The story of Megan Meier, the 13-year-old girl who committed suicide after she became despondent over a MySpace hoax, is definitely tragic. Most importantly, it should have never happened. As many people know by now, the adult behind the online prank was Lori Drew, the mother of one of Megan’s childhood friends. But should Drew be the only one to blame for Megan’s suicide?
Drew, assisted by her daughter and an 18-year-old friend, came up with the ruse so they could monitor anything negative Megan was saying about Drew's daughter. The scumbags, led by Drew posing as an online boyfriend, told Megan that she was not a good friend, an IM fight ensued, with a final line telling Megan something to the effect, “The world would be a better place without you!” Megan was already a troubled girl who switched schools because of bullying, and she was reportedly on medication for depression. Later that day, Megan tried to kill herself and died the next day.
Drew and her family have been harassed ever since the MySpace hoax became public. While I technically should not condone criminal acts and harassment, I must admit that I get a warm fuzzy feeling when I see a culprit suffer the repercussions they deserve in real life.
Not only were Drew’s initial actions evil, the depths of her betrayal redefine evil, as she portrayed herself as a friend to Megan’s family and comforted them after her death. The fact that someone can’t file charges against Drew might be one of the greatest failures of the U.S. legal system in recent history.
However, the one thing that struck me throughout the news coverage was the interviews of Megan’s mother, Tina Meier. During the interviews, Meier kept stating, “While my daughter was too young to legitimately use MySpace, I was monitoring her.”
Well guess what? You did a really bad job of it.
I don’t want to pile it on, but what was Megan’s mother thinking in the first place? A girl who was bullied and suffering from depression should not be allowed to exchange information with strangers on the Internet. People in her mental state generally attract bullies both in the real world and on the Internet.
Even if you assume that wasn’t an issue, logic says that a mother should stop a 12- to 13-year-old girl, whom she claims she was monitoring, from developing an online relationship with a 16-year-old boy. Allowing a troubled girl to be in a relationship with an older boy is not a good job of "monitoring."
A critical issue I want to make a point of is that the MySpace age limit is completely arbitrary, and was set because of the Online Child Protection Act. It still doesn’t mean that a young teen is mature enough to actually be on the site; supervised or unsupervised.
Frankly, I think Tina Meier is in a state of denial. She does not want to accept that she set the act in motion. If nothing else, I wish more press attention would be paid to the fact that few people are capable of adequately monitoring a teenager’s Internet activities.
Unless you filter all of a teenager’s communications, set up a computer that monitors every keystroke, or use professional forensics software, you better not count on your ability to keep your teenager’s online activities sufficiently controlled. This is the point that everyone is missing.
Maybe it is politically correct to ignore the issue, and take Tina Meier's word that even though she knowingly allowed her daughter to commit fraud by joining MySpace, and despite her daughter’s suicide, she did her job as a parent. However, for the sake of other troubled teens, I want to point out that Megan shouldn’t have been on MySpace in the first place.
Maybe I’m wrong, and Tina Meier did complete a computer forensics class. If she did, she should sue the company that trained her. Either way, I won’t be shedding any tears for the harassment suffered by the Drew family.
— Ira Winkler, Former National Security Agency analyst and author of Spies Among Us
It is a tragedy that the child commit suicide.....It is tragic when any child feels they have no way out.....
I have noticed that many parents were I teach (not myself) allow there children to use myspace. The ages are starting as young as 8. Some truly believe they are monitoring their child and when something appears on the site they do not like, well let's just say it isn't pretty.
To have an individual who call themself an adult particpate in a hoax like that is just wrong. And for that person to be someone's mom...............
I hope parents are educating their children in teling them that danger does await on the interent
I could not agree more with you Mashka, is the same old story, it just incuded the buzzword "MySpace". look at the figures in the UK for example.
IMHO this is a slight variation of the Missing white woman syndrome (MWWS), the true is that you can not monitor everything your child do, and even if it were possible is will not be sane! (Otherwise we will end with "mother suicide because she was not able to apropiately monitor her childs"...). We got go back to the basis, the values that we show to our kids, the value of human life. the value of self-estime, an so on. I guess it will be better to monitor us as current or future parents, remember
We do not own our childs, they are just a loan that was given to us by god for a short time. Use that time wisely!
and also i am sorry for being cynical, but i will like to see all the media coverage on other kids deaths, such as war, famine, vaccinable preventable deseases, and abuses other than cyberbuliying such as child prostitution, child slavery, and so on.
I don't think changing the law will solve the problem entirely. It has
to start from the basic and basic stuff – from the family and teenagers
themselves. Raising awareness and know how on Internet danger are some of the
basic stuffs that should be thought at school. At least this can be done soon
but the law will take a long time.
I agree that people need to be informed and educated in order to protect their children against Cyber Hoax. "When emotionally vulnerable young people get online, they can be very
easily manipulated," said Nancy Willard, executive director of the Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use. Therefore, parents should be mindful of their children's online activities and relationships. In Magan's case, her mother could "partly" be held responsible; the person to blame, is the woman who created the fake Josh profile, and it is really surprising that she has not been charged with a
crime because officials say her actions do not fit into any law. This means that american legislation needs "updating".
