Amanda Todd: The Impact of Cyber Bullying

[Style_Dota]

You are acting like its a perfectly understandable thing to kill yourself because scumbag kids called you names. Of course we've been all bullied at some point or another, but the difference here is that this girl did ridiculous things that GOT her bullied. HOW can you justify her killing herself when she fueled the fire? And, even if she had no portion of the blame, at what point in your teenage life did you ever decide "kids at school were mean to me today, I guess this means my life is over"? I know I was nowhere near the popular kid but when you're in that situation you deal with it because its only goddamn school, you're not gonna even remember the names of these little dicks in a few years because you move on to bigger and better things.

How about you read the story before saying this? Since your information is based on the fact that "she was being called names", let me actually enlighten you as to what her bullies did to her:

• Social Alienation - She was forced to eat alone every single day. Saying that she lost the respect of all of her friends is something very hard to cope with.
• Physical Abuse - Two girls kicked the living shit out of her.
• Severe Psychological Abuse - After she left the hospital after she drank Bleach, people posted pictures of Bleach on her facebook saying "you should have used this one instead".

Please tell me that if someone did that to you, you wouldn't remember who they were? Because I sure as hell would. If you're saying you wouldn't, then either you are so conceited and think so highly of yourself that you think you can deal with all of this shit or you are simply lying.

Edit: This thread was just here to show the consequence of bullying in its extreme, not for assholes to belittle someone's death. Saying someone deserved to die for their actions is a deplorable thing, especially when they meant little to no harm about what they did.

 

[Solace]

As someone who is definitely more similar to Amanda Todd than any other poster in this thread, I find it pretty awful that people are just willing to write her off as a stupid teenager who wasted her life.

Firstly, she didn't give nudes to random people on the internet, she gave them to her friends (or at least who she thought were her friends). It was a stupid decision, there's no refuting that. We have to look at the whole picture, though. She's a girl with obviously very low self esteem who was complimented and seemingly well liked by a group of people. She'd do whatever she could to keep their praise, even if it wasn't necessarily the wisest choice. She was like 13 at the time. Generally, 13 year olds don't have the kind of foresight to know that they're going to be betrayed.

As far as I understand from the video, it was then some random guy who approached her on Facebook and told her to "give him a show" or he'd show the picture that only her friends would have had access to. It seemed like she refused, since she got in trouble for him spreading around the original photo. I don't know if I'm just misunderstanding the card sequence, but that's the impression I got.

After that, she was bullied consistently to the point where she had to transfer schools. After transferring, it seemed like things cooled down a little bit until an "old friend" from her old school showed interest in her. Because she has low self-esteem, and no friends at her new school, anyone who cared to show interest in her was someone she could instantly like. She was just a kid desperate for friends and some kind of acceptance. She made the bad decision to do ~whatever~ with that guy, and it turns out that he had a girlfriend. He and the girlfriend, along with other kids from her old school, went after her at her new school and physically beat her up. That's honestly just so fucking disgusting. Since when has any of this ever been allowed to go on? There are so many things wrong with this situation. The kids beat her up and so when she gets home she realizes "how worthless she must be" and tried to drink bleach. She was rescued, but when she returned back people from her new school and people from her old school posted pictures of bleach and clorox, and sent her messages saying that they wished that she had actually killed herself. Obviously things just progressed worse and worse from there, and I think she transferred schools again. The situation really didn't remedy itself though, and she had already been feeling so low from the fact that not a SINGLE person was on her side for this whole thing, that she took her life. It's so horrible, really, that it could ever come to something like this.

So listen, for all the people who think that she's just some kid who wasted her life and should've gotten off the internet: that clearly didn't fucking matter. These kids went after her. They LITERALLY would not let it drop. She transferred schools, they should be done with her. For all their purposes, they "won". They got rid of her, she was not their problem. But they kept going after her. She obviously shouldn't have been so trusting of people from her old school, but she's a desperate kid. And really, who isn't going to be forgiving and open-minded at 15? People change so quickly from grade to grade, it wouldn't make sense to just write someone out if they're being kind to her.

