You may have seen my post on Monday all about Harriet, Scott and Kate. Well since that tragic news things have moved on apace.
As you would imagine a number of tweeters have bonded over this story and there was a lot of chatter last night and then a post from "Scott". It was a blog from "Harriet" admitting that they had stolen all the twin photos they had posted from someone else's blog. So the cute photo of Harriet and Alice dressed as Two Peas in a Pod and the first photo of the smile following the meninigitus scare were another set of twins. "She" said she didn't want photos of her own children "out there".
This blog has since been deleted and it would seem that this was not the only fakeness.
My twitter friends have found the blogs where other photos were stolen including using someone else's wedding album.
It would seem the entire story was fake. There was never Harriet, Scott or Kate or twins or any of the tragedy that they encountered.
I can't get my head around it. Was it a social media experiment or is someone, with a lot of time on their hands, enjoying the sick joke? Other twitter friends have sent presents to fake addresses and even donated money to "charity".
Maybe the "person" is ill and has wove these stories and believes them themselve?
I "direct messaged" both "Harriet" and "Kate" and told them both of our struggle with getting pregnant (something I've not spoken to the majority of my real friends about, until now! :-)).
Was I gullible?
I work in IT and I'm always the first person to highlight hoaxs that get emailed and facebook around. How silly of me to fall for such a thing. Nothing seemed fake to me and it wasn't like I was handing over bank details or my first born.
I guess this is a lesson to us all that the concerns we have about online identity are valid. Who are our children speaking to online? Are they who they say they are? How can we ever tell?
Maybe me and my twitter friends will learn all about the motives of this in some newspaper soon? Maybe it'll serve as a warning regarding esafety. Who knows?
I don't think we'll ever learn the truth.
I will try not to feel humiliated and treat the whole episode like a TV movie or Novel. I cry too easily at them too. :-)
Well said Katie. Having heard you mention the twins on numerous occasions in the past, I can't quite believe the extent this person has gone to with this hoax. I find it a sick and disturbing web of lies that seem to have been sewn together and added to over such a long period of time it is almost beyond comprehension.
ReplyDeleteYou should absolutely not feel humiliated for being drawn in. No normal person would be able to ignore a heart rending story as has been played out, but as you say it really really highlights the dangerous power of social networking. You can never ever be sure that your cyber friends are who they say they are, and should never (perhaps sadly) fully trust anyone known to you only over the big wide interweb.
To that person who is responsible for this, I would really like to say, you're horrid. Really horrible and you need help. Real people with, real worries, dreams, disappointments, joys, REAL LIVES who do nothing but try and do the best with their lives and the best by their friends, who have done nothing to you have been affected by your "joke". Not funny. At all.
Katie - you are a thousand times better, more interesting, more entertaining, kinder, beautiful and wonderful than this rubbish person, so don't give them another thought. Their scam is over, so they're probably feeling really sad and lonely now. pah. Who cares.
xxxx
Katie, this leaves me speechless. I fail to understand what is achieved by hoaxes and to prey on peoples sense of caring is surely the lowest of the low. However astute we are, those of us who truly care are probably always a bit vulnerable but that is surely our strength. Karen x
ReplyDeleteSome sickos out there. I couldn't quite believe what I read the other day and it played on my mind also. Personally I would never air my inner thoughts to anyone on the web much the same as I wouldn't go up to a complete stranger and start to download on them!
ReplyDeleteTalk to your tangible friends - thats what we're here for!! we all have issues and hangups, and tho not necessarily resolved it often helps to physically talk through stuff with others. I echo the comments of Jess and Karen don't let it get you down, regrettably you can never fully trust what you can't see. Jo xx
Thanks Jo. The thing is I didn't feel like I was talking to strangers. As far as I was concerned they were real people who I'd been conversing with for over a year.
DeleteWill try to be more careful in future but think it's a shame to suspect everyone.
Good grief. I wondered what had happened when the blog sites went down...and now I'm just glad I had happened across yours, and you've been able to put us all straight. There is a lesson to be learned from this, but right now I"m too shocked (and relieved, in a way) to think about what that may be.
ReplyDelete