“Fat Slut:” Killing Our Teenage Girls One MySpace Bulletin at a Time
November 20, 2007
By now, most of the country has learned about the suicide of Megan Meier last October. The Missouri teen was the victim of a cruel hoax perpetrated by the mother of one of her former friends.
The mother — 48 year-old Lori Drew — created a MySpace profile under the assumed identity of “Josh Evans,” a 16 year-old boy. Megan quickly became friends with “Josh” and for six weeks, she had the perfect e-boyfriend.
Then things went South. Josh began sending Megan cruel messages. He forwarded Megan’s private messages to people in her class at school. His last message to Megan told her that “the world would be a better place without you.”
Some of Megan’s so-called friends even got in on the hoax. People posted bulletins — electronic fliers that go out to all of your friends — with titles like “Megan Meier is fat” and “Megan Meier is a slut.”
This was too much for Megan, who struggled with her body image and already suffered from depression, suicidal ideation and low self esteem. She hanged herself in her closet.
Aside from being one of the worst cases of cyberbullying I’ve ever heard of, this also represents a colossal breakdown in the responsibility of adult women to safeguard and cherish the nascent self-image of young girls.
There’s no worse insult in the mind of most young girls than to be called “fat,” with the possible exceptions of being called a “slut.” The weight of those words is particularly meaningful when you take a minute to think about what they really mean.
“Fat” is the absence of thinness and “slut” is the absence of so-called sexual purity. Together, they send the message that the biggest assets a women has are virginity and a slender figure. If your body doesn’t please men, what worth can you possibly have?
What’s more, both thinness and sexual purity can — and many anti-feminists would argue should — be achieved through assiduous self-denial. After all, what is a fat slut but someone who acknowledges and acts on her desires for food and sex?
And yet, you can be fat and slutty and still be a perfectly wonderful person. I’ve met fat, slutty rocket scientists who run charities in their spare time. I know fat sluts who have met perfectly wonderful men, settled down and raised happy, healthy families.
But to a teenage girl, “fat slut” epitomizes lowliness. It means that you’re disgusting and that nobody will ever love you.
This prospect seems particularly horrible in a world where men — or in this case, teenage boys — are the ultimate arbiters of a girl’s desirability. In Megan Meier’s world, pleasing her new online boyfriend meant being anything but a fat slut.
Megan Meier couldn’t possibly see herself as beautiful or worthy because she was curvy and had a perfectly natural, healthy sexuality. Her very identity made her a fat slut. Nobody would ever love her. In Megan Meier’s mind — and in the mind of Lori Drew, her adult persecutor — the only good fat slut was a dead fat slut.
The worst part of this whole tragic affair is that the cyberbullying was perpetrated by a mother, a trusted friend of the Meier family. Lori Drew had a sacred duty to teach her daughter and her daughter’s friends that their bodies do not define them.
Instead, she chose to destroy Megan Meier by hitting her as hard as she could in that exact place.
There is a special circle in hell reserved for women like Lori Drew — women who crush girls when they should be lifting them up.
Very well written and so true!
I hope karma kicks Lori Drew in the ass plus some.
Ms. Drew played directly on the sensitivities she knew would cause maximum damage to the Megan. Ms. Drew lured Megan in a way she knew would be most devastating to the child.
This wicked MOA Drew used is the exact methodology that a child predator employs to bait, lure and reel a child victim into doing their will. Child grooming was utilized over weeks and weeks to gain the child’s trust… and once trust was obtained, she exploited it into a relationship. (Another Child Predator Hallmark).
When Ms. Drew saw her bullets were hitting it’s mark, she turned up the heat. She invited others to partake in the sick, twisted mental assault on this child, keeping the pressure up. Even her business employee joined in the game.
Ms. Drew then delivered the final blow that many depressed 13 year old girls would crumble under.
She mentally raped the child and left her for dead. Better said, encouraged her for dead.
Ms. Drew remains smug and defiant about her actions - even seeks to attack this grieving family while their beloved daughter’s memory is fresh in their mind.
She has committed the unthinkable…. and doesn’t even acknowledge she abused this child.
Child Predators go to jail for their actions. Physical contact is not required for a conviction. Evidence of any kind of sexually charged grooming of a child by an adult is worthy of a charge of indecent liberties with a child…. or at the very least harassment.
If even assisted suicide is criminal intent, driving someone to it should at least qualify as something more heinous than an ordinary parking ticket.