Amanda Todd made a few bad decisions, sure. She probably should've gotten off of Facebook. But are we going to just make her out to be an idiot victim, someone who should've been tougher? Just grow a thicker skin and move on? It's pretty clear that these kids would not let her move on. What kind of horrible children literally go out of their way to make a girl's life a living hell? And maybe the original bullying was just "kids being kids" and of course she was going to get into some kind of trouble for having nude photos. But to post pictures of bleach and say that they had WISHED that she had killed herself? That's fucking disgusting. And where were the teachers, the parents, any adult? This is the problem. The problem is that kids are sheep, and that teachers apparently are too. Everyone is so quick to jump and say "Hey, that's clearly Facebook's fault! None of this would've happened if she hadn't used that demon spawn!!!!" Well, maybe that's true. But it's not like Facebook sends messages on its own telling a girl to go kill herself. It's not like the nude photos sent themselves to random guys. There are people behind the actions, and while we're quick to say that Amanda Todd should have been responsible for her decisions, what about the little terrors who spread everything around? They're just as at fault, if not more, than she is. Her bad decisions were amplified by these kids who think it's a hilarious joke to send nude photos around and terrorize others. The problem is that we DON'T have any kind of punishment for this.

I'm very much for laws against this. There needs to be better prevention systems. Parents should have to monitor the usage of social networking for children under 18. People may think this is excessive, but since we are so willing to excuse what the children behind each action that drove Amanda Todd to kill herself because Amanda should've been tougher, we need to do something to prevent these things from happening. There are some laws already in act for in-person bullying in schools, but if we hold people accountable for these things in real life, we should be damn sure we hold them accountable for it online. I want the children who went after her like savages to pay for what they did. Whether it's through prevention or through harsh punishments that scare everyone so much that they don't bully, there needs to be something. Regulating Facebook comments can be tricky, but the way things are going now must be changed. It shouldn't become something that is taught after the bullying is taken to the extreme, and it shouldn't be something that people only care about AFTER someone takes their own life.

This whole situation is awful and my heart goes out to the Todds. No one's child deserves to be treated like that. People need to stop belittling the victims. Amanda Todd didn't make the video to be an attention seeker. It was a cry for help. No one wants to take their own life, but she had NO ONE to turn to. If you cannot empathize with that, I truly feel bad for you. A 15 year old girl should never have to fear going to school, should never be harassed and practically hunted down the way she was, and should never have to take their own life.

Sorry for the TL;DR, but I just feel so strongly about this. I think there's a lot to be said for this situation and others like it, and people are far too quick to reduce the victim to nothing but an irrational and emotional idiot.

 

[tml]

As you can see the title of this thread is: Amanda Todd: The impact of Cyber Bullying
I'm sure Mike's intention was to bring up a discussion for this serious issue, using the case of this girl as the most recent and famous example. People kill themselves, harm themselves everyday across the world due to it. Okay this girl didn't help herself at all, but that is no reason to not be bothered by it. Think about her family, and the families of the other worldwide victims. All I can say is: R.I.P.

 

[meteor64]

What the fuck???? How can you honestly say that this girl is at fault in killing herself?

Because she made the conscious decision to kill herself? How is that NOT her fault?

Sure, she made some stupid mistakes; no one can deny that. But saying that everyone who has ever been bullied should just "deal with it," is an unrealistic view to take on something like suicide.

How is it unrealistic to have a mentality where you pick yourself up and dust yourself off and soldier on? That's what life is all about.

Suicide isn't about making rational decisions.

Evidently. Doesn't mean I'm going to sympathise with it. You do what she did, you deal with the consequences.

This was nothing like some kids bullied her at school, there was some serious harrassment going on. did you notice the part where she was beaten? How the fuck can you say this isn't a tragedy???

She was beaten, people were horrid to her- of course thats bad and of course they have a good portion of the blame. But it's not really a tragedy to me when she had the ability to turn the whole thing around or even just not let it happen, and yet she decides to squander her own life.

Of course, there are other people who are suffering from "real tragedies" as you would call them, but that shouldn't minimize what has happened here. I don't see why people can show at least some amount of sympathy no matter if you think she is at fault here or not.

We're obviously not going to see eye to eye here. I think throwing your life away when you have a solid roof over your head, stocked cupboards and family who care for you is a ridiculous idea and impossible to sympathise with. I've already mentioned my brother attempted a very similar thing and I thought the exact same thing then. You on the other hand evidently think death in all its forms is a tragic thing, which, honestly I don't have a problem with. But you can't tell me to feel bad for her when the decisions she made caused this whole thing.