Megan's mother Calls For Law Change. She says that "The laws need to catch up with the Internet, because this isn't going to go away". And she is right. We should rather "fight her fight" instead of blaming her.
The fight against cyberbullying should include parents, educators, librarians, policy-makers, and others
regarding effective strategies to assist young people in gaining
the knowledge, skills, motivation, and self-control to use the
Internet and other information technologies in a safe and
responsible manner.
Of course,it's terrible, it's horrible-bla bla bla...
But all over the world people( and especially teenage girls) commit suicide because of the different reasons,and partly because somebody prank them or humiliate or their parents do not pay enough attention... and of course these suicides should have never happened but I think this case has such a great respond in Media because this is a new way of doing old things.People just get used to girls' suicides because of unrequited love and now we have something new- so let's discuss it.
It' s just a new way of old action.A person who has been humiliated publicly, commits suicide-a very old story.And because the Internet became a part of every day life- it is also used as a tool for everyday things such as bullying,etc.
I am sure it's not the first case ( other stories just didn't have so much publicity) and not the last of course. And yes, parents are blamed for this always-but you just can't really monitor a teenager!!!Did your parents know everything about you,no matter how hard they tried to monitor?
These things are happened and it's terrible but there's not only one person,who takes the blame.(thought the people who are bullers deserve very serious punishment IMHO)
On this same forum we have discussed cyberbullying before, right after this tragedy happened. Ira's efforts to draw attention to Megan Meier's parents' role in the whole situation however is a worthwhile contribution to this debate in particular and the general debate––outside IE––catalyzed by Megan's suicide. You're right Ira, the fact that those apparently directly responsible for this suicide cannot be prosecuted accordingly, points out flaws in the US legal system, and once again reveals the overall problems lawmakers have to adapt to the digital age. Moreover, I agree with you that a lot could have been done to prevent this from happening, especially because Megan Meier already was quite troubled. Her parents are mainly responsibility here, and you're right in pointing this out.
I would find it interesting though, to discuss what would be the best strategy to prevent these tragedies to happen again. It seems to me that most debates on this topic––especially in the popular press––focus on treatment of symptoms exclusively, in stead of addressing the root of the problem. To me, what the Megan Meier case comes down to is digital literacy. Whether we like it or not, the internet and MySpace are there. In stead of frantically keeping our children's pure souls away from the evil, evil internet, we should teach them to approach the web responsibly, with and without the guidance of parents. This implies that parents should become more digitally literate too––it seems Megan's parents were not.
I have to agree that, while Megan's suicide was terrible, Drew is not the only one to be held to blame in this tragic situation.
Where was Mom...really? I mean, she SAYS she was monitoring her daughter on MySpace, but, as pointed out, Megan was too young anyway, to be on this site. And, if Megan had all the problems that Mom states that she had, why oh why would she let her daughter become involved with a "boy" on the internet, as she did. It can be dangerous for an adult to become involved with another adult on the internet, but a possible suicidal teen becoming involved with another teen? And seemingly with Mom's blessings? I'm still trying to sort out that one.
Finally, my question must be, how much help was Megan receiving, with all the talk of suicide? And if she was that suicidal (which, it seems like she was as it did not take much to push her over the edge), why, as Paul mentioned, was this account even needed? If I had a child who was even talking suicide quite a bit, the last thing I would do would be to let her open up a MySpace or any other type of account, where anything could be said about him or her. It would be much more important to get to the bottom of their reasons for the suicidal talk for their 14th birthday.
As I said, this was a tragic situation, but, it was also a blaitant abuse of MySpace by both parties. Drew, for what she did, and Megan's mom for letting her daughter have the account to begin with.
It is episodes of bad judgement and misuse like this that help to give the internet a bad name. There is much discussion about internet predators...BUT, no one mentions that these "predators" would not get far if kids, who are old enough to know better, and even adults, did not voluntarially give out information, meeting places, etc. How many times do we hear about kids and teens giving out personal information to people they don't even know on line?
And will this episode hurt MySpace? If it did, I think it would be unfairly so. It seems like we are quick to blame the internet for tragedies, but slow to realize that, many times, the internet criminal can only get as much information as is provided to them. Granted, banks, government and other big business areas are making this easier and easier for the cyber criminals, but the individual does not have to add to it by setting themselves or a loved one up, even if it was unintentional.
I know none of us were there, but it does seem that many mistakes were made on both sides. I do hope that people learn from Megan's tragedy. And while it is a hard lesson, especially for her family, maybe others will now be more careful, and parents will actually follow age limits for sites, and use more common sense with kids and teens on computers. Especially troubled kids and teens.
Many thanks for this post which i believe has offered us the opportunity to look at this matter from a holistic point of view. The Meier family would always have my deepest sympathy and as you rightly pointed out it's a shame that the legal system could not make the perpetrators of such heinous and cowardly act accountable.However, our task now is to holistically assess this story for valuable lessons we can learn that will help us face the challenges of the internet age.
