4 Teens Sued For Obscene Fake Facebook Profile

mashable.com:

Imagine this: four teenagers take to Facebook to create a fake profile that continually misrepresents your son as a gay racist. Then consider that profile amasses 580 plus friends. You'd be pretty pissed off, right?

Read the whole story: mashable.com

Comments

[LaceSky]

02:20 AM on 10/04/2009

Perhaps civility could be taught in schools as antidote to what's passing for same on crass driven television and radio talk shows.

[Okieborn]

09:28 PM on 09/28/2009

Maybe just maybe they will have the crap embarrased out of them for such a fake made up deal !!
I think they still have a military school for trouble makers !!!!

[faith]

05:20 PM on 09/28/2009

You know, I honestly think that Facebook should be sued. Since any publication can represent material facts concerning a private person Facebook should not be allowed to say they have no responsibility in the matter concerning what individuals choose to print. After all, it IS their site location. If it weren't so easy to print disparaging and hurtful remarks concerning another I doubt so much garbage would be printed on Facebook. Lots of it may be malicious, but I suspect some of it is just bad behavior that has gotten way out of hand. Let's not let Facebook off the hook. Make them share in the liability.

[BambooHarvester]

01:37 AM on 09/28/2009

Serve's those little b@stards right !
~

[Alarmist]

12:12 AM on 09/28/2009

Assuming they all go to the same school, which wasn't clarified, the principal of the school should suspend and expel these kids. But wait, kids are sooo spoiled rotten by their parents, that would never happen. Do students get expelled at all anymore? Or even suspended? The parents will then sue the school, claiming their horrendous little Junior won't get into a good college with a suspension on his record. Hello, your junior is heading for jail, not college, anyway. But money and a good lawsuit will talk.

If the principal does nothing anymore, and if parents rule the schools with their money, this mom has no option but to sue. I say good for her, and I hope she wins. hat in the world are those bullies' parents doing to not even punish the devils they have created?

[QOTW]

06:50 PM on 09/27/2009

Before face book and other networking sites this happened to my neighbour's 15 yr old son, a quiet mannered young man who excelled at school.
We live in a very rural area and after getting off of the school bus one afternoon my neighbour's son was attacked by 7 students who'd followed the bus in a truck. He was chased and then held on the ground as they took turns kicking and beating him unconscious. Tired of beating him they roped him to a tree trunk and stripped him to the waist. Gagging him with his shirt they super glued his eyes shut. All the while they were viciously verbally abusing him, he was told they were going to mutilate him with a knife. Thankfully a passing driver stopped and intervened, the attackers ran to their truck and sped off.
The Police investigation uncovered a website set up by one of the bullies, it advertised my neighbour's son as a pedophile with his picture, telephone number and home address.
The students were identified and prosecuted for assault and torture, none of them were jailed. It took a court order to remove the website. The students were asked by the Police why they did it, they just 'didn't like him' because 'he was too quiet and didn't fit in', it was 'just a joke'.
My neighbour's son has been attacked again and has attempted suicide three times. He feels his life is over because he's been labelled a pedophile.

[LaceSky]

10:42 PM on 09/27/2009

Tragic story. I hope this young man is getting counseling and "mature" neighbors are standing with him and making it known.

[ladybuttercup]

10:59 PM on 09/27/2009

what are the parents doing?

[MiddleRoadLiberal]

08:04 AM on 09/28/2009

Looking "Facebook" up in their dictionaries.

[sheaintsayin]

04:24 PM on 09/27/2009

Good lord; this is outrageous! Harassing and victimizing innocent people, complete strangers, just because...out of control, and perhaps fully expected with the likes of tom delay, the 'hammer' dancing with the stars instead of being jailed and ostracized...fine example we have become for our children...

[Phoenixfire089]

02:35 PM on 09/27/2009

I'd first like to say that I was bullied pretty incessantly growing up, and that yes, it did make me feel bad about myself. However, I know that this has made me a tougher person today; I am more equipped to handle all types of people and situations because, let's face it, there will always be that person who tries to bring you down for their own gain. So when I read articles about preventing bullying, I have to ask, what are we actually preventing?