But of course it's a lot easier to pretend she's at fault (making some dumb mistakes? how dare she?)

She was at fault... and those were more than just mistakes, they were monumental stupidity.

and bring up how children are starving in Africa (which is funny because no one here actually cares about stravation in Africa; they just want to pretend that this isn't a big deal.

I don't think I've actually mentioned starvation in Africa once. What I have mentioned is my unfortunate best friend who has lost almost everyone important to her, something which I assure you, I care a lot about.

Also, I'd like to make clear I HAVE NOT SAID SHE DESERVED TO DIE. Thats fucking retarded. I am saying I find it impossible to sympathise with someone who killed themselves over a case of bullying that resulted from their own actions.

 

[Hamstern]

How about you read the story before saying this? Since your information is based on the fact that "she was being called names", let me actually enlighten you as to what her bullies did to her:

• Social Alienation - She was forced to eat alone every single day. Saying that she lost the respect of all of her friends is something very hard to cope with.
• Physical Abuse - Two girls kicked the living shit out of her.
• Severe Psychological Abuse - After she left the hospital after she drank Bleach, people posted pictures of Bleach on her facebook saying "you should have used this one instead".

Please tell me that if someone did that to you, you wouldn't remember who they were? Because I sure as hell would. If you're saying you wouldn't, then either you are so conceited and think so highly of yourself that you think you can deal with all of this shit or you are simply lying.

Edit: This thread was just here to show the consequence of bullying in its extreme, not for assholes to belittle someone's death. Saying someone deserved to die for their actions is a deplorable thing, especially when they meant little to no harm about what they did.

Also, not everyone have the same ability to deal with hardships. Genetics affect our minds just as much as our enviroment and events. Saying stuff like "I had a bad childhood but I turned out just fine" is a very ignorant thing to say :/

If you have a messed up chemical balance in you brain, its just not that easy to just "deal with it". Just to be clear, I totally agree with what you saying :)

 

[Style_Dota]

How is it unrealistic to have a mentality where you pick yourself up and dust yourself off and soldier on? That's what life is all about.

We're obviously not going to see eye to eye here. I think throwing your life away when you have a solid roof over your head, stocked cupboards and family who care for you is a ridiculous idea and impossible to sympathise with. I've already mentioned my brother attempted a very similar thing and I thought the exact same thing then. You on the other hand evidently think death in all its forms is a tragic thing, which, honestly I don't have a problem with. But you can't tell me to feel bad for her when the decisions she made caused this whole thing.

I'm just going to respond to these:

How closed minded are you to think that it's so easy for people to move on when they receive so much trauma? Sorry, but your brothers situation and this one are completely different, and comparing them is absolutely ridiculous.

Also, Solace for best post in this thread, thank you for summarizing all of the points I was trying to make.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Ok, like, why are you guys so focused on the kids who bullied her at school and facebook and not the guy who stalked and blackmailed her?

Except for Solace, terrific post

 

[Jorgen]

Meteor, it helps to realize that people who are suicidal aren't in a rational state of mind. At all. Especially if they've been abused like this. You don't just "turn it all around" if you're suicidally depressed, that's not how people work.

 

[Zacchaeus]

This sounds like cyberbu//y (AKA cyberbuslashslashy)

Story about a dumb girl making stupid decisions followed by her taking everything way too personally and seriously and making more poor decisions. I could just be desensitized but I feel nothing for her and that's the end of that

 

[meteor64]

I'm just going to respond to these:

How closed minded are you to think that it's so easy for people to move on when they receive so much trauma?

I've watched my best friend lose both her parents and numerous family members over the past few years. She's been living on her own since the age of 16. Don't even fucking bother trying to accuse me of being ignorant. She's come out of it scarred and changed for life, but at least she tried and succeeded.

Sorry, but your brothers situation and this one are completely different, and comparing them is absolutely ridiculous.

My brother is an idiot and the whole reason I brought it up was to show that I'm not being biased about suicide because this is about some random girl I don't know.

 

[Solace]

This sounds like cyberbu//y (AKA cyberbuslashslashy)

Story about a dumb girl making stupid decisions followed by her taking everything way too personally and seriously and making more poor decisions. I could just be desensitized but I feel nothing for her and that's the end of that

Which part did she take too personally? The part where they went after her and beat her up or the part where after she tried to kill herself people posted on her Facebook page saying that they wished she had died?

