To Set A Trap?

[musicalendorphins]

Long story short. I am a member of an on line group, we have all been part of this group since 1998. One particular member, "A" hasn't been seem for quite some time. A new member, B, joined a few weeks ago and said she joined because this other member had mentioned it. She told us that A had suffered some sort of brain infection and was now in a nursing home, unable to speak or communicate in any way. She would never be able to go back home and just sat and stared into space all day. It was very sad, and this sort of thing.

Everyone was very concerned and saddened, we all liked A.
Well, someone e-mailed me tonight and told me they suspect that A is the one posting. I am an administrator on the site so I went and checked the new member B's e-mail address and lo and behold, it IS A!
I am torn between laughing and being angry. A liked to spin a tale and get people going...but this seems too much.
So, I posted a made up story saying how a talk show is flying the other manager and myself and one other member to meet A in person, as part of a tv program about the importance of internet for disabled persons. I made up a bunch of malarky, thanking members for the donations for the flowers we will "surprise A with.
Now this new person (Aka A) has posted about A's miraculous recovery!
I kid you not.
I will delete my post, I just wanted to mess with her for a few minutes.
Was IBU?

I will delete my "fake" on the group, not here.

You are being a bit U. This person obviously needs help. You could have emailed and told her you knew, rather than do it publicly. You are helping her to perpetuate her lies, rather than deal with the problem.

You all sound like a bunch of immature, spiteful, unpleasant loons that need to get a life.

So you're trolling a troll?

I'd have just banned her myself but whatever makes you happy!

You sound like an utter idiot, and every bit as bad as 'person A/B'.

No, no, not spiteful at all! We are punking her back! She'll fess up with in hours I am sure.

Having been in a similar situation in real life, I completely understand the desire to catch them out and make them squirm. Like some form of payback for the emotion you have wasted on them.

Technically YABU and I am sure there will be droves of posters leaping forward with claims that this person must be mentally ill and in need of help, but honestly I am in the unfortunate position of really understanding why you needed to do this, so I think YANBU.

She sounds exactly like someone I know. In that position, I'm afraid I would have outed her with all the evidence laid bare.
I've done it before with a bloody woman who expressed annoyance that her son wasn't awarded a certificate from a gifted kids' group (Certs sent to school for presentation) even though he achieved the demanding standard. I contacted the group leader who told me she'd never heard of this woman or her DC so I took action; in my email to the class of which I was the rep, I added a bullet point that I'd asked the group leader about the certificate and suggested the lying bitch contact the organisation about membership, giving numbers, email addresses, etc. and anyone else was welcome to give it a go but a minimum standard was required. Some read between the lines and I had no trouble telling anyone "No,they'd never heard of him, or his mother so I don't know what she's trying to do."
I don't like liars. Especially ones who feign illness. I think you should have just outed her and asked why she did it. Publicly. It is NOT a funny thing to do

She isn't mentally ill, it is her warped sense of humour. I am a bit annoyed at the worry she caused a lot of members all week. The founder of the group will have a stern talk with her tomorrow.

Yabu. A private message would have sufficed instead of perpetuating the "drama". Clearly she has issues.

And why this "stern talk"? Just remove her from the group surely? Unless of course you want to witness more fallout

She posted under another name while using the same email address?

Amateur.

She used a different email address than her original one, but I guess she forgot that she has sent me e-mails from the one she used for this new membership.
We are going to delete all of her threads about A in a minute. We will have a talk tomorrow about what to do about her. I will keep an eye on new members IP's from now on.
It depends on what she has to say for herself.

YANBU, I bet she shat herself when you told her about the documentary . I think some of the replies on this thread are a bit harsh, all the OP did was bullshit a bullshitter, sounds fair enough to me.

I hope she did too.

You know whether you trolled a troll, perpetuated something hurtful against someone who has some sort of issue, or simply got your own back on someone who will find it funny. If it's the latter then I don't see the problem however some of the other members of your group may be quite hurt by what happened - no-one likes to be made to feel or look stupid - so you may find they're also upset by what you did. But it sounds to me like you know these people well enough to judge it.

tbh I'd leave it, out of kindness. A might well be suffering from some sort of mental illness or condition. Its only a bloody online forum. Its hardly going to affect your life. If you really feel uncomfortable, just ignore her. Both of them I mean. Its a bit spiteful and doesn't reflect well on you to become so involved when its not actually causing you any harm in real life.

How old are you? 12??? What group is this?

Blimey, you all sound like a right bunch of nutters

I might have sympathy for her (or him potentially), but having seen the pain and heartache one of these fuckers caused on a listserv for parents with kids with cancer, frankly I don't. I hope this goes off well, nobody is hurt and your group is not too damaged, sadly it is incredibly hard to out a vile troll like this without massive damage to the group, so fingers crossed for you. I understand your anger and desire not to let this person think you can get off with this kind of thing.

The other administrators want to give her the chance to do her "big reveal". One emailed her and told her we all know and best to stop now. She usually posts a few hours from now, so I hope she will speak up. We are giving her a chance to keep her membership and dignity, we feel she needs us.

Seems the only adult on your forum was the member who emailed her to stop it now that everyone is onto her "joke."

You're lying to all of us now, right?

We handled it with humour and hope she will learn a lesson. She has pranked us many times, but this is the first time she fooled everyone. So we wanted some fun payback, what is wrong with that? People can make mistakes, and problems can be resolved without a big falling out.

You're as bad as her, if not worse.

She needs help, you're just an arsehole.

Why do you say worse?

Me being an ass, I may agree with you on that!