Cyber-bullying and suicide?

May 7, 2008 8:17 PM

Do you know of any suicides in response to online abuse and harassment ("cyber-bullying")? For example, Megan Meier and Ryan Halligan.

I am doing research for a piece I plan to write, but I'm mostly finding articles about internet suicide pacts and not about people driven to suicide by online harassment.

I would really appreciate any leads or links if you've got them.

Thank you!

posted by Jacqueline to computers & internet (9 comments total)

Ad executive Paul Tilley is said to have committed suicide in response to online criticism. My link is to a blogger who is protesting that explanation of the suicide.
posted by jayder at 9:00 PM on May 7

Look, I can't access it at work, and this may seem in poor taste, but you might find www.encyclopediadramatica.(org? com?) a useful starting point - run a search on "AN HERO" and if my memory serves you might gather a bit of rudimentary intel.
posted by turgid dahlia at 9:15 PM on May 7

Look here! (NSFW) Scroll down to the bottom to expand the "An Hero" series box. If you are still offended by things on the Internet, you should probably not visit this website.
posted by Electrius at 9:43 PM on May 7

An hero (completely NSFW, generally totally insensitive and lulzy with some disturbing pics, but that's ED for ya.)
posted by neckro23 at 9:44 PM on May 7

Does text-messaging count? A quick google for "SMS bullying suicide" shows a few (believed) cases, in Norway, New Zealand and the UK.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 10:02 PM on May 7

Jeffrey Johnston.
posted by tellurian at 12:07 AM on May 8

(You're probably already aware of this, but just in case...) Frontline did this show about "Growing Up Online" and while I don't remember a considerable amount of talk of cyberbullying in the episode (pretty sure it came out before Megan Meier's story was well-publicized), a quick search of interview snippets turns up the quote:

We've had six kids that I'm aware of commit suicide in the United States in the last few years because they've been cyberbullied, and just recently we've just lost the first kid who committed suicide because her best friend had been cyberbullied and committed suicide six months before. So we now have one level beyond the cyberbullying, where kids have decided they can't live with what's happening to them

...but for some reason Parry Aftab's full interview didn't make it to the "Interviews" page. It's entirely possible that you might be able to pull some salient quotes from the other interviews though! There's also a links page that lists news articles and studies/research.
posted by giraffe at 5:54 AM on May 8

It might be hard to get real information because one of the aspects of suicide is that the people often feel isolated and so real information about what affected them might be hard to get.
posted by gjc at 7:13 AM on May 8

Thanks, everyone, for all the leads! I really appreciate it.

If you have any more, please keep them coming.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:23 PM on May 8