I ask this because I used to have a boss (not a child) that was pretty indiscriminate about calling people idiots and rarely missed the opportunity to rail on his employees. Was it fair? Not in the least. But from childhood you learn to recognize that opinions such as that have no bearing on your own self-worth. It seems like we strive to take all matter of emotion and thought from our kids and simply don't recognize their abilities of comprehension; instead we put them in little germ-free, hurt-free bubbles and expect them to magically obtain cognition of things when they hit 18. It's not going to happen and in the end, the only thing that was accomplished was that their own ability to deal with those types of people is now stunted.

[Phoenixfire089]

02:37 PM on 09/27/2009

No one wants to see their child hurt or upset, but we must remember that once they are on their own, these things will happen to them. The only question is: will they be prepared to deal with it? Support your kids when they need help dealing with their lives and teach them to have self pride even when others try to hurt them. In the end, that's what they will need in the 'real world'. No amount of legislating will supplant that lesson.

[Quislet]

09:23 PM on 09/27/2009

I don't know how you were bullied or how severe it actually was, but some of the bullying that goes on in school is quite severe. Brushing that off as "it happens" and that it will "toughen him/her up" is being irresponsible. You talk about the victim of bullying learning how to deal with these types of people. What about the bully learning the lesson of consequence for his/her actions?

Dealing with bullies and bullying is not the same as putting children in "little germ-free, hurt-free bubbles".

[PatA]

01:38 PM on 09/27/2009

I always remember Columbine and what happened with those two boys because their parents didn't keep an eye on them. A room full of GUNS?
And now it is computers, cellphones and on and on. My 11 year old granddaughter doesn't have a t.v. or computer in her room and likely won't have one until she leaves home.
Parenting is done today by sitting a child down in front of a computer with video games and any number of electronic devices. .....just so junior doesn't get on my nerves.....whatever keeps him quiet.
I work in a library and this summer mothers brought their children to us at 9am and left them all day.....til 6. One mother brought her 8 year old and told her to take care of the 5 year old......
Then they wonder what happened to cause the huge disconnect between them, their children and society.

[Kalie]

11:20 AM on 09/27/2009

Cyberbullying should be a crime in all states. Just because its a computer doesnt mean you can hide behind it. You should still be held accountable for what you do. Remember that lady and her daughter who abused a neighbor girl online and the girl hung herself? I think the mom should have done jail time but instead she got a slap. Their crime was malicious and they intended to cause severe damage. Some people are so evil and will not stop til prosecuted. Evil is evil whether done on the internet or in person, that doesnt change.

[nunzia]

01:07 PM on 09/27/2009

So true.

[AnglScarlett]

04:49 PM on 09/27/2009

So true. A woman from Shelton WA created a false profile of me on aol, along with my pic, and advertised me as a hooker. I realize now that I should have went to an attorney with it instead of having aol take it down, and pressed criminal as well as civil charges. But this was five years ago, and at the time, I just didn't know. More people have to prosecute and then these highly disturbed people will think twice before they take out their own miserable lives on an innocent person.

[randakost]

05:40 PM on 09/27/2009

Weird! Did you know this woman or was it a random act?

[DRaymond]

10:48 AM on 09/27/2009

One thing that may be lost among many of you is how much work it took for a private person to get the four boys tracked down throgh facebook, IP addresses, ISP DHCP records, etc.

So one thing that might be asked is whether this should be a crime instead of just a civil case. Some states have cyber-bullying laws, most do not, Should the act of presenting oneself as a specific real person other than yourself (as opposed to a fictional character) be illegal? Celebrities also have problems with people creating immitation facebook profiles.

[Candace8383]

10:30 AM on 09/27/2009

I check my children's computers
I check their cell phone
I insist on knowing who what where and when
Where i live most of the parents have the attitude that their children are the second coming of Christ and can do no wrong this makes the job of the minority of us who know that children make mistakes and need to be guided much harder. I hope this woman gets an enormous amount from these lazy parents . We all should because these heartless cruel lying children will soon be men and set loose on the rest of us ...probably on wall street.

[Kalie]

11:01 AM on 09/27/2009

You are so right girlfriend. But I think this goes beyond just "checking" on your children, although that may have helped. NEWSFLASH to any parents who think that they can "stop watching" their children when they get to high school age----WRONG! That is when you need to watch them the most because the mistakes they make in high school could follow them for the rest of their lives. Not to mention the heartache your monster children inflict on others. I really believe that you get what you give, in the end.

