From Lurker to Stalker

In my last year of high school, I had a stalker of sorts. A girl who had taken a shining to me and had decided that she and I were destined to be together. She was a friend of mine earlier, not a good friend but someone I had spoken to. She was quite overweight and I have a feeling that people hadn't always been so nice to her about this over the years.

One day after school I gave her a lift home and I think that this was the catalyst that started the semi-obsession as I was a guy that had done something she found unexpectedly giving.

I was already dating another girl which she knew but for the rest of the year, she proceeded to follow us around the school and at the breaks whenever we looked over our shoulder, she was there somewhere watching us. This went on until the end of the year and then after school had ended, I never saw her again.

Until over a decade later.

Just after I joined Facebook around 2007, I started getting pokes, requests and some messages from her but under a different last name, she was now married. I didn't accept and in the very first message, it was still evident that she was still harbouring some unresolved issues. She got disappointed and then nasty very fast.

What I wonder however is if stalking is increasing because of social media exposure. With so many people putting so much of their lives online, does this make finding someone and feeling like there is a connection to them that much easier?

We hear stories about stars who have had people fall in love with them after seeing movies and then create a fantasy world in which they are meant to be together. They then spend their time stalking and often harassing the star and at times it gets very dangerous.

But, with so much of our private lives out in the open and so many people able to lurk across a whole range of social platforms, wouldn't the same kinds of delusions manifest in some fraction of the population? Couple this with the ability for the internet to connect any person with a wide range of varied content for every taste, and I think it is little wonder that these kinds of things are increasing.

There seems to be a whole range of strange and sick people in this world and I am sure that they have always existed and will continue to well into the future. But, now the hurdle for these people to jump over is not very high if they want to watch through the digital windows. very few of us are overly careful with our digital privacy when it comes to a whole range of areas, not just here at Steemit.

The average person has a Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and whatever other random public social site. Many are also under the impression that the validation from strangers is important to their self-worth and will increasingly open their lives to the public eye, an eye they have very little control over.

What happens when someone becomes obsessive and starts to stalk, what happens if they can find you? The stars get into trouble and they have security systems and bodyguards to watch over them at nearly all times. The majority however are much less prepared.

And what of the obsessed? Would they build the delusion if they didn't have access to a myriad selfies and parties with friends to scroll through? Are we goading them into acting on behaviours that may have otherwise laid dormant had they never had access?

Am I to blame for giving a ride to someone who was sort of a friend and talking to her as if she is any other human I would talk to? Did I lead her on with my actions, did my smile or joke give her the impression that we were meant to be together? Of course it didn't but, some people become delusional very easily, especially when they are vulnerable for one reason or another.

For me, I did not fear her behaviour, I did not worry about my own safety as I am a man and under the (probably mistaken) impression that I can handle myself if needs be. My girlfriend at the time was somewhat worried as she was half her size and the likely target of any aggressive behaviour. She was not the physically aggressive type but, broken minds do broken things.

I am not a woman so I cannot accurately put myself into the shoes of one but, four out of five stalking victims are women and in the vast majority of cases, the stalker and victim know each other. Often through former or ongoing intimate relationships but also through more casual relationships.

I think that it is because people that know each other have access to some view of real life plus which is supplemented by an online view of the person too. This means that they can form a bond and then feed the delusion through a digital feast of images and information that winds the severity upwards and can send someone on a spiralling slippery slope downwards. Many of these interactions end violently.

There is no real stopping these people other than limiting their access to our lives which many are unwilling to do. Because of the anonymous social group validation so many seek, people are increasingly wanting content reach and less likely to consider the consequences of what content gets that level of reach.

At least, I think that the young people of today need to have a lot more education on the potential dangers of social media and sharing the content they do. Not only could it be out there in the internet wilds for eternity, it may inspire a whole range of unwanted attention and usages from people it was never intended for. Should this stop us? I don't think so but we should at least be aware as to what our actions could lead some broken people to do.

This is just some preliminary thinking on the matter but I will likely have to explore this further and much more deeply and practically as my daughter grows and joins the digital masses.

Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]