When will myspace and liars be accountable?

[MissJacksonCA]

Okay okay... I read People magazine... and sometimes I cry when I read about a 15 year old girl hanging herself and what could be more horrible than that right? Well it could be because apparently a neighborhood mother created a fake myspace account and pretended to be a similarly aged handsome boy interested in the girl in an attempt to screw with the poor child who was already suicidal and why? Because allegedly her daughter and this young girl had a falling out of some kind.

What's worse... is when apparently numerous people knew of the con the mother was perpetrating against this young girl and did nothing, until after the girl tried to kill herself and even then, just gave her parents an anonymous tip.

Should social networking sites like myspace and friendster that seem to be a playground for predators be held more accountable for its users deceitful acts? Similarly... if you prompt a suicide or taunt an attack shouldn't you be held accountable? It is tantamount to an assault. Isn't it?

[Danny]

and thats why i dont like sites like myspace. right there summe dup in that post.

[bassman]

No, the sites shouldn't be held accountable. That's what's wrong with most people today. They refuse to blame themselves so they blame games, movies, music, internet, etc.

Blame the friggin parents for not making the girl stronger/smarter than that. Why in the hell would you get so upset on a website that you would kill yourself? Oh yeah...stupidity.

Myspace get's a bad wrap because of sh*t like this. There are things I don't like about myspace, but it's been a great medium for me to keep up with old friends and family.

[_liam_]

no, the only things that should be strictly governed under such a rationale should be guns, weapons components and dangerous animals

anything else it's the person's fault, as such things require a fair amount of slyness to manipulate into a tool of malice

[3pidemiC]

I do not believe that website should be accountable. They have no way of controlling of even moderating the people that are on there. How could they?

And if Myspace should be held accountable...then shouldn't AOL? Yahoo? MSN? For supplying the messenging services that pedofiles use to contact minors?

It's just out of their control. A majority of the people that use these services are good, but there will always be bad apples.

Sorry for the typos (if there are any), I just woke up. ;)

[Mutineer]

I agree with Bassman

[AcesandEights]

Blame the friggin parents for not making the girl stronger/smarter than that. Why in the hell would you get so upset on a website that you would kill yourself? Oh yeah...stupidity.

Hard words, but I definitely agree.

[Mike70]

no way. people are 100% accountable for their own actions.

committing suicide because you have a horrible terminal disease-totally ok in my book.

suicide over a webpage?? that is just plain lame.



Blame the friggin parents for not making the girl stronger/smarter than that. Why in the hell would you get so upset on a website that you would kill yourself? Oh yeah...stupidity.

bravo, dude, bravo.

[MissJacksonCA]

I'm not saying people shouldn't take responsibility. Unfortunately the woman who taunted this young girl and pushed her over the edge is accepting no responsibility but by lying to the child she broke no laws.

But I think web sites that try to 'protect' certain users by only allowing those within the same age range should have some security measure by which they make sure people aren't out there making up fake names and using fake pictures so they can deceive children. By deceiving them I think that's a predatory act whether they're a pedophile or just trying to get a kid to kill herself.

Of course she should have had a thicker skin. But if this woman can get away with making her kill herself or prompting it in some way then damn... its like dang... I'm sure I could do that for tons of people and its basically like murder but since you didn't actually kill them with your own hands then it doesn't count no worries.

When you know a suicidal person and knowingly deceive them in some sick and low attempt to toy with their emotions you not only know what you are doing but you're planning what's going to happen. If that's not murder what is?

[Skippy911sc]

No, the sites shouldn't be held accountable. That's what's wrong with most people today. They refuse to blame themselves so they blame games, movies, music, internet, etc.

Blame the friggin parents for not making the girl stronger/smarter than that. Why in the hell would you get so upset on a website that you would kill yourself? Oh yeah...stupidity.

Myspace get's a bad wrap because of sh*t like this. There are things I don't like about myspace, but it's been a great medium for me to keep up with old friends and family.

The victim should not be blamed...she was a child and the perpetrator of the lie was an adult...blame the adult. I do not think that myspace should be held responsible but the adult that tricked her and pushed her should hold some responsibility...but so should the parents of the girl for not keeping their eye on her while on the net. It was a child versus an adult... don't you folks remember what it was like to be a child and how things around you had a huge effect on you.

[bassman]

The victim should not be blamed...she was a child and the perpetrator of the lie was an adult...blame the adult. I do not think that myspace should be held responsible but the adult that tricked her and pushed her should hold some responsibility...but so should the parents of the girl for not keeping their eye on her while on the net. It was a child versus an adult... don't you folks remember what it was like to be a child and how things around you had a huge effect on you.

I remember what it was like to be 15 and I definitely had much more common sense than this girl.

