Online Stalking in General

Image taken from www.stalkershandbook.com

I now go on to explain briefly the story of WHY I had felt the need to share the rest of my story of Bob, and how he turned on me from being my friend, to my stalker. I share this, because it is not just my story - this sort of thing has been happening to other people as well, somtimes not to such extremes, sometimes even worse. I have come to conclude from my experiences that cyber bullies are indeed stalkers, who enjoy abusing their victims verbally and emotionally.

I have recently been helping a friend who is also being stalked online by someone who has displayed the similar aggressiveness and zeal as Bob. However, for the record, this stalker is NOT Bob; he is definitely someone else. I know who Bob is, and I know who this other person is, but due to privacy reasons, I will not reveal the name of my friend, or the name of her cyber-bully. If my friend wants to make herself known, she will......

Originally, my friend was friends with this stalker here in Flickr, until he had stolen one of her self-portraits from her photostream. When she confronted him about this, he deleted the photo from his photostream and apologized. He later on followed her in all of her groups, harrassing her and creating new Flickr accounts, which she ended up blocking.

Eventually, he ended up joining one of my groups that my friend was also a member of, and she sent me a private message warning me of this man's behaviour. I ended up deleting him and sent him a message explaining why he was deleted. He responded with the following:

"hello jemanden
i red your stupid message and i could not stop laughing .why ? because i was sure that i will receive the exact message from you . i know also that you are Princess's friend and of course you will do what she told you without any reason.i mean you trust her because she made you blind and you follow her as a little child!!. i don't need to belong to your facken group.I only tested you and i was right.If you were really wise you would not react as a stupid man. Sorry for telling you that ,but it's the truth my friend.Now you should wake up and be wise before you can juge any body.What happened to me with (your friend) is none of your business boy.Do you understand???"

I responded with:

"Actually... it is YOU who looks more like a fool than you realize. I might be young, but old enough to know better that blurting out accusations WITHOUT BACKING THEM UP is childish and immature, such as what you yourself have done.

I have looked at your photostream, and (my friend) was absolutely right. There are pictures there that even I myself have recognized, and you have not given credit to that original person's work. (My Friend's)' self-portrait was one of those, and the only reason why you deleted it is because she threatened legal action against you. I HAVE SEEN THIS, so I know for a FACT that you do indeed steal photos from other people. Your failure to tell me your side of the story is evidence to me that this is true.

You say that I am lead blindly by (My friend). How do you know this? My judgement of you is not only based by what she has told me, but also by YOUR OWN behaviour and actions. (My friend) has been a huge support to me these past couple of months, ESPECIALLY when I was having personal problems in dealing with people who behave just like you are behaving right now. I too have had to deal with an online stalker, who I have had to block multiple times, because he had created multiple accounts, just like you have done. When I confronted him about his strange behaviour before I started blocking him, he reacted the exact same way I did, accusing ME of being the silly one and being stupid.

You see, whenever online stalkers/bullies are exposed, they tend to react the exact same way, such has been my experiences online. They chuck "temper tantrums" at the person who has confronted them, and accuse THEM of being the ones who are childish. Your immature reaction to my giving you a chance to explain yourself proves to me that, like my online stalker, you cannot deny that what has been said is true, and the only way you can defend yourself is by throwing insults at the people who have confronted you. It is interesting how you accuse me of behaving as a little child, when I had tried to be diplomatic by giving you a chance to explain your side of the story via email, and you come up with such a childish email.....

This behaviour, as well as seeing the stolen photos from other people in your photostream, does not give me any reason to disbelieve (my friend). It is not her words that have influenced my decision. Rather, it has a LOT to do with how I see YOU interact on Flickr. Your response to my email only further confirms that my decision is correct....

...Seeing as I have given you the chance to explain yourself, and and used that chance up by writing such an immature email, I am now going to block you, as I can see that you are not capable of responding in a mature and diplomatic manner, nor is your character any good....

