I used different articles of The Cyberculture Reader that we have been examining in class to explain the events that led up to Amanda Todd’s suicide that she breaks down in her video. Each event leading up to her death involved some aspect of technology that I looked to explain using the literature from the Cyberculture video.
The first event in the Amanda Todd case is her desire for her and her friends to join Blog TV. They went on to meet and talk to people. The literature backs up this desire for people to look to the internet to expand their horizons. As Willson speculates, virtual communities encourage communication and creative imaginations. Children growing up with this medium will see it as an extension of their world (224) Amanda Todd grew up her whole young life being surrounded by internet. But as Willson continues to hypothesize that children have no idea the ramifications of this, as Amanda Todd didn't.
Blogs appeal to adolescents because individuals can also choose to have several characters and flit between one character and another. (Willson, 216) Cheung also pointed out that there is a self-defined stage, upon which we can decide what aspects of our selves we would like to present (Cheung, 275). A blog as said before gives adolescents the ability to express themselves as well as create a new identity online.
Amanda Todd found her popularity among her viewers of her blog as she said that they called her stunning and beautiful. It is a dynamic, on-going and a relation among strangers. Bell points out that there is a self-conscious articulation on blogs to show how we wish to be read by these strangers, (bell, 268) Curtain explains how the public is crucial, not simply because the presence of an audience might be said to justify the work that is done within the blog but because this audience is qualitatively different than the others because it reads, interacts, and writes to the author, who then rethinks and changes the blog. (curtain, 325) In fact most complaints about blogging tend to focus on the criteria by which to judge them (curtain, 323) Because in the Blogosphere success is measured by having “the most attention” (curtain 324)
This common dilemma was posed to Amanda Todd’s blog as well, which lead to the next event that would change Amanda Todd’s life forever. It was when Amanda Todd was asked by her viewers on Blog TV at twelve years old to flash them. The maybe because identity involves the accentuation of particular characteristics and the suppression of others (Willson, 221) So many of her viewers only saw the side of Amanda Todd that may have been considered promiscuous, and seen as vulnerable to sexual exploitation. We cannot consider our self identities in the absence of others but getting recognition from other people is still important for establishing affirmative identities. After all if no one ever tells you that you are smart for how long can you convince yourself that you really are. And as most bloggers do, she remade and remarked her blog after one year she decided to fulfill her viewers desires and flash them.
The Cyberculture reader explains Amanda Todd’s actions and motivations to flash her viewers in different ways. First is the power of normalization, which refers to “the process by which a subject self-imposing of particular norms and behaviors to conform to self-perceived but socially constructed understanding of normality, this process is accentuated by the subject’s own perception of the depth and pervasive nature of her visibility” (Bakardijeva, 250) This means that Amanda Todd was told by her viewers even though she was underage that it was acceptable, and in fact encourage behavior to flash on her video blog. She being impressionable and unaware of the consequences of her actions on the internet normalized this. Another possible reason for her decision to flash her viewers is the identity validation function. This means to re-establish their self identities by getting positive comments from other net browsers. (Bakardjieva, 251) For a year Amanda Todd had been getting positive feedback on her looks and the admiration to a young girl is extremely important. Because of this desire for admiration the dilemma between privacy and public is blurred. So ideals of intimacy, immediacy and community are challenged bringing complex and challenging social values. (Bakardjieva, 251)
After Amanda Todd flashed her viewers she received a message on facebook from a man that she didn’t know and didn’t know how he knew her. This happens often in blogs, where the viewer is in a parasocial relationship with the blogger. Relationships develop across words and images by people who have never met face to face and a story emerges about a public created from links and commentaries, thoughts, reactions, and words. It is a potent fiction with real consequences for desire and affects and learning among and from strangers (curtain, 327) Blogs are liberated from the normative gaze of both institutions and society because identity cannot be verified and attached to the embodied user. The behavior of both parties are not constrained by real space norms and values, which makes the degree of anonymity questionable. (Willson, 216) These bring concerns about the elimination of distance between parties, bringing a expectation that new virtual media will overcome what are perceived to be the constraints of real geographical difference making no one really anonymous.