 

[JALMONT]

words

Get a fucking clue. This wasn't a case of fucking bullying, this was severe harassment. Did you even read the OP? You cannot sit there and tell me that she should "soldier on" after she was blackmailed and beaten. You realize people were telling her to drink bleach? You realize this wasn't just a case of "haha your a (BAN ME PLEASE)." How the fuck can you find her at fault? What about the people who could've saved her? What about the people who exploited her? They're aren't to blame, she should've "soldiered on" while they continued to poke fun at her. Clearly, that's what she should've done, why would anyone turn to suicide when people are telling her what type of bleach to drink, that's no big deal at all! You are minimizing what actually happened. Getting called a (BAN ME PLEASE) is one thing; getting beaten and being told what bleach to drink is another.

I repeat, she tried to get help. Did you notice the part in Mike's OP where it said she got counselling? The part where it said she switched school repetedly? how about when she had to go to the hospital after getting beaten? You think her parents didn't notice? You are making baseless assumptions without even bothering to find out what actually happened.

This sounds like cyberbu//y (AKA cyberbuslashslashy)

Story about a dumb girl making stupid decisions followed by her taking everything way too personally and seriously and making more poor decisions. I could just be desensitized but I feel nothing for her and that's the end of that

why do you post in this forum

 

[jumpluff]

and it really belittles the situation and the problem to say that she was 'emotional and irrational' or by attempting to deflect some measure of blame towards her being 'wholly too sensitive' or her 'poor decisions.' she was a teenager ffs, it was her prerogative to be emotional, irrational, overly sensitive and make poor decisions. i sure as hell was all of those things...i suspect we all were at some point; it's a part of growing up. rip kid, it should never have been allowed to reach this stage.

Agreed. Many of the people condemning her have likely done equally irresponsible things. Did they kill themselves? No. But they probably weren't bullied as badly, either, or followed by nude images of themselves.

It's been brought up in this thread there are people 'more deserving' of sympathy because they are bullied for things out of their control. As someone who was picked on for being awkward in kindergarten, nerdy in primary school, and paralytically shy in high school... everyone who is bullied like that deserves sympathy because it's horrible and no teenager should have to go through that. Nobody deserves that to happen to them, no matter how responsible they are for the actions that might provoke it -- the bullies are at fault, as are any negligent adults. Bad things happen to good people and nobody is perfect, this is not a fairytale and there is no need to blame her. What she did may have been dumb but she's hardly the first to do stupid things, the difference is she was tormented for doing things people do all the time (like sleeping with taken people, which I think is messed up but nonetheless it is very commonplace) to the point of suicidal bullying.

And sometimes people -- be they teenagers who are emotionally fragile, adults, little kids, whatever -- can't cope as well as other people with the problems in their life. There's no shame in that because everyone handles things differently and while some people might be emotionally stronger, they too have their weaknesses. With regards to the people here, I honestly wouldn't expect a sensitive attitude about suicide anyway.

Also, yeah, she was being stalked by some creepy guy distributing illegal images of her... That's not something to take lightly and is genuinely traumatic.

ETA: P.S. I ended up changing schools three times, being homeschooled, and eventually leaving high school because of how overwhelming the constant sexual and verbal harassment, the physical intimidation, and the neglect of the teachers and school district became. I was at a point where I had no more options to switch school to and could not get into the fucking school because of panic attacks. I am in university now and moving on with my life, and I'm very grateful that I'm in a relatively good place in my life. But even without the stalker haunting her, kids are cruel and what was done to her was horrible and ruins lives. In her case, it drove her to take hers. Many children are left utterly traumatised by the things people do to them at school. If people were less indifferent about it then there would be less Amanda Todds.

I find third-world tragedy to be tragic. I didn't say anywhere in my post that it was a statistic to me, but good try! Saying that we shouldn't care about issues such as suicide when people are dying in third-world tragedies is both an ignorant and irrelevant statement. Obviously it is a big deal. But it isn't really relevant in that you know, we can do both at the same time? Of course, you don't really care about Africa (as Eo said where's the Africa thread?) and I doubt you've ever helped contribute to prevent a third-world tragedy in your life.

