15 year old girl kills herself after persistent bullying
- Thread starter BloatedGuppy
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Unfortunately, this is nothing new.
She was a teenager. Teenagers do stupid things. That doesn't validate the bullying, especially someone illegally blackmailing her into further ?shows?. That would be classed under child abuse.White Lightning said:
I don't know how i'm trying to collate anything. I'm merely pointing out that the argument "but kids do stupid stuff" isn't a valid argument in itself. If it were than it should also be used in favor of bullies (unless you don't consider bullying "stupid").BloatedGuppy said:
Well you said it yourself, while he knew what he was doing was "bad" he most likely didn't expect the effect to be that bad. Now i would like to note i'm not saying the bullying was in anyway justified. I myself have never bullied and never have understood the fun of causing pain towards others for no reason.Yopaz said:
To me, the saddest thing about this is how the death of a clearly deeply troubled child is going to be exploited to fuel the fire on this bullshit "war on bullying." Make no mistake kids, this was the culmination of many more factors than bullying alone, but of course the Huff Post only runs the most sensationalist of stories.
Because one is clearly a product of malicious intent, and the other is not? I don't expect teenagers to have really intricate concepts of morality but I'm pretty sure they're cognizant of basic right and wrong by that age. You don't get a hand wave of "kids will be kids" when you are doing hateful or destructive things.generals3 said:
Can you quote me characterizing anyone, ever, as a "horrendous hell spawn"?Badguy said:
Please, take your time. I'm a patient guy.
Apologies if this is a font of yellow journalism, I literally just grabbed the first comprehensive link I came across. It's certainly front page news in BC today, it's not some page 3 article on the Huffington Post.irmasterlol said:
I can't help but feel that all these bullying instances are occurring because the younger generations are just doing things that previous generations didn't do until they were much older and could handle any of the consequences of their actions. I mean, a girl around 12 years old flashing herself for a guy on a webcam? That just seems so...impossible, to be the actions of a young girl. Maybe it's just all our new technology is making the younger generation feel they need to grow up and do more adult things at a younger and younger age, with disastrous results.
Regardless, it all comes down to the sick guy that threatened to share the photo of her and made her life spiral out of control. I can only give my best wishes to her family.
Regardless, it all comes down to the sick guy that threatened to share the photo of her and made her life spiral out of control. I can only give my best wishes to her family.
It pains me to see how horrible as a race we can truly be. This poor child, although she made some mistakes should never have been treated the way she was. Those responsible for her suffering need to take a step back and evaluate your lives. I don't wish anything ill towards you but please, for yourselves and the future of all of us, treat others with respect and grace and not with malice and hate.
How are we supposed to grow as a society if we continue to do stuff like this to others?
Let us grow.
How are we supposed to grow as a society if we continue to do stuff like this to others?
Let us grow.
I'm going to probably get a load of shit for this, but I'll just speak my mind anyway.
I think suicide is the cowards way out.
Whilst nobody deserves to die, and the people that made her feel so terrible are some of the worst human beings imaginable, she was not innocent.
She made the wrong decisions.
She flash when she didn't think about the possible repercussions.
It IS the internet people, nothing that is created is ever truly destroyed, particularly stupid due to being under-age and therefore vulnerable.
Her vulnerability was taken advantage of, but ultimately she made the decision to sleep with someone in a relationship.
She didn't stay offline, she didn't report it to the police, she didn't press charges etc.
It's terrible to see a life so young extinguished due to negligence, both on her part, the school's, and her parents'.
She posted that depressing video after all, where it showed everything, even her self harm.
Sometimes I just fucking hate this generation, both directed at the wretches that bullied and at the victim who just couldn't think of what the right thing to do was.
I think suicide is the cowards way out.
Whilst nobody deserves to die, and the people that made her feel so terrible are some of the worst human beings imaginable, she was not innocent.
She made the wrong decisions.
She flash when she didn't think about the possible repercussions.
It IS the internet people, nothing that is created is ever truly destroyed, particularly stupid due to being under-age and therefore vulnerable.
Her vulnerability was taken advantage of, but ultimately she made the decision to sleep with someone in a relationship.
She didn't stay offline, she didn't report it to the police, she didn't press charges etc.
It's terrible to see a life so young extinguished due to negligence, both on her part, the school's, and her parents'.
She posted that depressing video after all, where it showed everything, even her self harm.
Sometimes I just fucking hate this generation, both directed at the wretches that bullied and at the victim who just couldn't think of what the right thing to do was.
So your saying its normal for 7th grade girls to flash themselves to other people as long as there is an expectation of privacy? Yeah, that's a good idea. She should have known what she was getting into.Midnight Llamaman said:
There's a difference between making mistakes as a kid and asking for trouble; sending out naked pictures of yourself is not something where you say, "Gee, now I know that I shouldn't do that." I'm pretty sure that's something you can easily say shouldn't have to be experience to know that it's WRONG and will bring you the WRONG kind of attention.
That said, this is this a tragic event. But still, she could have avoided all the trouble she got in; it wan't an honest mistake, it was a plain STUPID decision. Let me repeat: Sending out naked pictures is not a mistake, its a deliberate grab for attention. I agree with White Lightning, she could have avoided this.