From was_bedeutet_jemanden"

Since then, I believe my friend has not heard anything new from this guy, so I guess he has moved on to, but not entirely lost in cyber space. Like Bob, I know he's still around too.....

What was interesting about this experience was how all my feelings towards Bob and what he did ended up coming flooding back to me when I was helping my friend deal with her problem. Feelings that I had thought I had definitely left behind, but yet a twinge of hurt was still there. Like my friend, I was betrayed by someone who I let in as a friend, someone who turned out to be a monster.

It was because of this experience that I decided to tell the rest of my story, as originally I had planned on not sharing it at all. Now that I have seen what my friend had gone through, I could see that not only the other part of my story would not only help me to deal with the hurt I feel, but also help others realize that my experience is not uncommon, that there are others out there on Flickr and other social websites that have experienced similar things, and it is important to share those experiences and explain how you overcame those trials. This was the whole purpose of why this group was organized to begin with.

In short, I hope that this group will continue to be a source of help to those who want to learn more about how to best deal with online predators, and I hope that we can all come to learn from each others' experiences.

(In case any of you were wondering, I did ask permission from my friend first before telling her story)....

Cyber Bullying and Online Stalking pt. 4 - The Conclusion

(Continuation from Part 3

So here is where my story offically ends. These past three months have been an emotional strain for me, but somehow, with the help of all my wonderful friends who have been there for me during this trying time, I have managed to pull through it. I really couldn't have done it without them.....

As for Bob, I believe he has finally gotten the message, after I sent him that last email, although that has not stopped him from trying at least once a week to try and get me to respond to him. His latest attempt was to get himself involved in a “get rich quick” scam, and wanted my advice AFTER he had gone ahead and signed the deal. Part of me wanted to warn him of the scam – the other part of me knew that even if his getting involved in such a scam were true, just to get my attention again, he deserves everything he gets. So I decided not to respond.

You are probably wondering what had happened to JJ, and whether or not I did end up apologizing to him in the end. As a matter of fact, I did. I sent him a private message, telling him only a small portion of my story, and asked if he could forgive me for doing what I had done to him. I figured after all this time that JJ's emails were merely a reaction to what Bob had done personally to him, but because JJ had chosen to react the way he did, he displayed those characteristics that one really would associate with a cyber bully.

He wrote me back this really wonderful email. Part of it reads:

“Don`t worry about the (Bob) clown and the other business, all that matters is that he has exposed his true colours to you. It would seem he manipulated you to his advantage and misrepresented me to you prior to coming unstuck...”

I was glad I was able to patch things up with him.

Bob, I know, is still around. I know that he has probably given up on me, but I have the feeling he won't stop at trying doing to others what he did to me, which is why I am telling you my story. I guess one important lesson to learn from all of this is to always be careful with who you associate/make friends with online, and learn how to best protect yourself from online predators....

(To read the entire story from the beginning, please click here.

Cyber Bullying and Online Stalking pt. 3 - Finding Ways and Means to get Me to Cave In

(Continuation of part 2)

As advised, I stayed clear away from Bob and decided it best never to contact him again. That was, of course, until he joined a couple of the Flickr groups that I am an Admin for, in the attempt of trying to get in touch with me through there. By this stage, my other fellow colleagues from Flickr, who were also actively moderating these groups, knew of my situation, and we all decided to play things by ear.

Knowing now that I had people who were standing behind me with my decision, Bob at first decided to “test” us by posting comments in threads that had nothing to do wth the topic at hand, and not strictly replying to the group rules. We politely corrected him, and re-explained to him what the rules were, and continued to keep a close eye on him. He even tried to openly attack the religion of the friend who had advised me to stay away from him. These comments we deleted, and he was reprimanded and told that if he made another wrong move, he would be kicked out of the group.