Danny Vice
http://weeklyvice.blogspot.com/
Breaks my heart. She tricked that little girl into opening her heart then she ripped it out.
I do not for the life of me understand why an ADULT would do this. I hope her children are taken away from her. She is not a fit parent, or human being for that matter.
[...] “Fat Slut:” Killing Our Teenage Girls One MySpace Bulletin at a Time How could a mother do this to a child, albeit not her own, but to a kid anyway? When did adults stop acting like adults and start behaving like, well, not even like children, but like wild animals? Not a good story to read, but if you want to see a bad (tags: bully cyberbully) [...]
Yes, point well made. I don’t get why some blogger put the main responsibility on Megan (a 13 year old) and Megan’s mother.
At first I was speechless now I furious. Sure they couldn’t have known that she would take that path, but as adults and parents this just isn’t an option. We try to teach kids that this type of behavior is to be avoided.
That’s like me posting their home address on Waterford Crystal Dr., Dardenne Prairie, Mo - at some point this turns into a bad idea.
On Wednesday, October 21st, city officials enacted an ordinance designed to address the public outcry for justice in the Megan Meier tragedy. The six member Board of Aldermen made Internet harassment a misdemeanor, punishable by up to a $500 fine and 90 days in jail.
Does this new law provide any justice for Megan? Does this law provide equitable relief for a future victim or actually weaken the current law?
I reject the premise of this new law and believe it completely misses the mark. The reasoning behind this opinion is that city officials have consistently treated this case as an Internet harassment case instead of a child welfare/exploitation case.
Classifying this case a harassment issue completely fails to address the most serious aspects of the methods Lori Drew employed to lead this youth to her demise. The Vice disagrees that harassment was even a factor in this case until just a couple of days before Megan’s death.
Considering this case a harassment issue is incorrect because during the 5 weeks Lori Drew baited and groomed her victim, the attention was NOT unwanted attention. It was not harassment at all. It was invited attention. Megan participated in the conversations willingly because she was lured, manipulated and exploited without her knowledge.
This law willfully sets a precedent that future child exploiters and predators can use to reclassify their cases to harassment issues. In effect, the law enacted to give Megan justice, may make her even more vulnerable. So long as the child victim doesn’t tell the predator to stop, even a harassment charge may not stick with the right circumstances and a good defender.
Every aspect of this case follows the same procedural requirement used to convict a Child Predator. A child was manipulated by an adult. A child was engaged in sexually explicit conversation (as acknowledged by Lori Drew herself). An adult imposed her will on a child by misleading her, using a profile designed to sexually or intimately attract the 13 year old Megan.
Lori then utilized the power she had gained over this child to cause significant distress and endangerment to that child. She even stipulated to many of these activities in the police report she filed shortly after Megan’s death.
We can go on and on here, but the parallels between this case and many other child predator cases that are successfully prosecuted bear striking similarities.
Child Predator laws do not require much more than simply proving that an adult has engaged a minor in sexually explicit conversation. Lori Drew has already stipulated that her conversations with Megan were sometimes sexual for a child Megan’s age.
City officials who continue to ignore this viable, documented admission and continue to address this issue as harassment are intentionally burying their heads in the sand, when the solution is staring them right in the face. Why?
On June 5th, 2006, Governor Matt Blunt signed into law stiff penalties for convicted sex offenders. The Vice believes that officials continually reject a child predator classification of this case in order to keep the penalty of this offense out of this harsher realm.
Opponents of this law are active in defeating this law not by changing it, but by disqualifying cases like Megan’s from ever being heard.
There are several other child exploitation laws on the books. To date, none of them have even been considered by City, State and Federal officials in this case. I’m outraged that a motion was never even filed, so that the case could at least be argued before a judge or jury.
Those satisfied with this response out of Missouri officials need to think through the effect this law will truly have. It quite honestly has the potential to directly undermine Jessica’s law. It quiet easily gives prosecutors a way out of prosecuting child endangerment and child predator cases in the future.
Beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing here.
Danny Vice
http://weeklyvice.blogspot.com
I just read about this in People magazine, and had to vent about it somewhere. Lori Drew may not have violated any laws, but she definitely is a head case. What in the world is happening to parents to behave this way? What happened to parents speaking to each other about their children’s issues? If she was seriously concerned about this girl cyberbullying her daughter, there is no excuse for her not going to the child’s parents and discussing her concern. Her behavior clearly demonstrates malice and immaturity - she’s not mature enough to have a plant, much less a teenage daughter.