Also, do you know the reason why many parents enroll their children in religious instruction at an early age? Many of us do it to give them a firm foundation and to teach them good morals and values. Even if you scorn religion, the park district and YMCA usually offer classes to help "ground" your children if you are unable to. I am reading that less and less people are choosing to be involved in organized religions and this just tells me that more and more people are just into themselves. And that will never have a good outcome. But you are right, Candace, we are seeing the outcome these days arent we? Children with no respect, morals, direction. Let them run amok at your own peril.

[Phoenixfire089]

02:44 PM on 09/27/2009

I love how no one asks what the boy did to the other four, they are just immediately "heartless cruel lying children".

[Kalie]

07:46 PM on 09/27/2009

Oh Blaming the victim Phoenix? You still need more work. It doesnt matter what he did. When "groupthink" kicks in and not one of the four stop it, it crosses the line. The jails are full of groups of criminals who could not or would not identify that what they were doing was wrong. Right/Wrong, not brain surgery.

[goldbry]

10:30 PM on 09/27/2009

What they did was wrong. I don't care about the circumstances. It was wrong. If the other boy did something, then they could have reported it, not done something wrong themselves.

[gbrooks]

09:00 AM on 09/27/2009

If I was one of those four, my father would have kicked my butt (probably not literally) and made sure I went to jail. These days, the parent(s) of those four boys will likely defend them.

Hope I'm wrong, but I'm probably right.

[DRaymond]

10:27 AM on 09/27/2009

The parents will likely defend them for no other reason than because as minors the huge civil judgement will come out of their pockets

[Candace8383]

10:33 AM on 09/27/2009

your children must be grown now parents defend anything their children do and i mean anything. It seems that if you deny it it didn't happen .

[OhComeOnNow]

10:57 AM on 09/27/2009

And most likely will play the victim card.

[StJames]

08:54 AM on 09/27/2009

I am sooooo happy that Facebook wasn't around when my children were teenagers. I hope this mother wins her suit in a big way. Perhaps more parents will then begin to act responsibly and monitor their children's use of this and other social networking sites. I worry about the apparent disconnect between the real world of teenagers and their cyber world.

[CaveatLector]

09:20 AM on 09/27/2009

As a former teacher, I can tell you there have always been bullies and there will always be bullies. The Internet, however is giving bullying a whole new meaning.

Children today are very different than were 25 years ago. They're meaner, more persistent, and many are completey devoid of a moral compass. They don't talk with their family around the dinner table; instead they're developing all of their relationships thru the Net.

There is a crisis happening out there, folks. This current generation is the first to be raised with the internet, cell phone texting, ipods, and all the techonology that suddenly appeared in the last 10 years and took over our lives. Suddenly, children have the ability to talk to 300 people at once.

There is something very cold about the relationship these kids have with their computers. Normal relationships have been replaced by facebooking, myspace, texting that demands conversations that are nothing more than tiny sound clips in abbreviated language; no feeling, no inflections, no true human exchange.

Parents out there; take the texting function OFF your children's cell phones. Deactive facebook and limit social networking on the internet.

Gone are face-to-face interactions. Privacy is gone as well....every thought, action and feeling is reported hourly sites on Twitter. Children used to grow up in a community of people. Now they are part of a global techno-world, too naive to understand that the person behind the avatar may not be who they think it is.

[StJames]

09:30 AM on 09/27/2009

Well said! This is exactly what worries me. Thank you for expressing it so clearly. I am now a fan.

[OhComeOnNow]

11:24 AM on 09/27/2009

Fanned and faved!

[Ifticar2]

04:45 AM on 09/27/2009

Today's "progressive" teams need to get a grip on their morality. Chances are that these kid come from single parent homes with liberal Democrat mothers.

[jukesgrrl]

06:10 AM on 09/27/2009

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

[Sing Out and Slap Iron]

08:56 AM on 09/27/2009

Your avatar looks as if it truly presents your thought pattern. I looks like a man stuck in the 50's.

And thanks to your "conservative" revolution of the last 30 years, you've effectively destroyed the nuclear family by making it impossible to have a singular bread winner in a family, leaving a parent at home full time to properly nurture a child.

[nwmother]

09:10 AM on 09/27/2009

Seconded! Thanks you very much and fanned!

[randakost]

05:48 PM on 09/27/2009

HEYLL YES!