Amanda Todd's mother speaks out about her daughter, bullying

Amanda Todd's mother speaks out about her daughter, bullying Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Amanda+Todd+mother+speaks+about+daughter+bullying+with+video/7384521/story.html#ixzz2OTnVZnSX Amanda Todd’s mother, Carol Todd, doesn’t want other children to suffer as her daughter did — stalked and harassed by bullies in cyberspace and in the schoolyard, by people she knew and by stalkers many miles away. Amanda told her story in the heart-wrenching video that chronicled her nightmare: the taunts, the beating, the cyber-stalker who tracked her down whenever she tried to start afresh at a new school — firing off images that captured her showing off her young body, flattered by online attention from someone she thought was a kid just like her. Amanda killed herself this week, one month shy of her 16th birthday and one month after telling the world through a YouTube video of bullying that left her depressed and despairing. If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, click here for ways to get help Now Carol wants to tell her story. It is a story no mother wants to tell. “Amanda was a very caring individual. She would help others who needed help,” Carol told The Vancouver Sun during an exclusive interview Friday at her home, where she was surrounded by friends and family. “One of Amanda’s goals was to get her message out there and have it used as a learning tool for others.” As a teacher in the Coquitlam school district and a specialist in assistive technologies, Carol is comfortable around computers and knows well the dangers the online world can hold. Still, she wasn’t able to protect her child. “I have lost one child, but know she wanted her story to save 1,000 more.” Amanda was 12 years old when she made a mistake that would haunt her until her death three years later. Her ordeal started while she was fooling around online with friends. She probably didn’t think it was risky behaviour when she lifted her top to flash the person who was flattering her at the other end of the webcam. Amanda’s moment of indiscretion was not unusual for someone her age: Sexting and using webcams to share sexual photos is a growing trend among children, some so young they are still in grade school. “The Internet stalker she flashed kept stalking her,” said Carol. “Every time she moved schools he would go undercover and become a Facebook friend. What the guy did was he went online to the kids who went to (the new school) and said that he was going to be a new student — that he was starting school the following week and that he wanted some friends and could they friend him on Facebook.” “He eventually gathered people’s names and sent Amanda’s video to her new school.” The video and photos went to teachers, to parents, to Facebook friends, which lead to repeated taunts: “Oh, there’s the porn star.” “It increased her anxiety and she couldn’t go to class,” Carol said. In putting together her video, which Amanda did on her own, Carol said her daughter wanted to help other young people who are being bullied and to bring attention and education to the problem in the hope of seeing it eradicated. “Amanda wanted to tell her story to help other kids. I want to tell my story to help parents, so they can be aware, so they can teach their kids what is right and wrong and how to be safe online,” she said. “Kids have iPads, they have smartphones, technology is much more accessible than it was even five years ago — that is the dangerous factor.” When Amanda’s story and video went viral this week, the outpouring of grief from local teens left Carol unable to distinguish Amanda’s true friends from those who may have helped drive her to suicide. Carol has launched a trust fund in Amanda’s memory to raise money for anti-bullying awareness education and for support programs for youth with mental health issues. Amanda was the victim of unrelenting blackmail. And the cyberspace stalker was aided by people in Amanda’s real-world life — kids who would share the photos on their cellphones, kids who would gang up to hurl first verbal abuse and then fists at her. “Everything she said in the video happened over the past two years,” said Carol. “It was horrendous. I think about it now and I think, ‘Oh my God. How did she survive this long with the pain?’ ” The end, when it came, was a shock. Despite Amanda’s earlier suicide attempts, Carol said in recent days and weeks she was getting much better. She spent time in hospital in September, getting treatment and counselling. Her life was starting to return to normal, which it hadn’t been since grade 8. “She felt like a normal teenager, she was so proud of herself,” said Carol. “She went out with friends, she went to the mall, she said to me, ‘Mom, this is the first time that I feel normal again. I have had the best day ever.’” Carol doesn’t know what caused her daughter’s setback, but Amanda may have given Carol an answer in a private video. “She left me a video message on her phone. I’m not ready to look at it yet,” said Carol. “The coroner has told me it will provide closure for me but I can’t look at it yet.” Carol doesn’t know what happened, but sometime earlier this week — before Amanda killed herself late Wednesday afternoon — something happened to shatter that fragile recovery. The police have been unable to track her stalker down. “The police investigated and investigated, it got traced to somebody in the United States,” said Carol. “But they never found him. Those people are very good at hiding their tracks.” The suspected pedophile threatened that if she didn’t do a show for him, he would circulate her pictures again. Amanda wouldn’t bow to the pressure and he carried out his threat. Finger-pointing at schools for not stopping bullying only angers Carol. She said Amanda, who had learning problems, had excellent support in the Coquitlam school district, where Amanda spent most of her school time. Since March, she was a student at CABE, Coquitlam Alternate Basic Education secondary school, which is a haven for youth who, for whatever reason, need the alternative learning situation. It was there that Amanda made friends, among both the students and staff. “She had a good support network there,” said Carol. Among the teachers Amanda especially liked was former Olympic track and field star Leah Pells, who teaches physical education at the school. “She and Amanda clicked and Amanda trusted her,” said Carol. Carol is much more tech savvy than the average parent. But Amanda’s victimization at the hands of the stalker led Carol to learn more about the horrifying world of child pornography, where some victims don’t even know their images are being shown on porn sites. “You’ll see pornography and the girls are so young,” she said. “I don’t know if the girls are doing this for kicks, if their parents are monitoring it or if they even know about it. The Amanda Todd trust fund is being held at the Royal Bank of Canada, which will be accepting donations in Amanda’s name at all its branches. gshaw@vancouversun.com If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, click here for ways to get help Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Amanda+Todd+mother+speaks+about+daughter+bullying+with+video/7384521/story.html#ixzz2OTn8gDJI http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Amanda+Todd+speaks+about+daughter+death/7384521/story.html