It happened to a 13 year old in my school a 3/4 years ago and it didn't even break national news nevermind international. It happens all the time there is nothing particularly special about this instance regardless of how sad the occurrence is.
But the intent is irrelevant to the stupidity argument. I could easily say wanting to do evil things stems from stupidity as well. But that would be too easy. Just like justifying flashing at the age of 12 can't be solely be justified with "them kids be stupid".BloatedGuppy said:
I agree in principle...I went through a clinical depression in my late teens and early 20's, and contemplated suicide for a time. Eventually I came to this same conclusion...that it would be a cowardly, selfish act...and decided against it. However, I was older than Amanda, had more life experience to draw on, and most critically I did not have a cheering section of tormentors following me from town to town imploring me to commit suicide and undermining me at every turn. I hesitate to say with any authority that I wouldn't have made the same decision she did under the same circumstances. Not all people are wired to cope with stress well.JokerboyJordan said:
Again, though, where is this collation between flashing someone and active malice coming from? Are we THAT appalled by the idea of someone being needy, or wanting attention? Is the sight of someone's breasts so horrifying that a lifetime of abuse is a logical consequence? I have to admit, I'm struggling with the logic of this. It's not like we're all members of the Taliban, right? Since when do we view the world through that lens?generals3 said:
I'm not advocating young girls run around showing their breasts, but I cannot understand why (some) people are acting like it's morally abhorrent behavior.
I hate these stories, principally because of the headlines basically shout to the world "Hey kids! Depressed? Being picked on? School sucks? Kill yourself! All the cool kids are doing it." Condolences and such, but still. It's irresponsible reporting. Bullying does not equal suicide. My boss was once telling me about going to school in Kenya where hazing/bullying is upheld and allowed by teachers and administrators. It's a fact of life, yet kids aren't committing mass suicide on a daily basis.
Point being: Bullying is bad. Suicide is bad. Suicide is not a solution or a means to an end regarding bullying.
Point being: Bullying is bad. Suicide is bad. Suicide is not a solution or a means to an end regarding bullying.
Sure, but that is far from what said. You compared her mistake of flashing herself on a whim and his thought out blackmailing. You don't blackmail someone on a whim, you don't track down their friends or family on a whim. You compare a 12 year old who did a terrible mistake to a guy who was blackmailing a minor into giving him a personal show.generals3 said:
You might think that it's fair to compare those two, but on the one side you have a guy who has committed two quite serious crimes, blackmail and distribution of child pornography. The fact that she commit suicide has nothing to do with my opinion of the matter he did. People go to jail for this kind of thing. You might say it was a mistake, but by that logic any rapist or murderer could simply say the same. It was a stupid mistake to stab the guy after taking off with his wallet. It's not a crime to make mistakes so why should so many have to be in jail over petty things like arson or rape?
What I don't understand is how this could be an issue in an age when literally (and I do mean literally) at LEAST 30% of girls in high school have shared something nude or highly sexual with someone else.White Lightning said:
Seriously.
I hardly know a single girl in real life from high school personally that didn't share nude pics at some point before graduation, and most of them were at some point at least viewed by someone other than the intended recipient, but never did my high school have bullying problems related to it other than ONE single case by a bunch of jock assholes and a girl that dated one of them.
Shit, I don't know what age my own damn sister was, but she's shared nude pics with her now-ex boyfriend and understood that he'd probably end up showing some of his friends (who, sadly, include most of my friends).
The case here seems a bit of an anomaly, since a huge minority (possibly a majority) of girls under 18 now have done the exact same thing without massive bullying.
Not an edit, but kind of an edit (since I haven't posted yet): I typed the above thinking the original picture was taken while she was 14/15 with the bullying happening in high school. Seems she may have been younger when it happened, which makes the case even stupider.
I personally know two girls that have been investigated by police for pictures that they took of themselves before they were 18. Yeah, police/prosecutors can do some fucked-up things, like charging teens as adults for things that wouldn't be a crime if they were adults (like taking nudes of themselves).Badguy said:
Our laws need serious re-working in the US with respect to kids sending shit to each other, which, as I mentioned, practically everyone does in high school or college right around age 18 or even commonly as young as 14/15.
Every contribution you've made to the thread thus far has been an attempt to argue things from the perspective of the bullies. Don't assume they're adults! I doubt they wanted her to kill herself! Why do we care about this anyway? The beating is unrelated! And on, and on, bickering over every semantic detail regarding condemnation of "the bullies", while directing a not insubstantial amount of scorn and doubt at the victim. Your level of passion might be debatable. The fact you've decided to adopt a "defend the bullies" tack is not.Badguy said:
Perhaps your goal here is play devils advocate, or to be that "edgy guy" who gravitates about forums and makes stern posts detailing what a hard bastard he is, unaffected by the trivialities that fluster the rest of the world. Your user name doesn't exactly impart a lot of confidence in that regard, but I have no idea, really. Regardless, I'm not terribly interested in a "Won't someone please think of the bullies" argument. I'm aware that they are most likely children too, and I'm not advocating their death or imprisonment (although Mr. picture spreader needs to face some form of serious consequence). I have argued that they share some culpability in the events that unfolded, because they do.