He was eventually banned when he decided to vent his frustrations publicly in the forum, threatening that he would leave Flickr for good within 24 hours, if I or my online friends did not unblock him. When he saw that I wasn't going to budge, he carried out his “threat” and deleted his account, but created a new one and re-joined the forum. This time, he decided to write comments in there that he knew I would try and interfere and reply to. I decided to be civil, only giving short, but polite answers to his comments, but nothing more to make him think that all was forgiven, and that I would be unblocking him.

As far as his private emails to me were concerned, (and they kept coming, even after I stopped writing back), they consisted of all sorts of things to try and get me to respond back. A couple of them had been about supposed sick relatives and how he was grieving for their health, in an attempt to try and get me to feel sympathetic and write to him back. Then emails asking how I was doing, and hoping that he will hear from me soon:

“Dear Raymond,

How are you? I heard that Australia is hitted badly with the A fluenza flue H1N1. I hope you are ok. Please take good care of you! I am so worry of your safety.

Bob”
Some of them had to do with my church, and could I please re-teach him about Jesus Christ and his Gospel. Or he would ask me for help with something, or he would ask me for advice on a certain philosophical question, ANYTHING to try and get me to respond.

The last straw was when he sent me the following email on Facebook:

“Hi !
...I am right now more active in facebook I wonder will you accept me back as your friend? Will you add me back in the face book?

Missing you!

Bob”

Frustrated, upset, and to the point where I had to make it clear to him that ENOUGH IS ENOUGH, I ended up writing him the following email:

"Bob/ (long stream of all the Flickr aliases he created)

As I am writing this, I am thinking very carefully about the words I wish to say to you. Never in my lifetime have I EVER had to break a friendship off with ANYONE, as I really feel that when I trust someone, I have a TRUE friend for life. However, I will no longer tolerate being threatened, lied to, intimidated, manipulated, or emotionally blackmailed by the likes of you, such has been your behaviour towards me these past few days.

You knew very well when I asked for you to keep your distance from me after our disagreement, that I meant it. I specifically asked on more than one occasion that I ONLY wanted contact via hotmail, NO LONGER on ANY social site. Instead of respecting my wishes, you chose to create multiple Flickr Accounts (really long list was included in brackets), to try and get to me. When you saw that I had blocked each one of your aliases, you decided to send me YouTube videos of animals eating each other, a short film about a female bus driver being raped and murdered, said that you and your “twin” are now suffering from depression because of my decision to keep my distance, among SO many other things.

When that did not work, you tried to get through to me via my online friends. When you saw that they were on my side and were trying to help me, you decided to take the matter further by threatening to leave Flickr's Biggest Group within 24 hours, if I did not unblock you. You also had the gall to attempt to translate it into German, in an attempt to try and make even my German contacts turn against me.

This is only A TINY PORTION of the things you have done to me since I have distanced myself from you. Not once did you repect my privacy, in order to give me the chance to think things through. Not once did you show any understanding for my feelings and my wish to be able to reflect things over by myself and sort things out. Instead, you chose to continue to lie when I confronted you with more inaccuracies in your ever changing stories, used manipulation and partial truths to try and turn my friends against me, used emotional blackmail to make me feel guilty about my decision, and using inadvertent violent and non-violent threats to get me to unblock you.

It is for my own protection and safety (and MUCH evidently for your own safety and mental well-being) that I now tell you to PLEASE stay away from me. Your behaviour is making me feel uncomfortable, and I feel as if I do not know you at all any more. Do not try and create further Flickr Accounts to get through to me – I will simply keep blocking them. Do not try and get through to me via my friends – they are already well informed of my decision. Do not continue to threaten or harrass me via my hotmail account – I will simply ignore them. You cannot hurt me or my friends any longer, and I will not allow you to make me feel uncomfortable, stressed, angry, or upset any more.

I wish you all the best in your future endeavours.

From Raymond"


As I finished writing this email, I felt a huge wave of relief rush over me. It was as if I had truly said to myself, “I am letting go for good”. All my frustration had gone, and I felt for the first time in the THREE MONTHS that this had been going on for, that I was finally free. And this is how things have left off until the present day...

(Click here to read the conclusion)