I wasn't 100% blaming the girl, anyway. I'm blaming her parents for not teaching her and raising her stronger than that. I don't think the parents should have been watching over her as she used the internet because at 15, the girl should have a spine and be able to protect herself to some extent.

The adult that lied to the girl is wrong, but how many people lie on the internet? That's basically what the internet is used for these days. A way to communicate and at the same time remain anonymous. The girl should know to take everything on the internet with a grain of salt. Why didn't she know this? Ding ding ding....her parents!

[Yojimbo]

Some 15 year old children are too fragile for this new world of myspace.

That said, what kind of adult screws with a 15 year old child out of some warped sense of retribution? This is who is to blame.

Certainly it is not MySpace's fault that this happened. I wouldn't blame the victim or her parents.


There was a case where a man hit his friend over the head as a joke, an innocent rap on the head that would not have injured a normal person, but his friend had a rare disorder that caused his skull to be very fragile. As a result of the hit, the victim died. Court ruled that you take the victim as they are. It did not matter that a reasonable, normal person would not have died from this seemingly innocuous blow, the fact remained that this particular victim did have a disorder, however rare, which resulted in the blow being fatal. So you take the victim as they are, and in the MySpace case, this particular 15 year old child was very fragile and committed suicide. The adult who made the posts is legally responsible.

[AcesandEights]

The adult who made the posts is legally responsible.

That's not what a preponderance of the US legal community is saying, and I definitely agree with them.

[DeadJonas190]

The website was just the means for the adult to torture that poor kid. The adult should be held responsible and quite honestly, I hope she burns in hell, but not after living a long and horrible life for what damage she has caused to that child and her family. I say we stone that woman, but not before slicing her all over with razor blades, rolling her on a slip and slide full of lemon juice, covering her with honey and dumping fire ants on her.

[MissJacksonCA]

Uhm remind me not to do anything to receive the torture DJonas just illustrated... that would be too much for me to bear.

I think web sites specifically created for social networking whether it caters to minors or adults need to be governed in some way in an effort to force them to verify the identity of the party that is seeking to join the community to socialize. Not only would this help law enforcement crack down on the predators that create fake online personas but similarly it would help the police locate persons of interest should someone go missing after scheduling a meet n greet with some unknown stranger.

This girls parents should have been monitoring her myspace yes especially since she was depressed and being treated for that depression but the majority of the blame should be on the woman who seemed to enjoy toying with this kid.

[DubiousComforts]

That's not what a preponderance of the US legal community is saying, and I definitely agree with them.
Here are links to the actual story:
St. Charles Journal (http://stcharlesjournal.stltoday.com/articles/2007/11/10/news/sj2tn20071110-1111stc_pokin_1.ii1.txt)
ABC News (http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=3929774&page=1)

Without knowing the particulars of this case, this issue seems to fall from the slippery slope of free speech into possible criminal negligence, and the law is always on the side of the child. And even if the district attorney doesn't pursue criminal charges, now that the story has broke it's just a matter of time before the inevitable wrongful death suit in civil court, which doesn't require nearly as much evidence for a guilty verdict. Just ask O.J.

With no less than ABC News naming the perpetrator and noting that an employee of the perp's business was also involved, no one should be shocked if she soons learn the meaning of "social justice." Wouldn't that be ironic?

[AcesandEights]

With no less than ABC News naming the perpetrator and noting that an employee of the perp's business was also involved, no one should be shocked if she soons learn the meaning of "social justice." Wouldn't that be ironic?

Well, that'd be cool in my book.

[Mike70]

a little private justice might be just the attitude adjustment this fool needs. where is the cast from silver bullet?

[Yojimbo]

That's not what a preponderance of the US legal community is saying, and I definitely agree with them.

Perhaps from a "free speech" point of view the adult can say and write whatever he or she wanted to. Certainly, the adult's actions clearly were meant to harrass a child at the very least, and that certainly should not be legal.

Even if this adult did not intend to cause the child's death, what this adult did was most certainly negligent, perhaps criminally so, given that she clearly intended to cause a minor distress by harrassment.

I recall the "free speech" argument as being explained that you do not have the right to shout "fire" in a crowded movie theater. On an elemetary level, I recall being taught that a person's right to swing their fist ends where someone's face beings.

Certainly from a moral and ethical standpoint, the adult is guilty. If the minor was my relative, it seems to me that I should be able to bring a case in civil court against the adult. In this regard, I am interested to know on what basis the preponderance of the legal community feels that the adult should be held harmless, since I am not an attorney and do not understand how this adult could get away with harrassing anyone, let alone a minor.

