Suicide of Megan Meier Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Suicide of Megan Meier - Research Paper Example It was on October 15, 2006 that Megan Meier received really unexpected and harsh messages from her boyfriend Josh, who ended the conversation by saying that â€Å"The world would be a better place without you†. Megan had been talking to Josh for quite some while. They met on MySpace and Megan instantly fell for this person, who surprisingly enough, did not have a cell phone or landline and had just moved into town. She loved talking to such a handsome boy as she had faced problems of obesity, depression and attention deficit disorder but this friendship was really boosting her self-esteem, something, which promoted her mother from allowing her daughter to spend her time on MySpace (Long, p. 28). When this relationship boosted, her self-esteem, those messages and then subsequent leakage of those messages to her friends, lowered her self-esteem to such a point where she decided to take her life by hanging herself. In the aftermath of events, it became apparent that â€Å"Josh† was the mother of a former female friend of Megan and that this family only lived four blocks away from Megan. A few months back, Megan and her friend had a quarrel and Lori Drew, her mother, decided to teach Megan a lesson by adding her through a fake MySpace profile (Tokunaga, p. 277). In the aftermath of Megan’s suicide, cyber bullying emerged as a serious issue and educational institutions, parents, teachers and even the law enforcement agencies felt the need to play their part in ensuring that such sad news does not come into the limelight ever again. However, naturally, many people felt disgusted and sickened at the actions of Lori Drew called that she should be prosecuted for her actions. The same led to a nation-wide debate on whether or not Lori Drew’s actions deserved prosecution. Many people shocked and perplexed by the actions of Lori began to raise their voice for Lori Drew prosecution. On the other hand, several critics began to question such demands and raised their concern that such calls would lead the nation to a slippery slope. According to its definition, prosecution refers to the process of a government attorney getting involved, charging, and trying the case against the accused. This paper is an attempt to explore and analyze the s ame question mentioned above. Discussion For charging someone with a particular crime, misdemeanor, felony, or offense, it is imperative that the court should find that person guilt of those actions. Furthermore, in case of serious crimes and convictions, people cannot be convicted in the absence of malice aforethought. This is the reason why people with mental illness, children, and minors do not receive strict punishments even for the most serious crimes since they are less likely to have malice aforethought and more likely not to understand or foresee the consequences of this action. The first and the foremost argument in favor of Lori Drew’s conviction or prosecution is that she, being an adult and mother or a daughter of the age of Megan, knew and understood the full weight of her decisions and went onto to bully and torture a young girl (Brenner & Megan, p. 15). The problem with cyber bullies is that in most occasions, it is almost impossible to prove that they foresaw or understood the implications or consequences of their actions. For example, in the case of Megan Meier, the cyber bully could only be prosecuted for bullying and could not be blamed for suicide. Nevertheless, the fact is that in this case, the cyber bully, the mom of Megan’s former friend, knew all about the consequences of her actions. That woman was well aware of the fact that Megan suffers from low self-esteem due to her previous obesity and has a history of depression (Bhat, p. 53). Furthermore, she also suffers from attention deficit disorder. That woman was well aware of all these facts and it would be apparent, even to a nonprofessional that any attempt at pushing the back of this girl against the wall