Why Megan's parents allowed her to use MySpace at 13 even though the legal age to have an account is 14? Do they feel that by letting her meet and involved with a boy whom they have never met would be a good therapy for thier daughter's depression?Personally, i think that even at age 14, young people would not be prepared for a malicious campign against them. Frankly, Megan's parents have to accept some responsibility, an emotionally fragile child should not have a MySpace account.
It's reported that Tina meier, the mother of Megan is already going through guilt for agreeing to let Mega have a MySpace account mere months bfore her 14th birthday. Sadly, according to the St. Charles journal story, the Meiers may be heading toward divorce due to the strain of grief on their marriage exacerbated by the mother's guilt. Although she confessed that they closely monitored Megan's access and that she could'nt get on-line unless they accessed the Net for her and that she checked what "Josh" was telling her daughter, was the supevision sufficient or as Ira pointed out was the account even needful in the first place for a teen like Megan who according to her mother has mentioned suicide several times but had never attempted it?
I hope that this incident would alert many more parents to the danger that can exist in cyberworld and take appropiate actions.
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
In his recent Congressional testimony, Dennis Blair, the U.S. director of national intelligence, stated that the U.S. is "severely threatened" by cyber attacks and that the recent Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) attacks should serve as a wake-up call.
I keep telling people that if they do everything right, they will be generally secure. I like to think I do everything right myself to minimize the likelihood of being hit by malware. I avoid going to unusual sites. I don’t click on links in strange emails. When reading normal emails, I verify any embedded links, just in case.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is going on a hiring spree. They intend to hire more than 1,000 cybersecurity experts over the next three years.
Given all the issues we have with cybersecurity, it amazes me that every time there is a government effort to improve security, it always involves calls for more research. Such is the case with the proposed Cybersecurity Enhancement Act.
Smarter Collaboration: How to Thrive in a Challenging Business Environment Market conditions are changing faster than ever, and organizations need to improve their agility and adaptability in order to provide better service and improve processes. The ability to work with customers, business partners, and employees as effectively as possible - while at the same time holding down costs - is a key to success. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
What can users today do to protect their online privacy? The simplest and most obvious option is to not use the Internet – at all. However, once all digital information is consolidated over the Internet, trying to protect digital identity by simply unplugging from the Internet becomes impossible – a fact that has manifest implications for civil liberties, Saunders says.
By 2011 the number of Internet-connected sensors will exceed 1 trillion, making your chances of doing anything or going anywhere unnoticed pretty much zero. Saunders talks about how the 'sensortization' of the Internet is eliminating the traditional divide between online and offline populations.
The 20th Century Internet was characterized by the ability to interact with other people and information on the Internet largely without anyone knowing who you were. The Internet of this century, conversely, will be defined by identity. Saunders explains how Internet users are unwittingly contributing to the demise of the anonymous Internet.
Steve Saunders talks about the risks inherent in uncontrolled, widespread profiling of Internet users, and how one day this practice could form the basis of a new industry, the Outernet, which in economic terms will have outgrown the commercial value of the Internet itself.
Search companies and social networks are collecting incredibly detailed information about their users, says Steve Saunders, who predicts that these 'profiles' could one day become commodities to be bought and sold by companies on 'profile markets' or 'identity exchanges’ – the digital DNA equivalents of the financial and commodities exchanges on which stocks, oil, and gold are traded.
One of the most important Internet issues of all time is being ignored by the media. In this three-part video series Steve Saunders explains how search companies are turning the tables on their users by creating user profiles for financial gain, and how soon this trend will explode into full scale profiling.
More companies are trolling social networks to find and vet potential job candidates. Beware the pitfalls of blurring the line between personal and professional lives.
It is 20 years since the invention of the World Wide Web, and the Internet has changed beyond recognition since then. Steve Saunders peers into the future to predict what the Web will look like in another 20 years time – and he doesn’t like what he sees.
Research shows that the youth of today like Facebook – but not blogging or Twitter. Does that mean Facebook has won, or just that it's not yet out of favor? Will all the services we see today fade into Ovaltine-or-Wheaties status in just a few years?
Data mining of social networks means people might face unforeseen consequences as a result of their seemingly innocuous personal choices and associations.
Research shows that the youth of today like Facebook – but not blogging or Twitter. Does that mean Facebook has won, or just that it's not yet out of favor? Will all the services we see today fade into Ovaltine-or-Wheaties status in just a few years?
What kinds of companies are doing the most innovation in the data center? Turns out it's midtier enterprises that are taking the "Just Right" approach.
Ray Kurzweil's Blio and Apple's iPad tablet will make it easier than ever to have books "read" to us, says Dr. Kim, who believes that talking tablets will become interwoven into our consciousness as we "merge" with the increasingly elegant machines we hold in our hands.
Digg
Del.icio.us
Reddit
Email This
TWEET THIS
