Tyler Clementi: Another Case of Cyberbullying

Along with the case of the cyberbully of Michigan--Andrew Schirvall--there was this sad story of a cyberbully who most likely caused Tyler Clementi, a talented young musician at Rutgers University, to kill himself. His roommate actually used his computer to watch Tyler make-out with another man, and then posted the images for others to see.

Tyler killed himself by jumping off the George Washington Bridge.

From the nyt.com:

It started with a Twitter message on Sept. 19: “Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly’s room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay.”

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Richard Perry/The New York Times

Mr. Clementi, a Rutgers University freshman, is thought to have jumped off the George Washington Bridge.

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That night, the authorities say, the Rutgers University student who sent the message used a camera in his dormitory room to stream the roommate’s intimate encounter live on the Internet.

And three days later, the roommate who had been surreptitiously broadcast — Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old freshman and an accomplished violinist — jumped from the George Washington Bridge into the Hudson River in an apparent suicide.

The Sept. 22 death, details of which the authorities disclosed on Wednesday, was the latest by a young American that followed the online posting of hurtful material. The news came on the same day that Rutgers kicked off a two-year, campuswide project to teach the importance of civility, with special attention to the use and abuse of new technology.

Horrible death.

Cruel people out there.

Pace,

B