15 year old girl kills herself after persistent bullying

[Odbarc]

I like hearing and reading about people who've killed themselves for having a better life than I had.
A gruesome and inconsiderate opinion, yes - but if I can survive the way I was treated, it's very weak willed people who are killing themselves.

And it's probably LESS people doing bad things but we HEAR about it more often because of the internet.

 

[Judgment90]

As a victim of bullying myself, I am both saddened and appalled at these recent years.

No one seems to answer the plights of these people.

 

[Blade_125]

If you did hypothetically do this, then I would have partly brought it on myself for leaving so much personally identifiable information on this forum and other sites, and talking to random strangers on the internet. My family would also be at fault if they didn't recognise that something was seriously wrong with my mood & try and talk to me about it. You would also deserve a portion of the blame, because you made a deliberate effort to highlight this information for someone who has mental health issues.

And I know I'm being that guy, I'm trying to be Devil's Advocate to stop this thread turning into the self-righteous wankfest that it is almost inevitably going to degrade into. The situation isn't black and white and almost certainly involves more than just bullying.

I am sure the story is not black and white as I don't know they whole thing that has happened, however in a straitforward view of this girl doing nothing offensive to promote this level of aggression (say she released personal info of others or something equally bad)then there is no excuse for this bullying. That is black and white.

I am quite sure that if a woman didn't walk by herself at night then she wouldn't be raped on the street. I am sure if no one person period walked outside at all at night they wouldn't be mugged. If we didn't drive we wouldn't be in car accidents. If we didn't go into the shower we wouldn't slip on a bar of soap and kill ourselves.

The reason your argument is so very, very wrong is because you equate her actions as a cause that validated the result. If I rob a liqour store then when I go to jail it is right to say I brought this on myself, because I did. A cause with a known outcome. If I break a law then I will face consequences.

Now I am sure your argument right now is "she should have known this would happen if she posted videos of herself toppless online". For starters we will ignore that she was 12 years old and really didn't know better. This is still the same argument some people bring to rape victims. You know if you dress provocitively then some guy will attack you on the way home, so why do it? Does that mean that the rapest doesn't carry 100% of the blame?

There are so many idiots on the internet, but that is their right. What is not a right is to harrass and abuse someone constantly. I can't stand outside your house and shout obsenities all day. I can't threaten you, or intimidate you.

So there is the difference here. She did something that while stupid, was perfectly in her rights to do so. The same can not be said for her bullies. Your devils advocate position is jsut plain foolish for trying to defend the actions of these people based on one silly action from a young girl. Your attitude only enables this sort of behaviour.

I will agree that her parents should have noticed and done something, but that is easier said than done. That is why more education needs to be put forward to try and teach children, and adults as well, that this sort of behaviour should not be tolerated at all. Hopefully then we can get rid of this blaming the victim mentality that seems to exist in society.

 

[Slayer_2]

Right now this is going viral in my city, Victoria. The biggest shame about the whole thing is how the catalyst was her flashing some guy online. Such a small, harmless action ended in tragedy. This is a real life example of what can happen if you aren't careful online, and hopefully her story serves to prevent others from doing similar things, since it's unlikely bullying is going away anytime soon.

Also, while I have never been bullied, and therefore lack any personal experience with it, you think if her problem was mostly on Facebook, she could just disable her account and/or stop signing in till it blew over. And if school is bad, do homeschooling for a few years till it blows over. Such a shame.

 

[Aaron Sylvester]

Eaten by Darwin, plain and simple.

Flashing on webcam? Getting into drugs/alcohol? Everyone goes through some form of bullying or the other. It doesn't sound like she was being abused by her family. It doesn't sound like she was in poverty, or a double-amputee with a bleak shot at life.

Therefore I have no sympathies for her. I DO have sympathies for her family however, for experiencing the loss of a daughter.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

After having watched the video, it seems her parents were divorced since she want to live at her "mom's" which is a pretty good sign that she and her dad didn't live together.


