George Tyndale: Stop people posting Facebook memorial sites

Sep 18 2011 by George Tyndale, Sunday Mercury

INTERNET “troll” Sean Duffy, who posted revolting messages on Facebook sites dedicated to dead children, won’t be able to cause any more misery for a while.

Duffy, a 25-year-old social misfit, has been jailed for 18 weeks and banned from using social networking sites for five years.

He mocked the death of 15-year-old suicide victim, uploading vile messages and videos on a condolence page set up by her devastated family.

Duffy, who became addicted to the craze of trolling – in which sickos leave disturbing and bullying messages online – also made warped “jokes” about the deaths of three other kids.

There can be no excuse for such activities but there is an easy way to stop the trolls – stop creating online memorial sites.

These often tacky web pages encourage a feeding frenzy of grief that reaches hysterical proportions, particularly among the young.

Distant colleagues and associates, as well as strangers, behave like motorway rubber-neckers, taking a quick look at the misery of human loss before logging on to the next online shopping site.

Grief is both a private and a public affair, which is why we have funeral services. It should not become a gruesome spectacle. You don’t need a website to honour the dead.