The weekly newsletter for Fed2 by ibgames

EARTHDATE: January 13, 2008

Official News page 5


SHOULD IT BE ILLEGAL TO LIE ONLINE?

by Hazed

Before Christmas I reported on the gruesome story of the chat-room love triangle which ended in murder, where two of the participants had lied about who they were, claiming to be much younger and prettier than the real life truth. That ugly little saga showed the dangers of pretending to be something you are not online - which many people do. Now there's a new, even sadder story, and it could set a very nasty precedent.

This tragic story involves a 13-year old girl, who committed suicide after being spurned on MySpace by someone she thought was a 16-year old boy, but who turned out to be the mother of the girl's former best friend, with whom she had had a falling out.

It appears that after the two girls had stopped being friends, the mother of one of them had decided to create a fake profile on MySpace so she could keep on eye on the other girl, presumably to see if she was saying nasty things about her daughter. Setting herself up as a 16-year old boy, she made friends with the girl, but later rejected her and treated her badly - which is what led to the very sad suicide.

Prosecutors in Missouri, where the girl lived, have been trying to find a way to prosecute the woman, but so far they have failed. However, federal prosecutors in LA, where MySpace is based, are reported to be exploring the option of prosecuting her under federal wire fraud statutes, which can carry penalties of up to twenty years in jail. The fraud would be, of course, lying in her MySpace profile.

I am sure that everybody who hears this story will condemn the woman's behavior, but if you stop and think about it for a moment, you will probably accept that it would have been impossible to predict the terribly tragic outcome. But even if you consider to be absolutely reprehensible, should she be thrown in jail for it?

In my opinion, no, for two reasons. Reason 1: it would in effect be criminalizing nastiness. You can't make a law against behaving in an unpleasant manner, and you can't imprison someone for being a bitch. In the UK, the use of ASBOs (anti-social behavior orders) are an attempt to do just that, and they have resulted in a real mess.

Reason 2: This would set the precedent that telling lies online could lead to prosecution. Not only would it become illegal to pretend to be a different age or gender in order to form relationships online, it could also be illegal to give false info when registering for a site, in order to remain anonymous. You could probably stretch it to say that role-playing being a different character would be covered, too - after all, when I pretend to be the demi-goddess Hazed, aren't I telling lies?

So, sad as I think this story is, and horrible as the woman probably is, there's nothing the law can - or should - do about it. She's going to suffer, anyway, with the guilt of what her actions caused, and with the approbation of the community she lives in.


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