Haha. Also, honestly, it's not just about the tragedy of Amanda Todd's own suffering. Kids like Amanda Todd become representations of all faceless, nameless suicidal kids. She wanted to raise awareness and that will be her legacy. It's about all the kids that are like Amanda Todd, about inspiring people to give a damn about harassed teenagers, inspiring parents to check up on their kids, inspiring schools to take action with the few depressed kids that are inevitably enrolled. Dismissing this because it's just one person is ignorant and honestly amounts to pretending this isn't a problem / justifying apathy. If you don't care then wear it, don't criticise others for caring about this when it is such a prevalent issue.

 

[Style_Dota]

I've watched my best friend lose both her parents and numerous family members over the past few years. She's been living on her own since the age of 16. Don't even fucking bother trying to accuse me of being ignorant. She's come out of it scarred and changed for life, but at least she tried and succeeded.

Because she still had people who cared about her. Different scenario here. But this is the last I am going to post about this, I don't want to seem like I am belittling this situation, which I am not. I am just saying that you are trying to juxtapose two completely different scenarios because they both had trauma, but their trauma is completely different.

On another note, this thread is not about belittling this girls death, so please refrain from posts like those, otherwise, I will simply lock the thread. Thanks.

 

[faint]

This scares me since I've had girls send me pictures before (tinychat). I just hope I didn't have the same effect on them as this guy did on this girl.

 

[meteor64]

Get a fucking clue. This wasn't a case of fucking bullying, this was severe harassment. Did you even read the OP? You cannot sit there and tell me that she should "soldier on" after she was blackmailed and beaten. You realize people were telling her to drink bleach? You realize this wasn't just a case of "haha your a (BAN ME PLEASE)." How the fuck can you find her at fault? What about the people who could've saved her? What about the people who exploited her? They're aren't to blame, she should've "soldiered on" while they continued to poke fun at her. Clearly, that's what she should've done, why would anyone turn to suicide when people are telling her what type of bleach to drink, that's no big deal at all! You are minimizing what actually happened. Getting called a (BAN ME PLEASE) is one thing; getting beaten and being told what bleach to drink is another.

I repeat, she tried to get help. Did you notice the part in Mike's OP where it said she got counselling? The part where it said she switched school repetedly? how about when she had to go to the hospital after getting beaten? You think her parents didn't notice? You are making baseless assumptions without even bothering to find out what actually happened.

Read my posts before you try to make them sound callous. I quite clearly said the people harassing her were to blame, but she could've avoided her portion of the blame and not exposed and killed herself. At no point have I played down what those people did to her. But what happened is in NO WAY a justifiable reason to kill yourself. And that is the only reason why I cannot sympathise with her.

So before you tell me to ""get a fucking clue" try reading my fucking post next time rather than making baseless assumptions as to my stance on this like some pious soldier for justice.

 

[Razza]

I'm with triangles, people die everyday, people who want to live, amanda todd chose to die, she brought the bullying upon herself, and id be willig to bet a lot of money she was probably fairly horrible to some of her peers irl ( i even read somewhere she was in fact a bully herself before her reputation hit the fan), she made shitty choices with her privileged life and couldnt face the consequences of her actions so she took the cowards way out. If she wants to opt out of life thats fine by me, its just annoying that this recieves so much attention when there are thousands of REAL tragedies occuring everyday.

PS. Do people know that she got beaten up by some other girls for sleeping with one of their boyfriends (when she was 13)? There are 2 sides to every story, and its pretty obvious the stuff you will read on FB about this and the stuff in her video is biased and paints her as a perfect angel when in fact she was far from it ( sleeping with peoples boyfriends, multiple webcam shows and flashing at age 13? the word slut comes to mind)

 

[meteor64]

Because she still had people who cared about her.

And Amanda didn't? Amanda had a family, and as the saying goes, blood is thicker than water.

 

[Zacchaeus]

Which part did she take too personally? The part where they went after her and beat her up or the part where after she tried to kill herself people posted on her Facebook page saying that they wished she had died?

I suppose every part considering that there are many people who have endured worse

 

[zpattack12]

Sometimes things aren't just black and white. How you interpret this shows how you see the world and human nature. Everyone has different perspective and that can't be disputed. It's obvious to see how cynical meteor64 and Triangles are, and how naive Solace and MikeDecIsHere are.
My take: Don't be an idiot and expose yourself to people, but she didn't deserve to be treated that way. The thing is, you have to realize that the world isn't a good place, and not do stupid things. You have to be a little bit cynical when it comes to the world, because the world ISNT a good place.

