ever ruin someone's life using the internet?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Internet drama can be fun; it can also be ruinous. I’m curious to see what other horrible drama you’ve effected through use of the internet.

My story: when I was about 15, I met a girl online through AOL. Through weeks of chat, I learned she was a pastor’s daughter in a big church, and was having an affair with an older guy (she was 16 at the time; he was 24). I ended up talking to a girl that went to her church as well, and let the scenario slip. You can imagine how it went down - police, scandal, and more. I even read a local news piece on it in their local paper online!

What about you?

2

Spreading gossip instead of reporting possible statutory rape? Kudos. :rolleyes:

3

She was 16 and it was consensual. I don’t consider that a big deal. Sure, the guy’s a friggen idiot and gets what’s coming to him, but I wouldn’t report it either.

Anyways, let’s try and stay on topic here, eh?

4

Not sure about ruined. But quite possible scarred.

Maybe about two or three years ago, I was playing chess online (I don’t anymore). And it started off alright.
But my opponent was typing in stuff like, “Ha ha. I will trash you.” and “You will lose”. So I just blinked and didn’t bother to reply. And he kept on acting all smug, like he knew some big secret. Then I moved my knight forward, and he typed “Ha ha. I have you now. You have no where to go”

So I looked again at the board, wondering what he was talking about, as he went on typing, “I knew you were going to do that. You fell into my trap”
My next move, I got my knight in between his Queen and King. Ate his Queen. And he went “Oh… didn’t see that”.
And because I was a little pissed, I killed his pieces one-by-one, and totally annihilated his force.

Later I found out he was only 10, I felt terrible. Poor kid. Probably ruined chess for him forever.
:smack:

5

Hmmm, I was going out with a girl (not as in girlfriend/boyfriend, just socially) for about 2 years, and wanted her to come to a wedding with me, that she was invited to. She wouldn’t, as she hated weddings because it was all couples - this was my reason for taking her with me. I was disappointed, but she was coming up with me to my Mum & Dads in a week or two anyway. Until she e-mails to say can we go on the Tuesday instead of the Saturday as she has a wedding to go to.

I fucking lost it on the many replies, big time. I went to town on this girl, with furious anger and bile, picking apart all her little character faults as well as the hypocrisy of her wanting to go later - I truly dont believe i’ve been as angry about anything ever. I later found out she was bursting into tears everytime I was replying to her over the course of two days too.

6 months later I apologized to her. I’m better friends with her now than I ever was. YMMV. I certainly aren’t doing that to anyone again.

6

I figure the mere fact that I’m on the internet is calamitous enough. :smiley:

7

Once, one of my in-laws, who is in her late 40’s and hasn’t been in a relationship for several years now, developed a crush on her 23-year-old nephew who had recently visited from Europe. So, my wife and I tried to talk her out of it, and she kept insisting that it was a mutual thing, that he had indicated he liked her too, etc. Soon she started getting upset and eventually kicks us out of her house, after screaming about how she had been talking to him on the phone and by e-mail every day and he loved her too, wanted to have sex with her too, etc. She even said that his mom, who he lives with, was okay with it.

A few days later, the subject comes up again, and she frostily informs us that she talked to him about our “interference” and he is extremely upset and hates us now, never wants to see us again, wants us to mind our own business, etc. My wife was extremely upset about this because he had always been one of her favorite relatives, even though they rarely saw each other because of the continent and ocean in the way.

So, a few days later, we compose an e-mail to him apologizing for getting in the way and saying something to the effect that we thought he would be freaked out if he knew his twice-his-age aunt wanted to start a sexual relationship with him, but clearly that was not the case, so we wouldn’t interfere and wished them the best and hoped they wouldn’t hold it against us.

I’m sure you can see where this is going … his reply comes back "WHAT?! Aunt XXXXXX wants to do WHAT WITH ME?!?!"

As it turned out, she had been e-mailing him and talking to him, and what to her were highly suggestive sexually charged conversations like “When you come to visit next I’ll have to give you a backrub, you’ve been working so hard!” were just normal conversations to him.

And of course then he told his mom, and boy, was she mad … and as it turned out, this in-law of mine had a fairly high-security government job, and last we heard, said nephew’s mom was grumbling about reporting her as a security risk because surely incest is something to be blackmailed over, right? I don’t think she ever did … at least not yet.

So … yeah.

8

I think chorpler wins!

9

paulberserker, can you elucidate on your post? I’m not sure I’m following. She didn’t want to go the wedding with you but then emailed you to ask what? Maybe I’m too sleepy but I’m not following at all and your paragraph following that seems to indicate that she did something pretty offensive. To you, at least.

