With the growth in popularity of social media pages that allow users to post anonymously, local residents are feeling the negative affects they can have.
For a year and a half, Bonnyville woman Crystal Chretien endured online harassment through Facebook pages such as Lakeland Confessions.
“It got to the point where everybody has their limit, and it was making me very depressed and embarrassed,” she said.
Confession pages are online platforms that allow users to anonymously submit information, which then gets posted by the page’s administrators. While they’ve been used as a means for someone to share their own details, online bullying and harassment like what Chretien experienced are also common.
When it all began, Chretien was employed as a social and disability worker in Cold Lake.
“I moved back (to Bonnyville), and it just seemed like the confessions on the page grew. I honestly couldn’t make sense of it, because I spent all my time working and being with my family,” she detailed.
According to Chretien, the posts claimed that she was either a prostitute or addicted to drugs.
She added, the stress caused by the online abuse forced her to quit her job.
“The things I heard about myself were absolutely unreal... I did try to ignore them over the last year and a half, but it got to the point where I was on antidepressants and wasn’t able to get out of bed. Having my kids and friends hear that, (I was) just really embarrassed for my family to have to go through that, and that my work had to go through that. It was causing a lot of problems everywhere I went in life.”
Due to the anonymity offered by these types of pages and websites, Chretien noted, “it could (have been) anybody” writing about her.
According to the manager for addiction and mental health services in Bonnyville Reggie Jackson, not knowing where the online abuse is coming from can have a negative impact on a person’s mental health.
“You have no idea who these people are, what their context is, how they may or may not know you, and it leads to a lot of fear,” he explained.
When the Nouvelle asked readers their opinion on these pages, Brad Crowley said, “Confession pages provide people with anonymity, and therefore talking back at them isn’t like talking to a person. Everyone on these pages are very good at saying something behind a screen that they wouldn’t say to someone’s face. Bullies and cowards, all of them.”
While Chretien claims comments on the page weren’t true, messages from complete strangers made it hard to ignore.
“People can make up anything about anybody. It doesn’t matter, and it’s not the point... It’s the point that you live in a small community, and you have to hold your head up out there. You don’t want people to think those things about you when you’re out there,” Chretien exclaimed.
When Chretien reached out to administrators of the page requesting the posts be taken down, she alleges that she was only met with taunts.
“Numerous times I contacted the group, and the person would laugh at me and say ‘go ahead, go to the police or go get a lawyer, nobody will help you,’ and it didn’t get taken down.”
Bonnyville RCMP Sgt. Kim Hillier noted these cases are hard to investigate because all posts are made anonymously.
“Most times, people don’t use their names and there’s no information about who’s actually (commenting). You have to go through the process of getting a warrant for someone’s (social media) account. It’s very difficult to investigate and convict,” she detailed.
Although Facebook’s community standards state any content that “purposely targets individuals with the intention of degrading or shaming them” will be removed, Chretien believes it’s easy to get around this rule.
“When somebody would put a post about me... someone said Crystal and they put a star where the “s” goes. The next confession that would be up would have my name, and they would put the full first name, but then put a star in the last name,” she said.
Chretien wasn’t the only one to be targeted by the pages.
“Whether it’s true or not isn’t the point, people need to go about their lives, mind their own business, and stop hurting each other,” Chretien stressed.
Sarah Pequegnat told the Nouvelle through social media she believes the platform can “destroy people’s lives.”
“It’s a way to slander and say things that could seriously cause issues in someone’s work place or personal life.”
Francine Gale also said in a comment, “It’s mental abuse on the web. I have a good friend that I had to rush to her home to hold and give her hugs, and tell her that she’s better than that... She was broken, and it shouldn’t ever be allowed. It’s bullying in a much worse way because you don’t know who’s saying the stuff. All the things I have seen on there, in one way or another, is really hurtful.”
Knowing she wasn’t the only one being harassed was among the reasons why Chretien made a video on social media sharing her experience.
“After I made it, I felt really good. I had a sense of closure come over me because people, whoever it is, that has that hate on for other people that go to that extent to bully people like this, need to realize it’s really doing a lot of damage,” Chretien said, adding she had an outpouring of support about what she had been through.
Jackson noted, “If people aren’t willing to put their names on it, why are they saying it? I think that has a certain level of accountability, as well. There are ways of saying things, and being critical constructively rather than (derogatory) and really having those negative impacts on the people that it’s impacting.”
Although the page has currently been taken down, Chretien noted this has happened in the past.
“I’m really hoping if it’s gone now, it’s gone for good. I, along with my husband, friends, and family, have spent a lot of time reporting a lot of these posts. We’re really fortunate if it doesn’t come up, but another may pop up after this.”
The Nouvelle reached out to the page’s administrators, as well as Facebook, for a comment, but they they didn’t respond by press time.