 

[Chou Toshio]

I dunno about the things she (or her parents) should have done--

But god, more importantly, the bullying in this case is absolutely sickening. People sure are fucked up. I used to think the bullying/suicide cases in Japan were ludicrous, but honestly apparently we western north americans can do even worse. Fucked up, seriously. Why the fuck would you ever go out of your way to treat someone this way? What do people get out of it? It's mind boggling(ly fucked up).

edit: I don't want to put the "blame" on the bullies, but what they did was fucked up.

 

[Ninahaza]

I've been told that I dont participate in big discussions enough, but really all threads like these do is give people new users to add to thier "terrible posters" list. Dont get me wrong however, thats not the reason I dont post much. I am not afraid to give my opinion and could care less about people that are so opinion sensitive.

I havent taken a good look at this case, but I have read almost every post in this thread as i do with many threads (and I hope to beat vader to closing this thread when the time is right). From what I've read so far, all I can really think about is that suicide will always remain a sensitive topic. When suicide is involved there will always be your jrrrrs, traingles and metoer64 or whatever, as well as your lee, mikedecishere etc. No matter the case, you'll have this split when suicide is involved.

I remember the last suicide case I followed. It was some kid abused and bullied for his sexual orientation. He did absolutely nothing wrong. It was a very clear and clean cut scenario, and yet people found a way to throw blame his way and have a negative reaction to him. Whether it was picking on the decision itself to commit suicide, or something else, a way was found.

Alright I am heading to work, but maybe I'll look into this whole case and come up my reaction later

 

[JALMONT]

Read my posts before you try to make them sound callous. I quite clearly said the people harassing her were to blame, but she could've avoided her portion of the blame and not exposed and killed herself. At no point have I played down what those people did to her. But what happened is in NO WAY a justifiable reason to kill yourself. And that is the only reason why I cannot sympathise with her.

So before you tell me to ""get a fucking clue" try reading my fucking post next time rather than making baseless assumptions as to my stance on this like some pious soldier for justice.

And, even if she had no portion of the blame, at what point in your teenage life did you ever decide "kids at school were mean to me today, I guess this means my life is over"?

You are acting like its a perfectly understandable thing to kill yourself because scumbag kids called you names.

I dunno man, it sure looks like you are playing down what happened to her in those statement.s I think the harassment she endured was just a tad bit more serious than "kids being mean at school" or "scumbag kids calling her names." I don't really know what else to say to you, you seem intent on believing that every single human being must be steadfast emotionally. What about things like depression? I'm guessing that's not a big deal for you because those people should just be able to "soldier on," right?

Cute insult at the end btw I appreciate it :) Now you really do sound callous!

 

[Style_Dota]

PS. Do people know that she got beaten up by some other girls for sleeping with one of their boyfriends (when she was 13)?

Yes, I know about this. No one said she was perfect, but you are not understanding that she did that because she thought that she could finally have someone who loves her. As someone who has been in a similar, albeit not as extreme situation as her's, it's pretty clear that she just wanted someone who cares about her. And people cheat all the time, but the boyfriend didn't get anything done to him did he? Why is the blame placed solely on her, when it could be that this boy knew she was an easy fuck? (excuse my lack of better words)

But I digress, there have clearly been other instances of bullying and discrimination (I remember the story of a kid getting alienated because he was gay, and he chose to hang himself). It's very difficult for those with fragile minds to cope with bullying, especially at a younger age, when your mind isn't completely developed and social interactions still have an extremely large outcome on a child's psyche.

 

[Eo Ut Mortus]

There exist two people: person A, who can lift 100 pounds, and person B, who can lift 500 pounds. Person A is given 200 pounds to lift, and person B is given 400 pounds to lift. Person B has been given more weight to handle than person A; yet, would it not be justified for person A to be unable to lift the lesser weight he is given?

There exist two people: person A, who can handle an unquantifiable amount of stress, and person B, who can handle another unquantifiable amount of stress that is certainly more than the amount person A can handle...

This point has already been iterated and reiterated, but I want to reiterate it again via a silly analogy, since people still insist on making comparisons without regarding the fact that people have different limits...