This lack of anonymity in the Amanda Todd case brought the viewer to blackmail her. The perpetrator told her that if she didn’t give him private shows then he would send pictures of her flashing to her family, friends and authority. This was brought on according to Willson (216) as the chaos within some communities as a consequence of anonymity being equated with a lack of accountability. Amanda Todd never expected to have consequences for her actions as well as her perpetrator never expected to get caught. It is a diverse, de-centered communications system with unlimited input in as much as anybody who is connected to a network can participate in the system resulting in seemingly uncontrolled and unpredictable development. This is viewed by some institutions as potentially threatening, leading to media exposure of ‘illegitimate’ or socially destructive activities on the internet and attempts by politicians to grapple with this issue through discussions of censorship and guidelines. In the Amanda Todd case it shows how this fear of a uncensored media can be used for illegal activities such as blackmail and sexual exploitation.
Not only is an uncensored media with parasocial relationships detrimental also the practice of providing information about oneself contributes to their own surveillance. The perpetrator knew Amanda’s address, school, relatives, friends because even though at all points along the way in the processes of encountering others and interacting with them online people are located in their private homes by putting up information about themselves makes one vulnerable to the public. (Cheung,273)
Despite the blackmailers best attempts, Amanda Todd didn’t meet his demands so he sent the photo to all her friends and family and eventually the police were notified. This is a consequence of this technological innovation is a world which everything is equally near and equally far, it is impossible to hide from the internet. The continuous but often unverifiable surveillance has implications (Willson, 214) such as in Amanda Todd’s case anything that is put on the internet can be used against you. In fact a year later the perpetrator made a facebook page with a photo of her flashing as the profile picture. The photo is detached from its referent subject it is able to be moved, manipulated, and transformed, the internet also enables information to be moved, transformed and manipulated, bringing into question the issues of authorship and authenticity of material. (Willson, 215) The photo has been turned into internet memes, saved on thousands of computers and can be viewed on the internet at any time, despite the efforts to take the photo down. With the internet now, there is no way to control who is using the pictures and for what.
Once the picture was sent Amanda Todd experienced anxiety, depression, and self harm, which are often associated emotions with blogging. (Curtain, 321) Curtain further suggests that the social and cultural uses of the application to the technology of such terms as controlling or liberating. At first Amanda Todd felt liberated as she had a venue to blog her emotions and receive positive feedback, but it then turned into what eventually became a control on her entire life.
She tried to move schools & move to another state, but because of her facebook account she was cyberbullied not only by her schoolmates at her old school, but at her current school and even from strangers. There seemed like no escape. There is no substitute for the therapy of distance (robins, 234) But with cyberspace everything is equally far as it is near and without nearness there can be no remoteness nearness is necessary in order to preserve farness (robins, 232) Because of this we are no longer mobile. Which means escape and forget the erosion of the reality of the world is harder with the internet. (robins, 231) The Rousseauist dream often challenges the notion that that if everything is public on the internet in a transparent society visible and legible in each of its parts there will no longer be any zones of darkness zones of disorder. (robins, 230) But I argue that the internet’s transparency which is evident in Amanda Todd’s case, has made it so we can never get away, imprisoning us.
