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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think that if one of your mates...

108 replies

GhostShip · 08/08/2012 21:40

Donned a cap and a pair of track suit bottoms and tried talk all manly like, you'd realise?

I'm just watching the programme The Girl Who Became 3 Boys and I'm gobsmacked.

Basically Gemma, Jessica and Alice are friends.

Gemma creates a fake profile on Facebook and becomes Luke. Gemma, cleverly disguised Hmm as Luke meets up with Alice and they have a relationship.

Gemma then creates a new profile, this becomes Aaron. Aaron meets up with Jessica and they have kisses and cuddles etc.
But Jessica doesn't like Aaron enough, so Lo and behold Cona is born!
gemma creates another profile as this Cona, and meets up with Jessica, apparently Jessica doesn't realise
Neither Jessica or Alice realise at any point that Gemma, Cona, Aaron and Luke are the same!!! They had even had sex!!

www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/tv-and-radio-reviews/9459791/The-Girl-Who-Became-Three-Boys-Channel-4-review.html

I haven't explained it too well but here's the story and I recommended anyone watches it on 4od

But seriously, is it that unreasonable for me to think I wouldn't be tricked this easily?? Even when I was their age

OP posts:
Raspberrysorbet · 09/08/2012 09:44

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

SoleSource · 09/08/2012 10:40

Roseanne Barr did this in the 1990's in the sitcom Roseanne.

FlouncyMcFlouncer · 09/08/2012 10:42

Yes, but she did at least put fake facial hair on and use a deep voice! Grin

SoleSource · 09/08/2012 10:47

Oh I lovwd that show so much I bought the whole lot on DVD. I wish I had a family like thst. Lol

Original poster
GhostShip · 09/08/2012 11:06

Imperial - they 'got together' before they even met. That's what I meant. You don't do that. It's ridiculous.

I think there's a lot more to the whole thing, but I have sympathy for all 3. Especially Alice.

OP posts:
Original poster
GhostShip · 09/08/2012 11:09

Louis lane isn't real though....

I really wish they had got a psychologist on and give it a bit more depth rather than concentrating on Jessica.

OP posts:
MrsRobertDuvallHasRosacea · 09/08/2012 11:32

I was amazed at the nan, who allowed the "boy"to stay the night.
And if you have been assaulted in your own home, why would you lie there all night. Why didn't she go and tell nan?

I found it all so bizarre and unreal.

ImperialBlether · 09/08/2012 11:38

"Keep your hand on your ha'penny and your pecker in your pocket" says the nan to a teenage couple.

Right.

I don't think you should blame her for not shouting for her nan.

Krumbum · 09/08/2012 11:44

It's still sexual assault, she just didn't want him to break up with her so she's not going to call for her nan.
They said one of the boys did speak because it was described as like an unbroken teen boys voice. I knew boys who never took their hats off, who didn't speak much and I had friends who gotta into relationships with boys on the Internet before they even met them. That stuff is fairly normal.

MrsRobertDuvallHasRosacea · 09/08/2012 11:48

Very weird situation.
There are some very gullible people around.

Pickles77 · 09/08/2012 11:48

Did anyone hear the bit about jess seeing one of the boys pictures on Facebook (not sure which one) and saying he had really nice hair? But when it came to taking his hat off in RL he said he had alopecia?
Urm.... That doesn't work to me? Confused

MissKeithLemon · 09/08/2012 12:23

I think it was clear that poor Jess has other issues in her life. Proably lack of support in anything, low self esteem etc.

Her nan, for one, actually let an unknown boy spend the night in her dgd's bedroom even though she admitted she found 'him' weird Shock to most of us that would not be normal at all... but for Jess it was.

The fact that she made this doc. at all without the protection of anonymity suggets that she has no one to guide her in lfe.

Yes she laid there all night, probably in shock and fear - how many victims of assault and/or rape tell us that they shut down and didn't do anything at the time?

I know one young girl who seems to live out her life on fb 'meeting' boys on there and then meeting up in rl. Posting inappropriate things and sexy type pictures of herself. I know her family well and the parents are a pair of tossers, so wrapped up in their own fucked up-ness that they don't even appear to notice what their dd does. It can, and does happen.

It is not a crime to be young and naive as Jess & Alice were; but Gemma was not naive. She was calculating and methodical - I believe prison is the right place for her. She will hopefiully get the psychiatric help she needs too whilst in there.

