Reading man jailed for dead girl 'trolling' insults

Originally posted by Orkojoker
If you are of the opinion that the best thing to do is put this guy in jail, what is your reason? I can think of a couple possibilities. Some people may feel that a few months in jail will prevent him from committing the same offense after he gets out. Others might think that his punishment will deter other people from committing similar offenses. A certain percentage of people probably just don't like what he did and want him to be hurt as revenge. I'm interested to know how many people fall into each category.

I honestly think it is best to jail him for his own protection from those he offended, until their anger blows over.

He posted offensive and abusive comments on the internet because he felt safe doing so, if he went and said those comments to the parents and families affected his own safety would have been severely compromised.........he is just slightly luckier he didn't and is in jail.........guaranteed he will still get a smack off someone whilst doing his time and rightly so.

Wolfie

Originally posted by Wolfie_UK
He posted offensive and abusive comments on the internet because he felt safe doing so, if he went and said those comments to the parents and families affected his own safety would have been severely compromised.........he is just slightly luckier he didn't and is in jail.........guaranteed he will still get a smack off someone whilst doing his time and rightly so.

Wolfie

There is no anonimity, I'm sure given enough time I could find any offender I wanted too from any forum...I just don't care to but beleive me it can and is done daily.

Originally posted by mnmcandiez
reply to post by fooks

 

Words are JUST words. PEOPLE are jerks at times, stop being sensitive and get over it.

If you don't have freedom of speech you have nothing.

And sickening videos that target people when they are at one of the lowest points in their lives...

Sigh.

Why do you feel it necessary to defend the right to target people with hate and malice when they lose a loved one?

"Oh, don't take away our right to post disgusting videos and Facebook pages that make a mockery of a families loss...” Are you serious? If you read back through this thread you will see why I find this so atrocious. Our family had this happen to a close relative. Have you lost someone only to see foul remarks posted on a Facebook page THE DAY AFTER? I doubt it. We hadn’t even buried them and already we had to put up with that kind of filth. All on a Facebook page a friend of theirs had created. Personally I dislike Facebook (and the like) tribute pages. As I’ve mentioned before, I find them trashy and don’t think they are respectful at all but others use them so it’s out of my hands.

Stay off the internet then, some might say. Well why should I have to? Oh I see - it’s because people like you want everyone to have the right to be able to do this kind of thing. People like you who have no understanding of the hurt it creates. People like you who think it’s a harmless little joke. Yes I could have avoided going there, but when a relative notified me of certain comments that appeared there I went to see what the fuss was about. I wish I hadn’t.

Personally I don't have a problem with people being able to say what they believe; I have a problem with unnecessary, vulgar attacks on the recently departed and their families by a complete stranger who didn't even know them. Until anyone has experienced that, I don’t believe they are qualified to state such rubbish.

Again, I believe people should be able to say what they like, I don’t believe in strangers attacking people they don’t even know at one of the saddest points of their lives with obscene posts and videos for their own sick little giggles. Sad little losers.

Originally posted by joshter
reply to post by sepermeru

 

Lol that's not illegal at all. If I walked around telling everyone that I think they're ugly and a waste of space I wouldn't be arrested or given a ticket if the cops were called....

Yes, you would be arrested for harassment and disturbing the peace. You really think what you described above is and should be legal behavior?

To me attacking people personally like that is a form of stalking.
Anyone who does this should be aware that they can be suspected of planning real physical harm, and treated accordingly.
When someone goes as far as making Youtube videos attacking a bereaved family, one simply doesn't know whether they will just stick to cyber-trolling or have psychopathic intentions.
Hence they shouldn't cry if law enforcement does a pre-emptive strike, just like they do to potential terrorists.
Better safe than sorry.

Sounds like the guy can put his talents for insulting the dead and bereaved to good use with the Phelps clan, and he'd be perfect for the Westboro protests, and he could design some less tedious new posters for them.
I doubt the US would let him in however.
If you insult people in the name of religion it also seems quite legal.

Looking at the guy is a good reminder of what kind of people (with obvious physical complexes about themselves) do this kind of thing, and that one should never believe what they post is the truth, but just a way of expressing their inferiority.

Originally posted by woogleuk
reply to post by BetterCallSaul

 

Yes illegal, hate speech, causing emotional distress, misuse of communication.

It would be illegal to kick the living crap out of the guy, so jail is the next best thing.

If you truly believe this man does not deserve jail for causing misery to others, you need to check your human morality.

So we should start locking people up for saying mean things? It doesn't matter if the man had good or bad things to say. They were just words.

I have human morality. I feel for those people and I think it's despicable that a man would say things like that to the family, but at the end of the day I'm not going to incarcerate another human being for being mean. I think this country has enough people in jail for no reason and stuffing one more behind bars doesn't seem like a reasonable solution.

The guy has Aspergers and I'm not using that as an excuse for the courts to go easy on him. God no.
Some times people with Aspergers don't 'get' that while they are 'having a laugh', they are hurting people. They don't understand why people are getting upset. When people like him and the other Aspie I mentioned sit on 4chan all day, what are they gonna think? They have boards and raids on memorial pages all the time on there. It's acceptable for him to do things that others find funny.

By all means chuck him in a detention centre for a while. Get him some therapy. He has an illness and he needs to understand that this kinda thing just isn't cricket, old chap.

reply to post by Flyer


In the USA you will not be jailed/fined/charged with a crime for calling someone a name...or making fun of someones dead grandmother.