And yeah, chorpler wins.

10

Just my own. I met my second wife through the errornet.

11

How ‘bout just a good quick scare. I was online talking to somegirl that I new (from the profile) lived somehere in the neighborhood. After a few minutes of talking I noticed that the replies seemed to coincide with something in the corner of my eye. Yup, it was my next door neighbor. I was a ‘friend’ of her sisters’ (that is, we walked to school together, but that was about it, and I knew her (as in I’d recognize her walking down the street, as she would me, but we weren’t friends at all). I had a little fun with that one. “Hey is your name Julie?” “Do you live on Lake Dr?” “Do you live on the X-hundered block of Lake Dr?” “Do you dye your hair?” “Red?” and so on and so forth. There was one other incidence where I scarred the living crap out of her, to the point where she couldn’t be in a room alone for a week or so (honestly, I didn’t think it would scare her like that), but that had nothing to do with the internet so we’ll save it for another thread. (It involved a laser pointer, a police scanner, and her thinking someone was pointing a gun into her third floor attic bedroom)

12

Oh come on, no better time than the present!

13

I am just totally fascinated by the Chorpler story. I kind of wish I knew the relationship **Chorpler ** and spouse had to the in-law and stuff. Oh,who’s kidding who, I’d like to see pictures.

14

My wife has a set of crazy ass cousins.

Cousin A - let’s call him James, gets a girlfriend and gets engaged and married
Cousin b - James’s sister… let’s call her Ramona. She doesn’t like Jame’s new wife.

They are from a small city in souther Utah… everyone knows everyone. Ramona logs on to their High School’s message board and poses as him, writes all kids of dirty and nasty things about them and makes him a laughingstock.

He sues her and wins.

15

Yeah Chorpler, we want to know all the details in The Adventures of Aunt Peg.

I know a case where someone tried but failed. A friend was in the adult entertainment industry more than a dozen years ago. She didn’t do this long but material featuring her floats around to this day. She doesn’t keep it a secret and close friends know but it’s part of her life that is behind her now. A few years ago she dated a guy and told him up front rather than let him find out. This :wally doesn’t say to himself, “gee I’m dating XXXXX XXXX, cool,” he decides to out her past to all her friends and posts to a local online social group we all belong to. She was mortified that everyone would shun her and that her child would find out. Fortunately all her friends, even the ones who didn’t know, told her the same thing, that it didn’t make a difference to us. Some of us offered to take care of the jerk but he still breathes… for now.

16

I guess I’m somewhat anonymous…(I say that cuz part of it is illegal, gee guess which part). So before the dawn of 900mHz phones, I used to be able to pick up all the cordless phones for about a 1/2 mile radius with my police scanner. Anyways, I could hear the girl (my neighbor) on her phone and was half listening to the converstaion (not too interested, there was a big scandle going on in the city, and because of this, I knew more about the scandle then the people involved did. It had to do with some stolen comptuer equipment, I was probably the only one in the city who ALWAYS knew who had the equipment, who they were going to give it to, what lies they were going to tell the police, their parents, friends etc… anyways, this conversation didn’t involve that, so I wasn’t all that interested.) Anyways as she was on the phone, I walked over to the other side of the house, and shined my laser pointer into her bedroom. (It hit her ceiling, I really didn’t even think she’d see it) IMMIDIATLY she started screaming, and spent a good portion of the night on the phone with her friend screaming and freaking out. She REALLY, HONSETLY thought it was a laser sight on a gun. I mentioned it to the friend she was talking to years and years later and found out that for about a week or so, she was truly mortified by the expiernce and woulnd’t go in her bedroom alone. I was sooooo woried she figure out that it was me (based on the angle it hit her room at, there wasn’t much of anywhere else it could have come from), but I guess that never even crossed her mind.

17

Ehrm, well, when I first wrote the post, I specified exactly who the relative was (not her name, but how she’s related to my wife) and then changed it because I decided I didn’t want to be too specific. But … um … well, let’s just say that she shares 50% of my wife’s DNA.

18

On USENET, I was part of a group that hounded a scummy USENET denizen and led to him drinking himself to death. At least according to a few of this man’s apologists.

Some in the group pursued him so that he would stop scamming and stealing from his employers. Must have made it hard for the scam artist to get anything done.

My role was minor, at best, and even if it was major I feel no qualms about how said person was treated. “Brought everything on himself” is the best phrase to use.