If your child is having such trouble and you still can't manage to be there and help her when she's in such a big predicament, that's a much grander "story" than all this bullying crap.



and oh my goodness captcha: "talk to strangers"....no...bad captcha...don't talk to or flash strangers...pay attention! >_<

 

[Calvar Draveir]

I live in that area and am connected to that girl through mutual friends. Never met her.

Screw the poster who said she got into all of this for her own fault. She was young and showed just a little bit of skin for one individual, and that guy used that to manipulate her into showing more. That's not her fault. And that may have been how it started, but it's not how it ended.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I live in that area and am connected to that girl through mutual friends. Never met her.

Screw the poster who said she got into all of this for her own fault. She was young and showed just a little bit of skin for one individual, and that guy used that to manipulate her into showing more. That's not her fault. And that may have been how it started, but it's not how it ended.

We've got 5 or 6 people in here saying it was her fault. Where is that Professor Farnsworth pic when you need it?

Well, technically it was in that if she didn't flash strangers on the internet who call her pretty, just like most young girls don't (I assume...) then this whole mess wouldn't have happened.


It is shortsighted to blame her though, as the blame lies with her parents for not raising her better. You don't blame the kid for lacking morals, you blame the parents for not instilling those morals.


I think what people here are noting is the fact that she indeed lacked morals, not that she is to blame for lacking them.

 

[wookiee777]

I might be called an asshole for this, but here is my views on this story of "bullycide" and every story of "bullycide":


EDIT: Relevant part starts at 3:36

You may not agree with everything TJ says here, but I think here he is fair and realistic about bullying. Fight back and learn to deal with conflict because it will come up again and again in life. The girl this thread is about should not have killed herself and should have figured out how to deal with things. And it seems like she almost did the third time she moved, until she started texting that guy. Then things got worse again.

Also, what is with October and suicide?

 

[thelonewolf266]

I don't want to be "that guy" but according to the article she was posting explicit videos and photos of herself online and got upset when some guy shared them with "everyone". Something tells me alot this could of been avoided if she wasn't an attention whore and kept her clothes on.

She was what...12 or so at the time? Did you make a lot of intelligent decisions at that age?

If a girl does seek attention, does that mean she merits constant hounding and abuse until she's dead?

While such bullying is never acceptable one could use your argument in favor of the bullies. Obviously they were also "young" and as such they obviously make stupid decisions. Like using one's stupid decision as a mean to bully him/her.

Weird captcha.... please pick "which one does not belong" , only option "emo kid"......

Yes but flashing people while stupid and irresponsible is not a malicious act disseminating a picture that is clearly meant to be private to everyone in a direct attempt to humiliate and upset the person clearly is a malicious act not to mention that it kept happening over and over that does not suggest guilt or remorse from the person responsible.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

I live in that area and am connected to that girl through mutual friends. Never met her.

Screw the poster who said she got into all of this for her own fault. She was young and showed just a little bit of skin for one individual, and that guy used that to manipulate her into showing more. That's not her fault. And that may have been how it started, but it's not how it ended.

We've got 5 or 6 people in here saying it was her fault. Where is that Professor Farnsworth pic when you need it?

Well, technically it was in that if she didn't flash strangers on the internet who call her pretty, just like most young girls don't (I assume...) then this whole mess wouldn't have happened.


It is shortsighted to blame her though, as the blame lies with her parents for not raising her better. You don't blame the kid for lacking morals, you blame the parents for not instilling those morals.


I think what people here are noting is the fact that she indeed lacked morals, not that she is to blame for lacking them.

She flashed a dude once, then got blackmailed and bullied till she killed herself. I would say that's about 5% her fault, if that.

I wouldn't put even that much blame on her, she did flick the proverbial domino but she isn't to blame for doing that, her parents are.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

You may not agree with everything TJ says here, but I think here he is fair and realistic about bullying. Fight back and learn to deal with conflict because it will come up again and again in life. The girl this thread is about should not have killed herself and should have figured out how to deal with things. And it seems like she almost did the third time she moved, until she started texting that guy. Then things got worse again.

