Hello petals!
Here we are again with another blog homework, thank you @missy and @rambo for always coming up with interesting topics to talk about!
For this one I decided to talk about a particularly creepy experience I had with an "admirer", if you'd call it that.
I was about 17 at the time, and @milafox messaged me and informed me that someone went back on her instagram to her first photos, and liked them. As you would be, she was curious to see who would care to scroll back so far - and when she clicked on the account - it had all of my images on it, but the account was under the name 'Sandy'.
I was shocked that someone had gone to the efforts of copying all my photos, what would make somebody want to do that?
For a while the account didn't bother me too much, but it did make me feel uncomfortable - but I thought it wasn't doing any harm. After a few months I came to realise that this person not only had an instagram using my photos and this fake name, but also other social media platforms such as whatsapp, kik, twitter, formspring, ask.fm, youtube, tumblr and on and on.
And i'm talking, this account had tens of thousands of followers on twitter, and my actual twitter, at the time, had about 40!
What made me jump into action was the fact that this account was being extremely rude to people and followers, and I started to get anxious that people could see me in the street, and actually think it was me who had said horrible things to them!
That was it. I had to get my Nev and Max on. (from the tv show catfish)
^ my actual facial expression when I first found the account.
Over the next few months, I planned how I was going to get this account taken down, and I was determined to find out who was behind it. Was it somebody I knew and trusted?
The further I dug, the more creepy things I found out - like this account had made other fake accounts to be my 'friends' on social media to make me look even more real!
After numerous failed attempts at reporting the account, I decided to contact this person through kik.
I told them that I was fully aware of what they were doing, what accounts they had and what they had been posting, and expressed how concerned I was for my own safety.
To which I received a reply along the lines of "Please don't make me take it down, You're perfect and I wish I was you, this account is the only reason I'm alive, I hate myself and by being you it gives me confidence and people like me"
I was absolutely stunned, but I was angry. Over the next week or so, I sought friends help after the person running the account got nasty after I tried sympathising. I made photos of myself holding up a sign saying 'Sandy <insert username>' is a fake account of me' and slowly but surely her followers caught onto it after I messaged a few she would continuously tweet.
They still refused to take the account down for some time, until I tried again to talk to them and ask them who they were. One of my main concerns was that it was an older person using my photos to lure other young girls or boys to meet up with them, so I was extremely worried. I stayed up all night talking to this account, and they finally revealed they were a young girl living in France, and had randomly come across my tumblr and stole all of my photos.
I demanded photo evidence of the person and I got it. I was still stunned, and as crazy as it was to me, I really felt for the young girl who felt she could not just be herself for she feared people would not like her. For months and months later I recieved all sorts of crazy messages, like people telling me that they were 'friends' with this Sandy account for so long and really thought they were who they said they were, and even a boy came forward and said he actually dated sandy for ages and was completely shaken up.
I think sometimes it's too easy to be mad at people, and I genuinely hope that this girl, wether she finally moved on or she's reading this now - found happiness and comforting in being herself - there's only one of you in the world and every one of us is important and special and deserving of love.
I hope you enjoyed reading <3
Akiramai x