We don't have "hate speech" laws like most of Europe does.


If you threaten to kill someone with words or libel them then that is another story.



It's extremely scary if you think making fun of a dead girl is a crime. Speech is speech.... stop trying to control what people say. If you think that you have the authority to control someones speech you are a tyrant yourself. For ANYONE to be on ATS and want to control freedom of speech is just weird/conflict of interest.

reply to post by mnmcandiez


No, you can be arrested for verbal crimes in the US too. Generally, you have to do it more than one time, but in the hypotheticals as well as the real story, "pattern of harassment" is a phrase which fits the behaviors described just fine.

To be clear, people arguing with this point are arguing that, for example, an abusive ex-spouse can follow a woman (or man) around yelling 'You ****** you are so ******* stupid that you should ********* a ****** with a great big *******' and if the police are called, nothing bad happens to that person.

reply to post by sepermeru


That is comparing oranges and apples. Freedom of speech and harassing someone is two different concepts. You can also get arrested for "inducing a panic" if you yell fire in a loaded movie theater. Again, this is not comparable to "hate speech" laws.

reply to post by mnmcandiez


Oh, so if I follow a black person around and call them names, then you think that's okay? What are you on about? How is it any different at all? The person in the story did the equivalent of following the family around and calling their dead daughter names, only he did it on the internet instead of in the street.

And hate speech laws in the US always have to be attached to an existing crime -- there's no such thing as a "hate crime" without a crime that was already on the books involved. Murder, for example, is broken down into many levels of severity depending on the person's state of mind. One of the states of mind we now include is whether the person was acting out of intent to intimidate an entire group. What's so hard to understand about that?

Now, this is different in the UK, but they don't have our Constitution -- they don't have a Constitution at all, in fact, in the same written sense we do. And the US definition of "freedom" is not the only ethically, philosophically, or practically valid one on the planet, you know.

reply to post by sepermeru


If you call a black/white/blue person a racial slur then big deal. It is freedom of speech....get over it. I've been called a honkey, cracker, etc many times. It's really not that big of a deal. Getting in arguments/confrontations/people being mean to you is a part of life and reality. People are allowed to be jerks/racist. This is NOT a crime. If you think it is then you are entering into the world of tyrannical thought crime laws.

If you stalk them or "follow them around" then it has the potential to become a crime. Not because of the words, but because of stalking and harassment laws. You are potentially putting the person in danger at that point.

And of course there couldn't be a hate crime in the USA without a already standing law being broke. That's like saying the chicken came before the egg. But in most of the EU it can be illegal to merely call someone a retarded homosexual spookface. This is not illegal in the USA.

If you think calling someone a "bad word" is a crime then you are an incredibly scary individual to have in a free society.

Originally posted by Flyer
reply to post by Bridge_Boy

 

Hes already been given a caution and didnt stop. Hes a repeat offender so the 2 options for me would be to ban him from computers permanently or send him to prison.

He would have probably preferred the latter if he had a choice.

Alcohol is no excuse, neither is Apsergers which is know a knee jerk defence for everyone who gets arrested for doing something online.

Um, so inept social skills based on mental illness is reason to lock someone up? I don't see it. Alcohol is no excuse, but a mental disorder is. Alcoholism is a mental disorder.

It's time we, as a whole, start to examine these mental disorders and where they are coming from. Perhaps, for starters, conducting the bulk of our socialization on the internet is not helping things...

reply to post by mnmcandiez


I just want to know why it's so important to you that you retain the right to call people cruel names. Since we are already not only capable of but practiced at defining speech and where and when it is legal, up to and including 'freedom of speech zones' and the like, I don't see why it's so difficult to perceive this particular aspect of that debate in the same light.

reply to post by sepermeru


It's important because there is a question where you are going to draw the line. Pretty soon saying any tiny offensive thing is going to get you fined or jailed. Toughen up buttercup.

reply to post by BetterCallSaul


Good for you. Personally I believe, if someone attacks a family verbally after they lose a kid, they should be locked away, they deserve it. YOU didn't lose a child, YOU have no idea of the grief the family is going through, YOU were not attacked by this awful little man on an internet page, YOU have no idea of the upset and anger this silly little troll has caused the family.

Justice is for everybody.

reply to post by Domo1


It seems like you're the one who isn't tough enough to handle a world in which you're not allowed to say whatever you want whenever you want. There's a word for that kind of mentality, you know. A few words, in fact.

You're engaging in a well-known logical fallacy known as the slippery slope. I have already pointed out that we regularly, routinely make all kinds of decisions about what kind of speech is prohibited when, so where is this "line" you're so worried about?

reply to post by sepermeru

You're engaging in a well-known logical fallacy known as the slippery slope.

I was implying that you are the one on a slippery slope. Right now it's people making fun of dead girls that go to jail. Where do you end it? When calling someone fat lands them in the slammer?

reply to post by sepermeru


Because all speech has to be protected. You can't pick and chose because something PERSONALLY offends you. This is the basis of freedom of speech. Very simple concept here.

Making "bad words" illegal is extremely scary, tyrannical, and blocks freedom of expression. There will always be hate in the world. It is part of being a human, we have all felt negative emotions and we have all called someone a name at some point in our life. By your logic we are all criminals because I called my sister stupid at some point in time......