Because Amanda Todd couldn’t escape her cyberbullying she faced people posting pics of bleach and ditches and posting on Facebook that they hope she sees this and kills herself. It is hard for me, as well as the literature to explain this extreme cyberbullying, but Robins tries to explain that the obligations of the human condition in which the possibility of communication is always counterbalanced by the risk of obstruction and misunderstanding. (robins, 230) Amanda Todd could possibly be seen as the villain by some, as she was seen as out of the norm, which was sexually promiscuous which in our society is villanized and undeserving of sympathy. Of course this is a result of Amanda Todd being characterized exclusively by what is produced online as the cultures enacted online have their roots in forms of life existing in the real world, but don’t tell the whole story. (Bakardjieva, 238) Everything that was posted on the internet highlighted her promiscuity and her ‘boyfriend stealing’. This is a stigmatized identity. We may be doubtful about certain identities of ours if these identity categories are controversial ,stigmatized or unacceptable in society at large (Cheung, 278) so we take it out on others that are fulfilling this role. Often Amanda Todd is condemned as undeserving of our sympathy because of her attractiveness and what people see as individualism, that she brought it upon herself. Victim blaming is one of the key components in the Amanda Todd case, as many that cyberbullied as well as criticized her failed to see her as the victim of sexual exploitation, blackmail, and harassment that she in fact was.
Because she was villanized on the internet Amanda Todd felt like she no one and felt like she needed someone. This is ironic in discussed before that the internet was supposed to connect us, but instead alienates us. It can be explained as the dichotomy between the private and the public that is at the root of both virtual Utopia and dystopia. (Bakardjieva, 237) Today we see a fear of social disintegration, interconnected across space and time than at any other point in history, the postmodern individual in contemporary Western society is paradoxically feeling increasingly isolated and is searching for new ways to understand and experience meaningful togetherness. This is because presence at a distance is about the technological synthesis of direct communication recreating the conditions of immediate, face to face community but cannot fully replace it, creating an inmaterial, alternative, virtual world. (Robins, 229) But this virtual world bleeds into the real world making real world consequences.
Lastly as Amanda Todd is contemplating how isolated she feels, she realizes that she can never get her photos back and says that they are out there forever. This is the ultimate sad lesson in the Amanda Todd case about the internet. The recording and archiving of interactions also creates the historical trace of a character decreasing the ability for that character to interact unidentified by past behaviors or statements. It has made us trapped within time and space by the continual visibility provided by the database, files can be called up at any time with a simple command typed into a computer terminal. Making us realize that the idea that maybe being intimate with everyone isn’t always a good thing, and maybe a little distance is the ultimate Utopia.
The first event in the Amanda Todd case is her desire for her and her friends to join Blog TV. They went on to meet and talk to people. The literature backs up this desire for people to look to the internet to expand their horizons. As Willson speculates, virtual communities encourage communication and creative imaginations. Children growing up with this medium will see it as an extension of their world (224) Amanda Todd grew up her whole young life being surrounded by internet. But as Willson continues to hypothesize that children have no idea the ramifications of this, as Amanda Todd didn't.
Blogs appeal to adolescents because individuals can also choose to have several characters and flit between one character and another. (Willson, 216) Cheung also pointed out that there is a self-defined stage, upon which we can decide what aspects of our selves we would like to present (Cheung, 275). A blog as said before gives adolescents the ability to express themselves as well as create a new identity online.
Amanda Todd found her popularity among her viewers of her blog as she said that they called her stunning and beautiful. It is a dynamic, on-going and a relation among strangers. Bell points out that there is a self-conscious articulation on blogs to show how we wish to be read by these strangers, (bell, 268) Curtain explains how the public is crucial, not simply because the presence of an audience might be said to justify the work that is done within the blog but because this audience is qualitatively different than the others because it reads, interacts, and writes to the author, who then rethinks and changes the blog. (curtain, 325) In fact most complaints about blogging tend to focus on the criteria by which to judge them (curtain, 323) Because in the Blogosphere success is measured by having “the most attention” (curtain 324)
This common dilemma was posed to Amanda Todd’s blog as well, which lead to the next event that would change Amanda Todd’s life forever. It was when Amanda Todd was asked by her viewers on Blog TV at twelve years old to flash them. The maybe because identity involves the accentuation of particular characteristics and the suppression of others (Willson, 221) So many of her viewers only saw the side of Amanda Todd that may have been considered promiscuous, and seen as vulnerable to sexual exploitation. We cannot consider our self identities in the absence of others but getting recognition from other people is still important for establishing affirmative identities. After all if no one ever tells you that you are smart for how long can you convince yourself that you really are. And as most bloggers do, she remade and remarked her blog after one year she decided to fulfill her viewers desires and flash them.
