‘It ruined my night’: photographers accused of targeting women at St Andrews May Dip

W hen the sun rises at dawn on Friday, hundreds of St Andrews University students will brave the chilly North Sea for the annual May Dip, an undergraduate ritual said to bring good luck in exams. But the students won’t be alone at the beach. In recent years this quirky ritual has become a target for agency and freelance photographers looking to cash in on images of students in bikinis, including some who camp out overnight on the East Sands dunes near the Fife coastal path. “It ruined my night,” said Anna, one of the students whose photo appeared in a spread published by the Scotsman. “Now when I think about that May Dip, I think about that image, and that’s it.” Like many of her classmates, Anna hadn’t thought twice about taking part in the dip at dawn. Hours later, she was in tears after discovering a photo of herself in swimwear published online without her consent. “I clicked on it and my heart sank,” she said. “I’m quite insecure about my appearance. I was thinking: how do I get rid of this? How do I make sure no one else sees this?” She contacted the newspaper immediately to request the image be taken down but it had already gone to print for the following day’s edition. Anna’s photograph appeared alongside dozens of others, mostly of young women, published across national newspapers including the Daily Mail, the Scotsman and the Sun. …