Also, what is with October and suicide?

For those who don't care to watch the video, a brief recap of 2:08...

Now I have a few questions about this whole "Bullycide" thing. The first of which is when did suicide become so revered in our culture? Everytime I turn on the news and I hear about one of these stories, all the reporters can talk about is these poor kids driven to suicide. You know, when I was going to high school, if someone got bullied and they killed themselves because of it, we called that person a Pussy. They were thought of as weak. Everyone said that about suicide when I was growing up. People who committed suicide were thought of as losers. What's with the sudden change? What's with Anderson Cooper and everyone else in the media now declaring these suicidal teens are some kind of "victims"? That they're some sort of heroes? Because they couldn't handle their own lives and decided to end them prematurely?

And doesn't the idea of making bullying a crime just encourage more teen suicides? If I was a teenager, and I knew that I could get revenge on all my bullies by...

Annnnd I had to stop there because my retard meter was exploding.

Look, I hear what this...guy...is saying. I find him abhorrent, and given his reputation I should've known better than to click on his little link there and listen to his 1948 style rant where he rails in horror against society's changing values, but yes, there is a point to be made about how life is generally going to fuck you over at some point, and the best solution to that usually isn't to pop off and kill yourself. Suicide is a destructive and selfish act that causes immense harm to your loved ones. There is almost ALWAYS a better way of dealing with the situation.

What buddy is failing to recognize is that we've come a long way in terms of recognizing mental illness in society. Depression is no longer demonized the way it used to be. Anxiety is no longer demonized the way it used to be. There's a far gulf between a depressed, anxious, 15 year old girl's ability to think and process things rationally, and that of a corpulent man in his mid 20's who is apparently of sound mind. Maybe it's because I have experience with people who struggle with severe mental illness, but everyone does not process this shit the same. Frankly the level of ignorance on display in that video is mind blowing.

The inability to relate to people who think differently, believe different things, or have different values is something that you're meant to grow out of by the time you are an adult. "If I can do it, so can you" is one of the more egocentric and narcissistic things anyone can say, because we are not the mold from which all other human beings are cast. I know people who would've wilted in half the time she did experiencing that kind of relentless peer abuse. Their generalized anxiety disorders simply would not have allowed them to process what was happening. They'd have catastrophized, and their reactions would have been grossly disproportionate. Because they DIDN'T go through that, they've grown into compassionate, productive adults. I guess their greatest failure in life, though, is lacking the particular mental fortitude to not qualify as a "pussy" in the mind of a bloviating talking head on the internet. Tragic, really.

 

[chadachada123]

Oh no, they raise us to think that it's a horrendous idea, with parents that aren't totally oblivious. But here, there's a GREAT deal of rebellion in respect to parents with respect to relationships.

They never teach about the possible consequences here, though. THAT'S a possible issue I guess.

Yeah, there's plenty of rebellion here, it's just generally a consensus among teenagers that it's a bad idea too. ;P

The whole "oh, it won't happen to me" mentality plays a huge part of it, I would guess. That and a lack of caring, I guess.

Heh.

 

[wookiee777]

Snip Snip

I'm not here to really respond directly because I think the video better sums up my opinion and anything I say will just back that, but I do realize that saying 2:08 is the relevant part was a mistake. 3:36 is the better part. 2:08 was the reason why I said, "you may not agree with everything TJ says...". Sorry about that.

 

[DoPo]

I might be called an asshole for this, but here is my views on this story of "bullycide" and every story of "bullycide":

You - no. That guy - he's just ignorant on the matter. He is not fair, nor realistic. But you do accept his view, so I suggest you don't follow him blindly.

I do agree though - she should not have gone through with the suicide. However, you do see she tried to find a way to deal with it. Not the best ways, to be sure, but she tried. And therein lies the tragedy - hindsight and so on.