did a favour for someone that has in no way, shape, or form returned it.

I hate the notion of free work. My skills cost me. Let it be time or actual money, they're mine and I expect to be paid for it. My ideas are mine, they're a byproduct of my learning, my experiences, my creativity. My name is mine and it belongs to my face, and if you want it on your anything—YOU. PAY.FOR.IT.

At least it's common courtesy to credit the photographer, the model, and anyone else involved in a production or a collaboration.

My manager claimed that she might not want her name to be featured. Well, it doesn't take a lot to ask. If he knew he wanted to features names, he could've asked prior to drafting the message for Instagram. He could've asked when he hired her. I thought we were over the dark ages when it didn't matter whose work was whose.

Since the photoshoot that involved her took place around a year ago, he didn't even remember her name. Needless to say that did not help my indignation. Neither did the way he brought up the conflict later on in a meeting, using me as an example, as the dark horse, potentially playing on the fact that I would not go against his word in a more public context. Not to mention that he basically painted me to be a the whiny bitch. He deemed the whole confrontation resolved in the middle of the meeting even though there was no previous communication between us that would imply anything of the sort. He expected that I understand because he had set a certain amount of time for the meeting and his presentation so I shouldn't make this harder or stall him.

I don't understand. I bet he would be pretty pissed if his work was not credited either. Or someone else used it without saying a word to them. As long as it is done to someone else, it is all 'we don't have time for this'.

The absolute pillaging that can go on in a workplace is abhorrent. Maybe I'm blowing this up. But plagiarism is a thing and some people will not let things slide. Especially if their likeness is credited with a fake name.

Since this is a start-up, the people in it will define and shape its outlook. A brand especially needs to have an awareness about what it communicates to employees not only to the public. If one communicates that in order to reach the target we can just disregard others on the way there to save time. That no matter how good your ideas are your voice when raised, does not matter.

There are far too many places like that. I do not want to be associated with people who think like that. And I will not. I will make steps to remedy this either from within or ultimately from outside.

I feel like if more people in the modeling or other creative industries spoke out about how hard work is devalued, how people's work becomes an amalgam of contributions for a cause, maybe it would be a different world; maybe this could turn into an uncorrupted #MeToo. Nevertheless, it is concerning that, as it seems not one step on the ladder of fame can be taken without walking all over others or their image, bodies or work are becoming commodities.