"Let's Talk About Cyber Bullying" or "Trolling Is Now An Addictive Substance"
 

Link

First off, dude is autistic: he's apparently an Asperger's sufferer, and an alcoholic. Don't know if he takes medication and it reacts in some way with the alcohol, but the article is pretty intent on demonizing him and didn't go into it that I saw.

But this is a dude who is... well, unabashedly evil. I understand that he's got a mental condition, but, (my) emphasis up there, he's... he's creating new situations where he can profit emotionally from the distress about others. I understand that "Trolling" is really just a descriptive term for a behavior that predates it, and that the behavior itself is something people have been doing for a while, but hey (little mad about it here) new buzzword.

I'm late for class, so I dun have the time to dig up that old thread what where the mother of a tween cyber-bullied her daughter's classmate until the young girl committed suicide, because I cannae remember what measures were put into place to protect others from cyber bullying.

Because I dun think this thing falls under free speech.

while I'm aware you are just repeating how the article phrased it. Please do not say things like aspergers sufferer, it is rather offensive.

That being said, it causes issue with non-verbal communication. Perceived insensitive behavior is a result of non-verbal ques being misunderstood and a disinterest in social mores. In other words, no, the guy was just a dick and fact he has aspergers shouldn't even be mentioned. Be like randomly inserting that he is black or gay, its not relevant. Alcoholism on the other hand I can see having a point, but unless someone is force feeding him beer its definitely no excuse for this behavior

Here's a question...

Do we really want to lock up all of the people in the world for trolling?

Yes. Of course, "all of the world" does not include the entire portion of the world that does not have access to the Internet and the entire portion of the Internet that are not assholes. So either you just poorly picked your words or you just constructed a strawman at record speeds with absolutely no one arguing against you.

When you are a complete and total fucktard online to the point of harassment like this guy, you should be treated like you went to the family's house and started harassing them in real life.

yea just apply the same laws for real life as with the internet. If this person, instead of sending messages called the persons house, or posted notes on their door, would they be arrested? If yes, then its harassment, and illegal.

Except her facebook page and memorial were both public spaces. It would be more like he went to her funeral or public wake and did it.

And in that case it's much more of a grey area as to whether it was harassment or not.

Well, the WBC gets away with it.

I think it still fits. Its simular to defacing said memorial, and I would call her facebook page private. I do think your funeral analogy is apt, and not so certain of the legality. But if someone crashes a funeral and acts like a dick, I see nothing wrong with punishing them personally

Except you can delete comments on your facebook page with three simple clicks. Something that can be removed that easily isn't 'defacing'. At least not any more than putting up a post-it note is. If it was private he couldn't have accessed it without permission. If you have a facebook page set to 'public' that is what it is.
Neither do I, but the funeral analogy isn't perfect, because the facebook page is used for other things.

Do we throw someone in jail for calling their cheating girlfriend a stupid fat cunt on her facebook page? Do we even make them defend themselves? Because law isn't exactly... discerning about these things. If you make something illegal to do on someone's facebook page you make it illegal, and extenuating circumstances laws still involve dealing with the law to prove your innocence by the letter of the law.

And, not only that, but we let people get away with much more hurtful things at actual real world funerals, wakes, and memorials. As Loyal already mentioned.

You can't throw someone in jail for doing something online that you wouldn't throw someone in jail for doing in the physical world. Well, obviously you CAN as they HAVE, but you shouldn't.

but it can be re-applied with just as much ease. More so if you know abit of coding.

Its not the act itself, its the relentless re-application of it. In your example of the girlfriend. Lets keep real world analog though since this is something we do have precedence for. Calling your cheating girlfriend a cunt, is ok. Calling her on a daily basis and doing it for weeks or months, not so much.

Harassment is not about a single act, its about persistently repeating an act against someone.