The Cyberculture reader explains Amanda Todd’s actions and motivations to flash her viewers in different ways. First is the power of normalization, which refers to “the process by which a subject self-imposing of particular norms and behaviors to conform to self-perceived but socially constructed understanding of normality, this process is accentuated by the subject’s own perception of the depth and pervasive nature of her visibility” (Bakardijeva, 250) This means that Amanda Todd was told by her viewers even though she was underage that it was acceptable, and in fact encourage behavior to flash on her video blog. She being impressionable and unaware of the consequences of her actions on the internet normalized this. Another possible reason for her decision to flash her viewers is the identity validation function. This means to re-establish their self identities by getting positive comments from other net browsers. (Bakardjieva, 251) For a year Amanda Todd had been getting positive feedback on her looks and the admiration to a young girl is extremely important. Because of this desire for admiration the dilemma between privacy and public is blurred. So ideals of intimacy, immediacy and community are challenged bringing complex and challenging social values. (Bakardjieva, 251)
After Amanda Todd flashed her viewers she received a message on facebook from a man that she didn’t know and didn’t know how he knew her. This happens often in blogs, where the viewer is in a parasocial relationship with the blogger. Relationships develop across words and images by people who have never met face to face and a story emerges about a public created from links and commentaries, thoughts, reactions, and words. It is a potent fiction with real consequences for desire and affects and learning among and from strangers (curtain, 327) Blogs are liberated from the normative gaze of both institutions and society because identity cannot be verified and attached to the embodied user. The behavior of both parties are not constrained by real space norms and values, which makes the degree of anonymity questionable. (Willson, 216) These bring concerns about the elimination of distance between parties, bringing a expectation that new virtual media will overcome what are perceived to be the constraints of real geographical difference making no one really anonymous.
This lack of anonymity in the Amanda Todd case brought the viewer to blackmail her. The perpetrator told her that if she didn’t give him private shows then he would send pictures of her flashing to her family, friends and authority. This was brought on according to Willson (216) as the chaos within some communities as a consequence of anonymity being equated with a lack of accountability. Amanda Todd never expected to have consequences for her actions as well as her perpetrator never expected to get caught. It is a diverse, de-centered communications system with unlimited input in as much as anybody who is connected to a network can participate in the system resulting in seemingly uncontrolled and unpredictable development. This is viewed by some institutions as potentially threatening, leading to media exposure of ‘illegitimate’ or socially destructive activities on the internet and attempts by politicians to grapple with this issue through discussions of censorship and guidelines. In the Amanda Todd case it shows how this fear of a uncensored media can be used for illegal activities such as blackmail and sexual exploitation.
Not only is an uncensored media with parasocial relationships detrimental also the practice of providing information about oneself contributes to their own surveillance. The perpetrator knew Amanda’s address, school, relatives, friends because even though at all points along the way in the processes of encountering others and interacting with them online people are located in their private homes by putting up information about themselves makes one vulnerable to the public. (Cheung,273)
Despite the blackmailers best attempts, Amanda Todd didn’t meet his demands so he sent the photo to all her friends and family and eventually the police were notified. This is a consequence of this technological innovation is a world which everything is equally near and equally far, it is impossible to hide from the internet. The continuous but often unverifiable surveillance has implications (Willson, 214) such as in Amanda Todd’s case anything that is put on the internet can be used against you. In fact a year later the perpetrator made a facebook page with a photo of her flashing as the profile picture. The photo is detached from its referent subject it is able to be moved, manipulated, and transformed, the internet also enables information to be moved, transformed and manipulated, bringing into question the issues of authorship and authenticity of material. (Willson, 215) The photo has been turned into internet memes, saved on thousands of computers and can be viewed on the internet at any time, despite the efforts to take the photo down. With the internet now, there is no way to control who is using the pictures and for what.