The naming of Lori Drew has sparked quite a debate indeed. Some major news outlets have chosen to name the perpetrator(s) behind this story such as the New York Times. Some have chosen not to. The mainstream media however has concluded that the blogging community should shoulder the responsibility of first naming the perpetrator behind this story.
The first question I have in this debate is simple. What is new here? Since before the French Revolution, the media has been used to ‘out’ individuals who’s actions seem to bear public relevancy in some way.
Although Lori Drew has not yet been charged in the case of Megan Meier, the media has never required formal charges to be made before running a story. In the case of some journalist like Dan Rather, some media outlets run with stories before even confirming that they’re true.
In this particular case, media outlets that have chosen to withhold Lori Drew’s identity have done so in consideration of other Drew family members.
I’m wondering if by doing this, the media plans to always withhold the names of interesting persons who outrage the community, if those persons have children. This would certainly be quite a ground-breaking event
Right at this moment, there is a story of a cop who is under investigation in the strange death of one wife and the disappearance of another. The cop in the story has a family, yet the media huddles outside his home relentlessly.
I could go back and list thousands of stories where the media wasted no time in delivering the names and occupations of individuals that were later cleared of any wrong-doing. I’ve never heard of another instance where the media apologized for naming names.
Don Henley’s ‘Dirty Laundry’ certainly applies well to conduct of most major news outlets.
Lori Drew is a primary subject of the story, she is not a rape victim, and is not a minor. Identifying her breaks no new ground, nor does it deviate from what news outlets do on a daily basis.
I also remind readers that her name and her role in the Megan Meier tragedy were documented as public record. A public record that Lori filed on her own accord. This is a critically important fact in this debate.
News outlets, bloggers and the general public were handed Lori’s name and Lori’s own self admissions when she herself filed that police report and sought to elevate the entire situation into the public domain.
Had Lori Drew simply acknowledged what she did was wrong, and apologized - the police report that identified her may have never been filed, and the entire situation may have well been kept at the lowest profile.
Will we see the media write about this? Not likely.
Danny Vice
http://weeklyvice.blogspot.com
Not that I am trashy, or even want to be, but if Megan was my daughter or a close friend of mine, maybe if my neighbor, I would bet the shit out of Lori Drew. I would do anything and everything in my power to make sure that she suffers for the rest of her life. I know that sounds horrible - but she deserves to live the rest of her life in prision and our pathetic legal system will allow her to be free. She killed that little girl.
While the Megan Meier case seems outrageous and unique, it isn’t unique. Hundreds of cases of egregious and heinous acts go on every day with the same excuses out of our lawmakers.
One such other case….The case of Nikki Catsouras, is a classic example of disgusting, hateful activity against innocent victims, while our lawmakers excuse themselves from enacting laws to prevent this.
The excuse lawmakers use to let themselves off the hook stem from the growth of the Internet and how fast it’s changing. This is a sham.
Chat rooms, message boards, instant messengers and email have been in existence for far over a decade now. While the software used to transmit messages changes slightly, the basic essence of using the Internet to send a message is largely the same. Is a decade or two long enough to establish some basic decency laws in regards to Internet usage?
I’ve posted the Nikki Catsouras story along with many details about the Megan Meier case so the inactivity out of our lawmakers towards these types of cases can be clearly seen.
Those who are interested in learning about cases like Megan’s and Nikki’s case are encouraged to drop by and comment on them if you like. I have a couple of polls set up as well. Danny Vice would like to hear your point of view.
Public awareness of the problem and discussions about possible solutions are the best way to pressure elected officials into action instead of excuse making.
I invite you to come by and share your opinion.
Danny Vice
http://weeklyvice.blogspot.com
I just saw this, have never even heard the story even though I spend much time researching sick and twisted acts. I gotta say, it sickens me that an adult would even get involved in what is High School bullying. I can not even imagine what kind of a person Lori was when she was a teen herself.
Most school bullies grow up and feel sorry for the actions against others they committed as kids, I can’t even imagine an adult doing that but there should be harsh punishments against such a thing when adults do it - it is a form of abuse and torture against a minor.
okay i mean no disrespect but who took that picture. I know im not the only one wondering this. I mean serosly why would someone that felt that bad about there body let someone take a picture of them nude and doing that.
that was horrible of lori drew and i wish she could feel the familys pain and if i were her i owuld suggest moving far far away b/c this staying quiet is not going to stay quiet for long!!!!!! SHAME ON YOU LORI DREW!!!!! you are horrible and the public is still mad at you take my word for it