My Worst Nightmare

Girl kills herself after being berated online

Well, one of my worst nightmares, anyway. This is something I am always scared to death will happen when I get in a fight with people online, usually because I am (a) vicious with my words and (b) arguing with people who are emotionally unstable more often than not (no names, but readers of this weblog can probably think of at least 2 good candidates).

I dunno. On the one hand, I agree that we can't illegalize angry rants. It wou;d be awfully fascist to say, "Talon, you can't say mean things to [so-and-so]; if you hurt their feelings bad enough, they might kill themselves." What if the inability to vent drives me crazy? Isn't that unfair to me? Couldn't I argue just as easily that it should be illegal for idiots to open their mouths because it frustrates me to no end? I mean, people gotta vent. We can't illegalize "mean things" being said online, we just can't.

But on the other hand, tragedies like this one are inexcusable; where do we draw the line between "intent to kill" and "intent to make somebody feel like shit"? In this case, the latter -- unknownst to the "murderer" -- mutated into the former due to the victim's inability to cope. Who is really at fault here? Is the victim to be blamed for being too weak, too thin-skinned? Is the victimizer to be blamed for not taking into consideration what consequences might arise from her actions? The latter may sound tempeting, but be reasonable, folks -- does this mean we're never, ever going to open our mouths again for fear of saying something that will set somebody off and make them kill themselves? Hyperbolic, perhaps, but a valid legal example none the less:

Josh: Megan? No, we're not going out. We're just friends.
Brad: Oh, cool, 'cause like, Megan said you two were ... oh shit.
*Megan is stood right there overhearing everything*
Megan: You mean ... you don't like me?
Josh: No, Megan, it's not what you think! I--
*Megan kills herself before Josh can even explain that he was just lying to Brad for whatever reason*
Josh: NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I mean, seriously. Could we really hold Josh responsible for Megan's death in the above example? Most of us would say, "Of course not. Megan was just crazy." But legally, what's the difference between that and what actually took place? That there was intentional malice? If that's the ONLY difference, then are we suggesting that we want to illegalize malice? Dream on ... right?