[Mike70]

i think the free speech arguement would fail in this case. this adult clearly engaged in this behavior with the intent to harrass another person. harrassment, like shouting fire! in a theater, is absolutely not protected speech.

plus she made the comments under false pretences on a website. the website could've chosen (and probably might have so if the true circumstances were know the it) to have removed her posts or banned her. remember free speech rights only protect you from actions of the govt.


please note yojimbo, that i am not saying that you have made this arguement. you had a free speech element in your post and this is my 2.7 cents reply.

[CornishCorpse]

Gah this is terrible, the woman has no files charged against her at all? The parents must do something even if it involves a little assault, someone did damage to their daughter causing her to commit suicide and thats all fine and dandy?

As everyone has said the girl should have had thicker skin but still what the hell? Some people are weaker than others that doesnt mean that its fine if they get stamped on. Everyone here is mentally weaker than someone else in this world, does that mean its okay if someone stamps on all of you? Not intending to start an argument jus peeves me off. The girl was weak but thats no excuse.

Never had or going to have a myspazz account. People always give the excuse of "its for social networking!" you know whats good for social networking? Life. Living youre life outside is good for meeting people. Bah.

[DVW5150]

Too many put so much stock in web life.
Knowing the difference between being online and being alive are
blurring.
There must be something else that would drive a child to suicide.:shifty:
People are either nasty as hell, indifferent, or (less than often) friendly via the 'net.
This is a brand new age of technocracy.The ramifications of your actions of the internet are never(usually) punished.
So many people use this vast system to hate, thats truly pathetic.:mad:
On the whole though, how would Myspace verify a user was under 16?
Age specific sites are probably full of 54 year old trolling.
Oh and if I could get my crosshairs on a total shi*head that threatened me,
I wouldnt pull the trigger...NOT!:elol:Just joking.

[MinionZombie]

I read about this on Kevin Smith's blog, the girl had something like ADD and a history of depression. There was a whole huge long article about it.

I think the sick-f*ck parents who made up the MySpace character should be held accountable, they're clearly not fit parents if they think messing with a fragile-minded teenage girl is fine behaviour, especially for a parent.

I think sometimes when you grow up, you forget how fragile-minded you can be as a teenager and how tough teenage years can be, and when in that period of transition you also don't realise as much as you should (if at all) that life continues beyond the teenage years and usually gets a whole lot better. High school isn't everything, the popular kids' lives usually end at graduation...meanwhile the bullied and chastised and less popular folk go on to lead normal or even great lives.

The freaks behind the fake MySpace account should be held accountable, it's not MySpace's fault - how were they to know it was fake? By the time the bad sh*t really kicked off it only lasted for a short period of time before the poor girl hung herself, and even then it wasn't even reported to MySpace prior - or was it? I skimmed the article that Smith linked to.

As for the dead girl's parents 'should have been monitoring' - they were.

[clanglee]

Blame the friggin parents for not making the girl stronger/smarter than that. Why in the hell would you get so upset on a website that you would kill yourself? Oh yeah...stupidity.

.
:lol: If we aren't talking about movies, you and I think alike.

Granted, most kids deal with a lot of emotional crap in their teenaged years, but most are able to deal with it. From a purely draconian point of view, I can say that I have very little sympathy for people that commit suicide. Especially if said suicide was caused by internet abuse. Cripes!!

Now that that is out of the way, I do admit that the Adult that caused that distress should be charged. What she did was malicious and it was towards a minor.

[Ivarr]

The problem is that too many people read something on the net and suddenly treat it as if its real and or true.

That started happening around the same time the majority of people started hitting the net.

Any jerk can post any blerb they feel like ... or represent themselves as whoever they feel like ... and some yutz will always believe them.

No matter if its the 50 year old hairy fat plumber who is going by "Amber" in the teen chat room or the self serving blogger who is being creative with facts for grins...

Nothing you see on the net should ever be treated as fact without coroberating (sp?) data....

That fact has long ago been glossed over by the media and users of the internet in general.

We used to be able to hold the legitamate "news" sources accountable to do the fact checking for us ... But now... too often the "data" gets confused with actual information.

It used to be joked about and called the "poor signal to noise ratio" of things posted on the internet...

It has not gotten better ... its worse. we all just have started to not be able to see the noise as different from the signal....

hurd mentality

[SymphonicX]

No way should the sites be held accountable,....the idea of Facebook or whatever isn't to harass so if people abuse that, they're the ones responsible for their actions.

And yes, those who harass anyone, online or not, should be held accountable.

[kortick]

She will get away with it unfortunately
Unless she typed in sexually explicit
material to a minor thats the only thing
that can get the adult in trouble
sadly that is all

myspace is ok
i have a page but unlike others I am not looking for
hundreds of "friends". I reject 95% of all requests.
I have friends in real life and I have no
problem meeting real people.

Plus I dont need people who want to be my friend
that want me to go to their web site
to see naked pics of them.