I hope that both girls are able to move on from this now. Tis all very sad Sad

FrillyMilly · 09/08/2012 12:46

MissKeithLemon I agree with everything you said. By waiving her anonymity she has allowed people to judge the case based on her personality. People assuming she's a liar and attention seeking because of it. I feel very sorry for her.

RubyFakeNails · 09/08/2012 12:59

I still think it is one of the most bizarre true stories that I've ever come across.

It made me wonder about if this is more common than we know. I mentioned I've heard about quite a few online impersonations but I wonder how often real life ones like this happen.

Also wasn't it so odd, as the reporter I think said, that as none of them truly existed she could have made them disappear but instead she ingratiated herself in the investigation further which is something that certain types of serial killer are always accused of.

MissKeithLemon · 09/08/2012 13:09

Yes Ruby - she could have not gone with Alices' dad to pick Alice up from school (worth mentioning as even the 'sensible' adults believed she was the boys).
She also could have just left and not talked to the police as one of the boys.

Frilly - and don't even get me started on the bastarding TV company that thought that it was OK to not give Jess the same anonymity and therefore protection from ridicule/backlash as Alice.

bubalou · 09/08/2012 13:33

OMG I watched it!!

Me & my sister just kept saying - how could they not know!!!

You have to have watched the programme to fully understand how ridiculously stupid these girls were!!!

Pickles77 · 09/08/2012 13:46

Bubalou I watched it last night and in still Hmm

garlicnuts · 09/08/2012 14:13

Apparently Gemma would walk completely differently as each person. I hadn't seen that, Blether. Clever. Marilyn Monroe could walk around unrecognised, do her shopping, etc. She wore a headscarf and stopped "projecting" - changed her bearing, looked straight ahead, etc. She didn't understand why everyone couldn't do what she did, either projecting or choosing not to.

My psycho ex could do it, too. He has the ability to blend with any crowd. I had to work hard to spot him when he did this - not just me, with my malfunctioning social recognition, but also his best friends and his sister.

daisydoodoo · 09/08/2012 14:16

a long time ago now, i'm 36 and this must have been the summer of my last year at junior school. I met a 'boy' but i knew straight away that it was a girl and not a boy. Im not sure how i knew, but i did. 'He' would insist that he was a boy and that he fancied me and wanted to go out with me, but i told them straight that i didnt beleive he was a boy.

Maybe luckily for me we were both os young so nothing like a sexual assualt would have taken place but if this person has carried on saying they are a boy, who knows who thye may have fooled?

It is difficult for me to believe that they wouldnt have noticed it was there friend dressed as a boy, but they are young and foolish and being the mother of a 15yr old boy, i see the foolish things girls and boys do do these days. Adding anyone and everyone to fb and meeting people at train stations etc.

It also seems dangerous to label the girl as adhd/asd after the event. This can't help people who are trying to get thier children with these disorders accepted and to not be bullied or thought of as deviants in some way. (my sister is asd so i know that this is not the case, but there is still a lot of non acceptance of asd/adhd and people saying they are just naughty and lack discipline)

honeytea · 09/08/2012 14:32

What I don't understand is why these girls ever agreed to go out with a guy who allways wears a hat and never talks to them? I remember from my days as a very average looking 15 year old that you had loads of choice when it came to boys, surely a boy that refusesto talk would be in the reject pile along with the boys who had been expelled/had an unhealthy interest in guns/didn't wash.

ImperialBlether · 09/08/2012 14:49

That's what a hell of a lot of boys are like though, honeytea!

And girls interpret silence with being deep. Mad girls, that is.

ImperialBlether · 09/08/2012 14:50

There have been several cases of men going into schools pretending to be pupils. Some have got away with it for a long time.

Krumbum · 09/08/2012 14:51

Honeytea. Not all teens have lots of choices when it comes to boys. Many have no male friends and only know girls and are incredibly shy. The fact that they meant online would have meant they didn't feel so awkward.
Seriously I knew LOADS of real boys that never took their hats off, I actually still know 2 adults that do it.

FlouncyMcFlouncer · 09/08/2012 14:56

All it would take for a girl who was a little bit 'different' (which I'd say Jess is - and believe me, she'll have suffered at school for it) is a boy, ANY boy, saying nice things. On screen, by text, by touch. Any girl who has been bullied, ostracised or made to feel on the outside in any way will leap at the chance of being loved.

Krumbum · 09/08/2012 15:00

Bloody mark zuckerberg Grrr!

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