I believe depression/suicide is the third leading cause of death in adolescents in America. That just goes to show how serious it is/can be.
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13 year old commits suicide thanks to fake Myspace account. Discuss
- Thread starter SynysterCola
- Start date
You guys are saying depression is just like an emotion but its not! Its not like being happy or sad sometimes, but all the time. Its like having your period 24/7... constant mood swings. I have a classmate who suffers from depression, and he is very sensitive...
I don't think its her fault, but a mix of Tom (the creator of myspace), Lori, and the mean people at her school. I just can't believe that a 47 year old woman would do this to a poor girl!
I don't think its her fault, but a mix of Tom (the creator of myspace), Lori, and the mean people at her school. I just can't believe that a 47 year old woman would do this to a poor girl!
Anyway, KIRA
It took me a few seconds to understand this, try and use the word "accept" correctly next time. I believe you missed my entire point, that point being that she could have noticed her lack of acceptance by the people with which she attempted to connect to, and thus she could have connected with others among her peers. Maybe all the depressed could get together and have a big non-party of depression! I would go to that lol...but I would basically just like to go to ANY party at all...ever.
Anyway, who couldn't she stop talking to the people who insulted her? In my experience, there is always somebody just as lonely/angry/depressed as you, and they want a friend just like you do...so she could have attempted to find that person.
It took me a few seconds to understand this, try and use the word "accept" correctly next time. I believe you missed my entire point, that point being that she could have noticed her lack of acceptance by the people with which she attempted to connect to, and thus she could have connected with others among her peers. Maybe all the depressed could get together and have a big non-party of depression! I would go to that lol...but I would basically just like to go to ANY party at all...ever.
Anyway, who couldn't she stop talking to the people who insulted her? In my experience, there is always somebody just as lonely/angry/depressed as you, and they want a friend just like you do...so she could have attempted to find that person.
Also, since I think all of you are probably guys, you have no idea how its like to go through your teenage years as a girl. Being a normal, semi-popular girl is hard enough... imagine being overweight, unconfident, depressed girl.
Girl fights are totally different from boy fights. Boys fight physically: punching, kicking, throwing people in the toilet/dumpster, etc. Girls fight verbally and mentally. It doesn't take much to bring a girl down to rock bottom, especially when it comes from another girl. Gossiping, rumors, all of these things hurt very badly. It doesn't matter if you're popular or not... any girl who is picked on this much would have thoughts of suicide.
Girl fights are totally different from boy fights. Boys fight physically: punching, kicking, throwing people in the toilet/dumpster, etc. Girls fight verbally and mentally. It doesn't take much to bring a girl down to rock bottom, especially when it comes from another girl. Gossiping, rumors, all of these things hurt very badly. It doesn't matter if you're popular or not... any girl who is picked on this much would have thoughts of suicide.
I don't really see what else her parents should have done. She was on medication, and only a MD can perscribe those. So she was obviously seeing a psychologist (or psychiatrist... the ones with the medical degree). She was in counciling as well...
Was it Lori Drews? Was it? Remember, she gave out a password to a neighbor's daughter. And it was another 13-year old girl who sent the first hateful message. NOT thee 47 year old woman with a job.
Then I would have expected you of all people to have some sympathy to her plight. I in in no way putting on the blame on the Drews. Both Megan and the Drews are at fault.
Megan to me seemed like she hit rock bottom and couldn't get back up. It would seem that she was SEVERELY depressed.
Of course no one forced her to kill herself. But you have to understand there is a difference between a "child" and an "adult" A child making fun of a child is understandable but an adult, someone who should know better tormenting a child is unacceptable to me.
The kids making fun of her and the Drews who knew that she had problems with depression still went ahead with their joke which I believe helped contribute to her emotional state at the time she decided to kill herself.
Thank you Kristy for giving some input from a "female" perspective.
Oops, I can't believe I messed that up. Anyway she probably had tried to find friends, but she was probably rejected a lot. Otherwise, she would not have cared so dearly for this myspace friend.
A somewhat typical female response to the subject. I have nothing against girls or anything, do not get me wrong, but they tend to let their emotions influence them to the point of, in this case, suicide. Males can be the exact same way, but it is more common in females. Males can play mind-games, just as females can get in a fist fight. You are stereo-typing. You should not be so ignorant to the possibilities.
I'm sure she did notice her lack of acceptance and felt even worse about it. I'm sure she did search for other perspective friends but given her current emotional state it couldn't of been easy.
I've dealt with severe bullying myself (I'm not going to say if it was as severe as what Megan had to go to) but bullies will go out of their way to annoy/persecute/attack you.
I feel bad for Megan I really do. I feel bad that she didn't have the inner strength to persevere though the hard times and felt suicide was her only option.
She might have had the strength to persevere, but unfortunately she was exposed to the happiness of having a "true friend" and then that true friend turned on her.. Effectively wiping out all hope, and strength she might have had left.
I really want that family to at least face some consequence for their actions.
I really want that family to at least face some consequence for their actions.
Meh. Life is tough. That sort of shit happens. The only problem in this case, was that it was thought out, carefully planned, revenge of sorts. The ones that pulled the prank cannot face criminal or civil charges. Well they could face civil charges, but the case would be weak in court.
Hold up hold up hold up.