Once the picture was sent Amanda Todd experienced anxiety, depression, and self harm, which are often associated emotions with blogging. (Curtain, 321) Curtain further suggests that the social and cultural uses of the application to the technology of such terms as controlling or liberating. At first Amanda Todd felt liberated as she had a venue to blog her emotions and receive positive feedback, but it then turned into what eventually became a control on her entire life.
She tried to move schools & move to another state, but because of her facebook account she was cyberbullied not only by her schoolmates at her old school, but at her current school and even from strangers. There seemed like no escape. There is no substitute for the therapy of distance (robins, 234) But with cyberspace everything is equally far as it is near and without nearness there can be no remoteness nearness is necessary in order to preserve farness (robins, 232) Because of this we are no longer mobile. Which means escape and forget the erosion of the reality of the world is harder with the internet. (robins, 231) The Rousseauist dream often challenges the notion that that if everything is public on the internet in a transparent society visible and legible in each of its parts there will no longer be any zones of darkness zones of disorder. (robins, 230) But I argue that the internet’s transparency which is evident in Amanda Todd’s case, has made it so we can never get away, imprisoning us.
Because Amanda Todd couldn’t escape her cyberbullying she faced people posting pics of bleach and ditches and posting on Facebook that they hope she sees this and kills herself. It is hard for me, as well as the literature to explain this extreme cyberbullying, but Robins tries to explain that the obligations of the human condition in which the possibility of communication is always counterbalanced by the risk of obstruction and misunderstanding. (robins, 230) Amanda Todd could possibly be seen as the villain by some, as she was seen as out of the norm, which was sexually promiscuous which in our society is villanized and undeserving of sympathy. Of course this is a result of Amanda Todd being characterized exclusively by what is produced online as the cultures enacted online have their roots in forms of life existing in the real world, but don’t tell the whole story. (Bakardjieva, 238) Everything that was posted on the internet highlighted her promiscuity and her ‘boyfriend stealing’. This is a stigmatized identity. We may be doubtful about certain identities of ours if these identity categories are controversial ,stigmatized or unacceptable in society at large (Cheung, 278) so we take it out on others that are fulfilling this role. Often Amanda Todd is condemned as undeserving of our sympathy because of her attractiveness and what people see as individualism, that she brought it upon herself. Victim blaming is one of the key components in the Amanda Todd case, as many that cyberbullied as well as criticized her failed to see her as the victim of sexual exploitation, blackmail, and harassment that she in fact was.
Because she was villanized on the internet Amanda Todd felt like she no one and felt like she needed someone. This is ironic in discussed before that the internet was supposed to connect us, but instead alienates us. It can be explained as the dichotomy between the private and the public that is at the root of both virtual Utopia and dystopia. (Bakardjieva, 237) Today we see a fear of social disintegration, interconnected across space and time than at any other point in history, the postmodern individual in contemporary Western society is paradoxically feeling increasingly isolated and is searching for new ways to understand and experience meaningful togetherness. This is because presence at a distance is about the technological synthesis of direct communication recreating the conditions of immediate, face to face community but cannot fully replace it, creating an inmaterial, alternative, virtual world. (Robins, 229) But this virtual world bleeds into the real world making real world consequences.
Lastly as Amanda Todd is contemplating how isolated she feels, she realizes that she can never get her photos back and says that they are out there forever. This is the ultimate sad lesson in the Amanda Todd case about the internet. The recording and archiving of interactions also creates the historical trace of a character decreasing the ability for that character to interact unidentified by past behaviors or statements. It has made us trapped within time and space by the continual visibility provided by the database, files can be called up at any time with a simple command typed into a computer terminal. Making us realize that the idea that maybe being intimate with everyone isn’t always a good thing, and maybe a little distance is the ultimate Utopia.