Who Was Amanda Todd?

Amanda Todd was a beautiful 15 year old girl who should have had her whole life in front of her, but because of some cruel bullies, she no longer does.  On October 10 she took her own life, because the pain she was forced to endure became way to much for her to handle.  She felt completely alone, alienated, and unwanted by her peers.  She made mistakes just like you and I do, but it should not have cost her her life to make up for a few mistakes.

Like every other teenage girl, she enjoyed talking to people and meeting new people via web cam.  And when she was dared to show her boobs she thought hey why not?  So she harmlessly flashed her boobs to a man who took advantage of her innocence and exploited her  in an such a way, all  for nothing more than to humiliate her, and degrade her.  And when she would not comply with his command to give him a show, he began with the blackmail threats.  She ignored them.  He told her he knew all her family and friends and he knew all their names.  She continued to ignore them.  Then early one morning at 4 am, there was a knock at her door, it was the police.  The picture of her boobs were  everywhere. 

Embarrassed and maybe even a little ashamed, she wound up depressed, and anxious.  Her peers decided to take it upon themselves to judge her, calling her a slut I am sure, talking a bunch of nonsense about her, harassing her, tormenting her, emotionally destroying her.  Hey they had every right to, -  in their minds, because each one of them was perfect and led the perfect lives, and were given special permission from the man above, to do so… Yeah right, in their wildest dreams.  There was not a one of them that was perfect in any way.  Obviously they had nothing better to do with their time effort or energy, then to relentlessly torment a fellow classmate.

Amanda  decided to change schools, to rid of herself, of all the pain and bullying she faced each and every day.  Everything was ok for a little while, that is on the outside, but on the inside she was slowly dying .  Some how the person who posted her picture managed to find out her new school, her new list of friends, and even created a Facebook page to further humiliate her.  Then all the torment and bullying started all over again.  It was sometime during that time she started talking to a guy she used to know.  They texted back and forth for a while, the whole time he was leaving her with the impression that he really liked her, but he did,  have a girlfriend.  So when he invited her over to his house one day saying his girlfriend was on vacation, she hesitantly went.  She thought her really did like her.  Turns out all he wanted was sex, he didn't care less about her.

Then one day at school she got a text that she needed to come out of her school. A group of boys and girls had accumulated and  in the crowd was the boy she thought had liked her.  The group of kids started talking a bunch of crap to her, threatening and intimidating her, until someone from the crowd yelled “hit her already”  And so she was punched a few times and knocked to the ground, where she was left to crawl away to the safety of a near by ditch where her father later found her.

I believe it was here where she lost all hope and reason to live.  She felt completely alone, she saw no light at the end of the tunnel, she saw no relief from the pain and misery that followed her everywhere she went.  She had a few failed suicide attempts which only made the bullying worse.  The bullies  said things about her on Facebook, and then posted “I hope she sees this and kills herself.” 

How in the hell can anyone be so cruel to another human being.  Did the parents of the kids who were tormenting her not teach their children any better.  And how could they not have known what was going on?   Yes I know you cannot be with your child 24/7,  a lot of parents are both working parents just to keep a roof over their families heads.  But come on, pay a little bit of attention….  Obviously a lot of time and effort went into tormenting this young girl, didn’t  the bullies have to extra curricular activities no part time jobs no lives of their own to lead.  And still no one notices a thing.  Wow that’s some good parenting there…

Anyway my heart is breaking here for yet another senseless death. A death  that could have been prevented had we as a society had not failed her.  Some how everyone turned a blind eye to what was going on here, and others were just in plain denial and  the truth of the matter is there is a 15 year old girl who will never know what it is like to fall in love, to live life to the fullest, or ever have a family of her own.  And that is ridiculous and it is a shame.  And something has got to change somewhere…

