Is this an appropriate defense for cyber bullying/stalking?

Asked by Cyberdefense (14) October 15th, 2012

The following is a statement I would like to post on a web community profile:

“Urgent Matter

I’m afraid I have to step forward and speak of a vendetta being played out here among us.

I have ignored attempts to cyber bully me and one of the poets among us has crossed over into stalking. I DON’T MAKE THIS ACCUSATION LIGHTLY.

I know this person is doing ten of the twenty five tactic of a stalker including numbers (1,2,4,5,6,8ab&c,13,18,19 & 20). I suspect this person is now doing fourteen of the twenty five tactics of a stalker. I have listed them at the bottom of this post.

If she asks for your participation in any way you may want to think twice because you will be participating in a crime.

I am now convinced this individual is obsessed with me. I only want to be left alone. I have not tried to perpetuate this situation in any way, but am deliberately staying far away from engaging this individual. Given the seriousness of the matter I am now being very careful to stay far away, but I am being pursued.

I have plenty of documentation of this behavior as it has run across my path and the evidence is overwhelming. Veiled threats are now being made to me.

This is not a game of chess or an episode of Big Brother. If you have become caught up in a mob mentality with this individual thinking you are in pursuit of someone who deserves punishment, you need to measure you behavior by the list at the bottom of this page and not play this out participating in any of that behavior.

Many of you know her as I did and she has been a sweet dear friend to many of us. Her propensity to become obsessed with any man that does not put her first precedes her. She has a hair trigger whiplash reaction if she feels betrayed by you and has a 180 change in behavior. Plenty of this behavior is being played out right before your eyes.

I suspect this person has multiple profiles with some of those even on my friends list. In order to eliminate this issue I may have to clear my friends list of anyone I do not know well. If I remove anyone that is not involved I am sorry but I just don’t know how deeply this individual has dug (mole) herself into my world.

This individual used to be a personal online friend and now is notoriously playing out a vendetta against me in spite of the fact that I have not engaged or responded to her in a retaliatory manner. Because she was a personal friend I am concerned that my personal contact information will be distributed next. If anyone sees this, this is a crime and you need to report it to the site owner Mr (omitted) or the police. I have a family and have been very careful and very quiet as this has escalated to not antagonize this behavior.

But as veiled threats are now becoming evident I feel compelled to speak out. Let it stand as demonstrative and evidence that I am not the aggressor in that I have not even publish her name. Let it stand as evidence that I have not published a continuous stream of cryptic disparaging remarks across the post and poems of this site. Let it stand as evidence that as this has escalated I have become more passive and stayed further from her.

I am only guilty of supporting a friend who has tried to stand against the cyber bullying that is being perpetrated but now realize that participation and those poems were not the correct way to handle this.

In contrast this individual has a continuous stream of disparaging remarks cast far and wide across this site, is actively campaigning for advocacy, maligning me through private messages and is writing poetry of revenge betrayal and I suspect in fake profiles, death.

But let it also stand as demonstrative and evidence in that many will know exactly who I am talking about based on her behavior alone.

If you have participated in this, thinking this was a game, your sticking up for the victim, or you have been caught up in the mob mentality cease and desist immediately, you have been unknowingly pulled into a crime.

Given that we are on a poetry site the veil of cryptic is an apt device. But if you saw as much as I have, which is likely only the tip of the iceburg you would see the full context and you could see how egregious her behavior is.

This individual’s objective is being played out as a vendetta given her malice for me and she wishes to chase me off of this site (omitted) which is a typical motivation and demonstrates what I am purporting here.

She has used false accusation and I suspect has even campaigned to get me removed from this site without significant good reason. The fact that I am still here is further evidence of my innocence in this matter.

To this individual LEAVE ME ALONE. The following are the traits and behavior of a stalker. Read them and take a long hard look at yourself. You are now made aware that your behavior has crossed the line into criminal. Cease and desist immediately from any of the below mentioned activity.

I’m sorry I have so offended you for you to become so obsessed and feel compelled to play out a vendetta against me. I cannot recall any behavior that justifies your actions, which demonstrates obsession on your part. I have been perplexed at how angry you have become over nothing and therefore now am concerned about your rationale on these matters.

I have notified the authorities of the threatening statements you have made and will continue to supply them with evidence if it continues to come to me.

WHETHER DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY

LEAVE ME ALONE!

Cyber Stalking:

Definition:

Cyberstalking is the use of the Internet or other electronic means to stalk or harass an individual, a group of individuals, or an organization. It may include the making of false accusations or statements of fact (as in defamation), monitoring, making threats, identity theft, damage to data or equipment, the solicitation of minors for sex, or gathering information that may be used to harass. The definition of “harassment” must meet the criterion that a reasonable person, in possession of the same information, would regard it as sufficient to cause another reasonable person distress.

Stalking is a continuous process, consisting of a series of actions, each of which may be entirely legal in itself.

“Stalking is a form of mental assault, in which the perpetrator repeatedly, unwantedly, and disruptively breaks into the life-world of the victim, with whom he has no relationship (or no longer has), with motives that are directly or indirectly traceable to the affective sphere.

Motivations:

Malice
Cause distress
Obsession
Vendetta
Limit victims activities online
Drive them away from a online community
Undermine autonomy
Undermine dignity
Undermine identity
Undermine opportunities

Tactics:

1) Harassment
2) Threats
3) Disregarded warnings to stop,
4) Seek to damage reputation:
5) Turn other people against them
6) Encourage others to harass the victim
7) Post false information about them on websites:
8) Set up their own websites, blogs or user pages for this purpose
a. Multiple fake pages to spy
b. Multiple fake pages to send harassing threatening poems
c. Multiple fake pages to intimidate
9) They post allegations to newsgroups,
10) Post allegations to chat rooms
11) Post to other sites that allow public contributions,
12) Gather information
13) Approach friends to gather information or malign
14) Approach family to gather information or malign
15) Approach work colleagues or client to gather information or malign
16) Advertise damaging information on internet
17) Hire a private detective to gather information
18) Monitor targets online activity
19) Monitor targets online activity by tracing IP address
20) False victimization by claiming victim harassing or harming them.
21) Posting victims name or circulating it to others
22) Posting contact information or circulating it to others
23) Attack data or equipment by sending viruses or hacking
24) Order items or subscribe to magazines in the victim’s name.
25) Attempts to set up meetings.

Characteristics by anonymous online mobs:

Experts attribute the destructive nature of anonymous online mobs to group dynamics, saying that groups with homogeneous views tend to become more extreme as members reinforce each other’s beliefs, they fail to see themselves as individuals, so they lose a sense of personal responsibility for their destructive acts, they dehumanize their victims, which makes them more willing to behave destructively, and they become more aggressive when they believe they are supported by authority figures. Internet service providers and website owners are sometimes blamed for not speaking out against this type of harassment.

Self organize to target individuals

Online defamation

Threats of violence

Technology-based attacks

Posting sensitive personal information

Emailing damaging statements

Manipulating search engines to make damaging materials more prominent

By adopting pseudonyms with fake profiles”