When Free Speech Crosses the Line

[browneyedgirl]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11649424/

There have been a rash of crime&borderline behavior involving the MySpace blogs. This, authorities say, is just the tip of the iceberg---no telling what is actually going on behind the scenes! You name it, MySpace seems to have it!

My son had a very bad experience with MySpace which forced him to abandon his blog&get a totally new nick, and profile to begin another. I did not even know what happened until 3 months later. Maybe he will explain. Wasn't criminal, but something that was not to be tolerated.

[NeonVomit]

The price of freedom. A glorious concept, but not an easy one to deal with.

[SETH]

Last year my gf and I both got blogs on myspace so we could send messages to each other. It never occurred to us to block everyone from our page. I started getting messages from a guy I did not know. I think he was from California. Right off he was aggressive, and I just ignored him. I should have put him on the block mode but I thought if I just ignored him he would stop. Finally he starts calling me the "N" word, and at that point I had had it. I wrote him a message and told him my intention of having the blog and if he was going to be so hateful to me not to write at all. He then sends me a very distubing, disgusting image very large and that was when I informed myspace. The guy had not threatened me, just was obnoxious and annoying. So, they froze my blog and told me to just form another and use a different user and profile, and said if I had only used the blockuser thing at first it would not have got that far.
So, now I have a blog for 6 months now and no problems. Just my gf and a few close friends can access it. Its embarassing to say, but I am an 80year old female on my profile, different state, no city. My gf also had a guy who started pestering her, but she blocked him right off the bat.
Last month I finally told my mom about all this and showed her the old blog which I can still access. Needless to say she really hit the roof. But, she knows it was nothing anyone can do in a case like that. There is no laws against someone just being hateful to someone on the Internet. All a person can do is block them, if possible.
The bad apples will spoil myspace for the good people who want to use it. I hope not because it is a good and fun idea.

[browneyedgirl]

Well, Vic, I tell ya--if someone had sent me an image like that guy had sent you, I'd been tempted to call the cops! Its bad enough when sorry people write you sorry messages, but I would not have had patience to tolerate an image like that. Not many people would.
I'm glad you worked all that out&hopefully all goes well with that blog service, because it is a useful thing&fun, too, if people would just obey the rules of etiquette&human decency.


@Talk of free speech, I think our code writer has returned. AGAIN!!!!!!

[Miguel_Ricardo]

what was the picture about?

[Beast_Pete]

I support the school. They were right in kicking those kids out. It's okay, if someone dislikes somebody, we are humans, aren't we? But hating someone this much? :/

[browneyedgirl]

I support the school. They were right in kicking those kids out. It's okay, if someone dislikes somebody, we are humans, aren't we? But hating someone this much? :/

At best, it was totally childish&stupid. At worst, to threaten someone like that is a criminal act. I cannot believe some people in the world think that kind of treatment is actually funny!!!! I can just image how hurt&scared the poor girl was who was treated like shit in this manner. People tell kids getting treated like shit in this way to not take it personally, but how the Hell can someone NOT take it personally? Being an outcast&a target for attacks, serious attacks, is reason to feel personally offended! Even if those nuts had no intention carrying out any violence against that girl, what they did was totally stupid&uncalled for!


@Miguel, it was sick. :sick: Maybe Vic will tell you in a PM someday--thats up to him.

[iron_thunder]

wow, that's nuts... my little myspace thing is so wholesome! the most vile thing i have is a story about a rotten tomato i threw away

there was a guy that i used to work for, doing landscaping and shit. he ended up stalking me in real life and on the internet. ... i contacted the email provider, and his account got shut down, but it took a lot more than that to get him out of my life.

i lost several paychecks out of it, but... well at least there isn't someone hiding in the bushes across the street anymore.

anyway... fuck yeah, the internet is fucking insane.

[Jester]

The school overstepped it's bounds. What a kid does on his or her own time is the business of themselves and their parents. If the threat is known to have existed, the student should be pulled aside, questioned, parents notified, etc. If the threat turns to action, the kid would be bounced from the school, and legal action would be taken.


Kids talk out of their ass all the time. When I was a kid, I did too.


Jesse

[NeonVomit]

Kids talk out of their ass all the time.

Exactly. On many occasions, they don't even know what they're doing is wrong. They're kids!

[browneyedgirl]

The school overstepped it's bounds. What a kid does on his or her own time is the business of themselves and their parents. If the threat is known to have existed, the student should be pulled aside, questioned, parents notified, etc. If the threat turns to action, the kid would be bounced from the school, and legal action would be taken.


Kids talk out of their ass all the time. When I was a kid, I did too.


Jesse

I'm willing to bet my life that if you had been the VICTIM you would not be talking so lightly about this situation. "Talking out of one's ass" as you call it&the treatment these pinheads gave this poor girl are 2 different things entirely.

[NeonVomit]

The school overstepped it's bounds. What a kid does on his or her own time is the business of themselves and their parents. If the threat is known to have existed, the student should be pulled aside, questioned, parents notified, etc. If the threat turns to action, the kid would be bounced from the school, and legal action would be taken.


Kids talk out of their ass all the time. When I was a kid, I did too.


Jesse

I'm willing to bet my life that if you had been the VICTIM you would not be talking so lightly about this situation. "Talking out of one's ass" as you call it&the treatment these pinheads gave this poor girl are 2 different things entirely.