We as a society need to pull our heads out of the sand, maybe it is time for some tough love.  Parents  have got to establish some boundaries with our children from the get go.  If your child is a bully, it is your responsibility to find out the root of the problem here and work on it.  Get your child some counseling, talk with your child, do something.  And if your child is the one being bullied, then remove your child from the situation, if the case is as extreme as this one and others have been, remove them from the situation by all means possible.  And if the schools see a pattern of bullying going on while the kids are at  school then do something about it, stop taking this bullying situation so damn lightly.  If one adult threatens another adult that is a crime and criminal charges can be brought up the one threatening and or intimidating.  So why should it not be like that in the school system?  

I am not sorry if I have offended anyone here, I merely said what needed to be said.  At the least Amanda’s death does not have to be in vain.  Maybe with more education and less tolerance this kind of thing can be put to an end.  And I realize that this is not a perfect world and it wont end completely.  But maybe if one less child dies through suicide due to excessive bullying, something for the good will have been accomplished.

Amanda Todd, I am sorry.  I am sorry that as a community we failed you.  I am sorry you felt alone and that you had no one, and if I could turn back the hands of time and bring you back I would. But since I cannot do that, I will do what I can to make sure no one forgets you, or what you went through or why.  To your family I send my deepest condolences, and I pray they find peace and understanding and acceptance.  May God be with us all…

 

Rest In Peace Amanda Todd

I am shocked and sickened by the fact that a young girl, with her whole life ahead of her, was pushed to the point of suicide, by ruthless, bullies.  Are you freaking kidding me?  What in the hell have we let this world become.  Everyone of us should feel down out right ashamed for allowing this to happen, again.  How many times are we going to allow this to happen?  Yep, that is what I said, How many times are we going to let this happen?  In my opinion enough really is enough.  If we want to put a stop to this bullying bullshit then we need to take some serious actions for bullying,  period.  Not only if the outcome is the same, and the bullied person commits suicide, but in every case of bullying.  To hell with the warnings, I say immediate criminal action should be taken. The bully is taking the other persons life in their hand and playing judge jury and executioner.  They might as well have a gun in their hand a shoot the other person, hell it would be a lot more humane…  The law really needs to throw the book at these bullies.  Maybe prison time with people who are bigger and better than they are, who could let them know first hand what it is like to be on the receiving hand of bullying.

I don’t know, but what I do know is enough is enough.  There should not have to be any more of this.  I just hope some major changes come around really soon, and Amanda Todd death will not be in vain.

Amanda Todd I pray that you Rest In Peace, Dear Child, and I pray you found comfort back in the arms of the Angels…

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2012/10/18/suicide_victim_amanda_todd_stalked_before_she_was_bullied.html

Amanda Todd's tragic suicide in British Columbia earlier this month is playing out through the familiar trope of bullying. As is often the case, it's much more complicated than that. In a wrenching video, Amanda described herself as bullied. She was taunted at school and ate lunch alone. She said she made a mistake by hooking up with a boy at her school who had a girlfriend, and that she was ganged up on, and eventually punched for it. All of this sounds like an ugly example of slut shaming, and to state the obvious, that's bad. And it's a behavior we need to speak out against—though I continue to think the best way to do that is through community-wide prevention efforts, not by making examples of individual teenagers. That's especially relevant in this case, because as she tells it, Amanda's troubles started not with other kids, but with an adult male stalker. She says that a year before the school bullying, she started chatting with a man via webcam. He persuaded her to flash her chest, took a photo, and then posted it online. People she knew saw it, and even though she moved and changed schools, she said the photo followed her, ruining her reputation wherever she went. "I can never get that photo back," she wrote. "It's out there forever." Why don't the headlines about Amanda Todd say "Stalked Teen Commits Suicide" rather than "Bullied Teen"? This isn't about semantics: It's about understanding what appears to have propelled this girl on a terrible downward spiral, which, based on what we know, included drug and alcohol abuse. Clearly she was vulnerable to depression, the major trigger for suicide—substance abuse is also a risk factor—and that's another part of the story that's not getting enough attention. The man who posted Amanda's picture online and hounded her reminds me of Lori Drew. She's the Missouri mother who created a fake Internet profile for a boy named Josh, which was then used to manipulate a girl named Megan Meier, an on-again-off-again friend of Drew's daughter who also took her own life. That story too was framed in terms of cyberbullying and led to a wave of legislation, much of it directed at schools. But in both of these cases it appears that the real victimizer was a creepy scary adult, not a teen bully, and that whatever happened in school was secondary to the damage that adult did. I don't want to feed into Internet predator panic. It is, thankfully, rare for adults to seduce children online. And I'm not sure what to think about this confusing story of how Anonymous tried to out Amanda's stalker and may have gotten the wrong man. I'm glad the Canadian police are investigating. I hope when they're finished, they can give us a fuller picture of what happened to Amanda. One more thing: Amanda's video has gotten 3 million hits on YouTube. It's stark and moving: I felt that watching it. But I'm worried about the effect it could have on other vulnerable and depressed girls. When suicide testimonies like this get an enormous amount of sympathetic attention, they can attract other kids in a disturbing way. This is the documented phenomenon of copycat suicide, which prevention experts worry about. Some of them have voiced such concerns in this case, too.