First things first: before we go towards manipulating the court system so that we can feel better when this woman is unjustly punished... lets make sure that Lori Drews actually did anything bad in the first place.
This has been the major unanswered question of this discussion thus-far. Did Lori Drews participate in the belittlement of Meiers?
We know Lori created the account and gained the trust of Meiers, but again, a neighbor's 13-year old daughter who sent the first hateful message. We do not know how many people actually had access to the account on that day. At least 2 people did... but I find it unlikely that we can pin the blame on Lori considering the fact that they were sharing the account.
First things first: before we go towards manipulating the court system so that we can feel better when this woman is unjustly punished... lets make sure that Lori Drews actually did anything bad in the first place.
This has been the major unanswered question of this discussion thus-far. Did Lori Drews participate in the belittlement of Meiers?
We know Lori created the account and gained the trust of Meiers, but again, a neighbor's 13-year old daughter who sent the first hateful message. We do not know how many people actually had access to the account on that day. At least 2 people did... but I find it unlikely that we can pin the blame on Lori considering the fact that they were sharing the account.
i agree. she did seem to orchestrate the whole event though. it is a sad story but there really is nothing to be done. the girl's parents are just as much to blame for letting a child with a mental disorder have her way on the internet. what kind of parents would let a 13 year old girl talk to a boy who said he was in high school on myspace, especially with all of the sex predators that have been caught on it? it really doesn't sound like they were monitoring her use very well. i think we can all agree that lori drew is one sick fuck but you can't pin all of the blame on her because she was only a part of the equation that led to the end result.
Well then, everyone who took a part in the "joke" should be responsible, but ultimately the person who made the account to trick the girl is responsible.
I just think that there should be something wrong with tricking a depressed, mentally unstable, social outcast, 13 year old girl. They knew all about her depression, and they should have been smart enough to know the consequences of their actions.
It does not matter if she did or not. The victim was attacked for a reason. A 47 year old woman does not do that for shits and giggles. She felt that her daughter was insulted and decided to take action. And do we know how many times something like this has happened? "Cyber-bullying" has been a problem that I have known of for three years, yet shit like this still happens.
As a parent she must take responsibility(or at least some of it) for her children. She willing created an account to spy on Megan. She created the account with full knowledge of Megan depression.
After she or her daughter were done spying on Megan with the ruse of being her dreamboy. How do you think it would have ended? A girl who's basically an outcast finding out the boy she liked wasn't real wouldn't have gone over well.
Lori is an adult that took part in the torment of a child who again I will say knew for a fact Megan suffered with depression. An adult should never take part in the torment of a child especially one with depression.
Even if Lori did not say/post anything on Megan's myspace directly she still must take responsibility because she created the account that would be used to spy on a child.
I don't understand how any sane adult would let their children or even take part in such an act their selves to a girl with depression.
What is there to take responsibility for if she did not do anything legally wrong? This is not,"she should not do this because she had this." This is about torment using myspace and its consequences.
Every bit of logic in my head pulls up a red flag. If the reasoning was indeed to get information about whether or not this Meiers was spreading rumors about Drew's daughter... then where does cutting all ties, making Meiers sad unnecessarily for a night and comming back with long lost friends who moved to another state online to make fun of Meiers all together come in?
These are the sort of things young girls do for fun. I've seen it done to my sisters, kids somehow manage to pull off these stunts. I think the mastermind was an anonymous 13-year old girl who was poking fun at this girl. None of this behavior benefits Lori Drew at all.
How far was Lori Drew going to trick the girl? Did Lori ever plan for the account to become hostile towards Meiers? If so, she is one sick fucker. If not, she is only a slightly less sick fucker who had little to do with this incident IMO.
How do we know the account was not hacked? How do we know this event occured within the knowledge of Drew?
Well, I wouldn't blame it on a hacker. Clearly the friend from Ohio knew Meiers.
However, the reaction of Lori Drew in the article can be interpreted many ways... we really don't know what happened from the article alone.
Lori Drew... is dispicable. No doubt. But I just can't seem to pin that night on her.
Woot, I get to use a line you used on me this debate :-p Have you even read the article?
It was Michele Mulford's daughter, not Lori Drew, who should be responsable then, as it was not Drew's children who did this. It was someone else's.
What else is there to discuss here. We do not know if she really did it for sure. We have to think she did it with premeditation. I do not think she would really do it knowing that Megan would go as far as to commit suicide. She simply miscalculated.
She has to take some responsibility for helping drive Megan over the edge to consider suicide. Let's not forget that Megan just didn't come home one day after school and just killed herself. She did it after a message from "Josh".
Just because it's not legally wrong does not mean that it's not morally wrong. Many of the laws were not made to consider the "internet".
Because the law cannot do anything the neighbors themselves decided to give the Drews their own form of justice.
EDIT
She did to it with premeditation. She KNEW FOR A FACT Megan had depression. Why would any sane adult create an account to mess with a girl like that.
We can't pin the blame solely on Lori either...
If it was only "Josh" who sent the message, it couldn't have been potent.
Which is nothing close to justice mind you.
Actually, in hindsight, can you be more specific here? You're a little ambiguous. The reason why they did it was clearly stated several times in the article... and it seems plausable that Lori Drew would do that.
Her daughter got into a fight with her and she took it into her own hands. Have you even read the article?