As we said, they're kids. They don't realise what they're doing. Everything is a game to them. Kids can be REALLY nasty, because they don't understand about racism or disabilities and the like. They'll make fun of anything, and the reason for this is because of their undeveloped minds and emotions.

I'm hardly taking this lightly. If I'd been the victim, sure I'd want harsh treatment. But if the victims of all crime got what they wanted against the perpetrators, I'm sure the population of the world would be a lot smaller. That's why we have courts and jurys who are meant to look at things in an objective way, unclouded by the emotion of personal involvement.
I seriously don't think that they should've been treated so harsly. Given a very firm warning, notified parents, yes. I'm not saying the school should have taken no action.

Now, potentially their futures are ruined, purely for having done something stupid at a young age before they were aware of and knew what they were doing.

[browneyedgirl]

This was how the incident of Columbine started out--just young boys having "fun". "Boys will be boys". And, I don't believe they did not realize what they were doing--they know enough to intentionally say rotten&mean things to/about people. They had a choice. We are not talking about 10&11-year olds here, but older teens.
I don't think their futures are totally ruined---the USA justice system in regards to juvenile crime is one of the most leniet in the world. If these kids learn their lesson, keep their nose clean&act like decent humans for 5 years their records will be wiped totally clean as if they had not done such foolishness. Maybe next time they will think before they purposely hurt someone else. If doing what they did was considered fun in their eyes, then they needed help and I hope they get it.

[cliff]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11649424/

There have been a rash of crime&borderline behavior involving the MySpace blogs. This, authorities say, is just the tip of the iceberg---no telling what is actually going on behind the scenes! You name it, MySpace seems to have it! .

We had similar pbms in France with a blog system called "Skyblog", especially during the french riots. Many f*ckers used their own blog to call the people to hate policemen and kill them, stuff like that...
Then, fine.
But on the other hand, I heard that 2 students were fired from their school, just because they wrote on their Skyblog about one teacher, they simply treated him of "jerk who smells" or something... That was really exagerated...

I hate blogs so much. I really don't understand how people can write so many personal stuffs about themselves in a public space, knowing that many people they don't know will come and read, and sometimes comments.
but of course, if you lock your blog so only your friends can read it, then it's fine.

[NordicStorm]

Suspending kids for viewing a website is clearly over the line. Especially since, according to the article, it wasn't even certain they were aware what the contents of the website was. The school ought to retract those suspensions.
But expulsion is an appropriate measure for the person actually posting the death threats. Actions have consequences. I sure as hell wasn't running around making death threats when I was in my early teens (the article didn't specify age, but middle school is typically ages 12-14/15, is it not?)
It's even one thing to blurt things out in the heat of an argument on a schoolyard, but taking the effort to create a website to post your tripe? That's something else. Even when it's a highly automated and fast procedure, you have a pretty good idea what it is you're doing.

[Jester]

I'm not saying it should be taken lightly. Death threats are serious. All I'm saying is that IF you pulled that kid aside, and IF you notified the kids parents, sat them down in the principal's office WITH the kid, SHOWED the parents the website, INFORMED them of what they can expect if their kids threats turn to actions. The legal system would throw the book at the kid, etc. I feel that might be enough.

I'm a person who believes, like in the case of Columbine, that the parents need to be brought up on charges.


In my opinion, the decline in decent behavior, and the severity of some of this behavior only points to the break down of the family structure here in the States. I know it sounds corny but I believe it to be true. If the family is strong they usually know what their kid is up to. My parents were always up my ass as a kid. I hated it then, but grateful for it now.

Columbine, and other similar stories could have been prevented at the parental level.


Jesse

[NeonVomit]

Suspending kids for viewing a website is clearly over the line. Especially since, according to the article, it wasn't even certain they were aware what the contents of the website was. The school ought to retract those suspensions.
But expulsion is an appropriate measure for the person actually posting the death threats. Actions have consequences. I sure as hell wasn't running around making death threats when I was in my early teens (the article didn't specify age, but middle school is typically ages 12-14/15, is it not?)
It's even one thing to blurt things out in the heat of an argument on a schoolyard, but taking the effort to create a website to post your tripe? That's something else. Even when it's a highly automated and fast procedure, you have a pretty good idea what it is you're doing.

What he said. I should've specified that viewing the website should most certainly not have led to expulsion. I mean, come on, we've all accidentally seen websites we'd rather forget!

For those actually posting them, something more should have been done, this is true. Psychological evaluation, counselling and warnings.

[SETH]

@Cliff you are right. I should have blocked that guy after the first hateful thing he said. but, I was naive. I thought if I just ignore the person he would stop. Now I realize that if a person is bound and determined to be nasty to someone, they will find a way to be hateful no matter how much they are ignored.

As to the article, there is a name given to dudes like that. Troubled. Nobody that I know, including myself, has ever EVER thought about doing that to somebody. And my group in school was and is still considered A Wild Bunch! Certainly, city kids and rural kids are different, I think. The worse thing most of us do is rolling yards on Halloween night, or something of that sort. the point is, doing what those guys did, of that magnitude has never crossed my mind or hopefully the minds of my buddys.
And, i agree that the kids who just viewed that page should not be expelled. that was just silly.