http://amandatodd.net/bulliedintosuicide.html

This girl, her name is Amanda Todd. She posted a video on YouTube a few days ago. She was bullied so bad it led to suicide... She was in a webcam chat group to meet up with new and old people. They started calling her Beautiful, Stunning, cute, Etc. And then they asked her to flash... So she did..... Thinking it was nothing... A year went by and some guy she did not know, messaged her saying ”Give me a 'show' or I will send your boobs.” She ignored it..... Christmas Break came and a knock came on her door at 4 AM. It was the police... That person sent the picture to EVERYONE. Everyone judged her. Bullied her. From ONE MISTAKE. She ended up switching schools. That person found out her school, friends, address once again and sent them there too. She had no one. Everyone hated her. She ended up switching towns. Then at this new school....She met this boy who she thought liked her. He didn't....he had a girlfriend. One day she got a note saying you better leave school. She didn't. A group of boys and girls including that boy, the girlfriend and more came up to her while the school surrounded her. The girl said “Look around, No one likes you.” One kid from the group said “JUST PUNCH HER ALREADY!” So she did, and Amanda got beat really bad. And got left. Alone. And her dad ended up finding her in a ditch hours later. She went home and drank bleach, to try to kill herself. It didn't work. The next day all over her Facebook page was written “Drink some more bleach", "No one cares", "I hope she dies, "No one would cry", "Everyone hates you", "Amanda try it again we dare you"…and so much more. She cried every night. Why did everyone hate her. One mistake. One. She started cutting so much and did drugs,and drank alcohal. She ended up trying to kill herself again. She failed. She couldnt take it anymore. At the end of the video it said ”I am Amanda Todd. I just need someone.” October 10th she hung herself. She is dead. Rest in peace, Amanda. You're beautiful. We will find a way to help stop bullying. Please share this to help stop bullying world wide: If you need "Someone" read this: Have you ever felt life is empty, void of purpose, useless or even pointless? I did too. Unlike Amanda, I found out key to freedom and joy. Since I was young I always questioned, what is the purpose of life, it all seems so meaningless? When I was only eight years old I despaired of life. I grew up in church but I never found anything there. The people who went seemed like they were just putting on a show for no reason. It's like they were pretending to be good just so people would like them. Over time I became more and more frustrated with the questions, where is the truth, where can I find hope, how do I stop this pain inside? Rather than looking to those who had gone to church, I, for the first time, began reading the Bible for myself. What I found in there was so different, so radical, compare to what I found in church. It's like the pages came alive and each word leaped into me. I really met and came to know Jesus as a person. Overtime I came to understand. That hole inside was always meant to be filled with Jesus Christ. I finally realized that all those things I did, which I knew were wrong, had separated me from the God who made me and imagined me. The Bible says that “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” What that means is that we have all separated ourselves from God, and we need God as a child needs his or her parents. You may ask: how did I separate myself from God? Well, God has given us a conscience, He has told us the difference between right and wrong and we all have chosen wrong at one time or another. We have all “sinned” by doing this, like lying, hating, lusting, cheating etc. So what’s the good news? The Good News is this: although God is just and obligated to not only separate us from Himself, but destroy us for our “sin,” He loves us and He sent His Son Jesus to take our punishment and die in our place. Let me explain, as we said earlier we have all made mistakes. These mistakes have separated us from God, left us empty and left us so guilty that God in His justice should destroy us. Not wanting to destroy us, God made Himself into a man (Jesus); He lived as a man and even was tempted to do evil like we do, and once the correct time had come He (Jesus) was crucified and put to death for you and me. If you are willing to turn from sin, accept that sacrifice for yourself and live for God, Jesus will give you a new life, restoring your fellowship with God and sparing you from the judgment that you (like all of us) deserve. Receiving Jesus is as easy as praying this prayer: Lord Jesus, I recognize that I have sinned. I ask you Lord to forgive me my sin. I choose to turn from sin and follow you. I choose to live for you, tell others about you and love others. I choose to be your servant and spread your love. I thank you Lord that you died in my place. I thank you for forgiving me my sin. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.