Why is this picture more upsetting than a girl being ‘abused’ on a gossip site? | News UK

It’s a cesspit of a thread – a staggering 49 pages long and counting. Hundreds upon hundreds of comments piled one on top of another, with the words dipped within varying degrees of malice. 

The anonymous comments oscillate between concern, disgust, crude sexualised descriptions of those involved and generally hate-fuelled ranting.

They can be found on the gossip forum Tattle.Life, and are all aimed at influencer Sophie May Dickson, who lost her daughter, 16-year-old Princess, reportedly to suicide, in February.

Sophie, 32, is no stranger to trolls after appearing in the controversial reality show Blinging Up Baby, but what was the reason she invoked such ire this time? Grieve ‘incorrectly’, with the influencer’s decision to share photos from her daughter’s funeral, and posting references to Princess’s death, causing an ongoing backlash.

For some, enough is enough, and the infamous online forum has also found itself at the centre of this story, with public figures attributing Tattle.Life as a contributing factor to the teenager’s death.

A letter sent by MP Jess Asato, signed by 20 members of parliament, directly addressed Ofcom about the impact the site had on the teenagers wellbeing.

‘Princess had been the subject of sustained and escalating online harassment, stalking and abuse by the adult users of Tattle.Life,’ the letter read.

‘The abuse included repeated derogatory commentary about her body, appearance, mental health, family and personal life. Users of the site created anonymous and fake accounts to monitor her TikTok activity, comment directly on her content, attend her live streams, screen-record and capture images of her, and then republish that material on Tattle Life for further discussion and ridicule.’

At present, further circumstances around Princess’s death are private, with the coroner’s report yet to be published. It should also be noted that mental health is a complex issue, with a myriad of factors often contributing to someone’s passing.

Yet, the death of a child doesn’t seem to have quelled the braying masses – if anything, it has poured petrol onto a roaring fire. Trolls continue to plague Sophie, with many on Tattle.Life speculating the authenticity of her grief, whether she’s fit to be a mother, and the contents of Princess’s suicide note.

It’s a tragic new low for a site previously hailed as ‘the most hate-filled corner of the web.’ Established in 2017 as a part of internet snark culture, Tattle.Life quickly became known as a community where users could hold famous names and lifestyle influencers to account.

Celebrities such Katie Price, Zoella and Stacey Solomon (as well as their families) continue to be regularly dissected. One thread, for example, discusses how ugly the children of one TV presenter are.

A report by VictimFocus, compiled in July last year, collected data from 150 people who reported to be victims of Tattle.Life. The research found over 90% of victims were repeatedly stalked and harassed, with 89% feeling ‘traumatised, isolated, fearful’ and in some instances ‘suicidal’.

Psychologist Dr Jessica Taylor, the CEO of VictimFocus, has previously been targeted by Tattle.Life users. The comments, she explains, started off in a fairly petty fashion – about her appearance, her qualifications, before they rapidly snowballed into outright lies and stalking.

‘A picture of my wife’s car and number plates was posted on Tattle,’ she tells Metro. ‘Users found the links to our home on RightMove. They discussed my children and their safety.

‘My thread was emailed to my family, my friends, the university where I had worked, my publishers, my agents and producers, with disgusting, malicious and false information. No stone was left unturned. We felt unsafe – it was one of the worst periods of my life.’

According to the letter Asato wrote to Ofcom, Tattle.Life users had turned their attention towards Princess since she was 14, and faced ‘repeated derogatory comments about her body and appearance’.

Although a dedicated thread about Sophie – where comments about Princess were also posted –  was temporarily disabled after the young girl was targeted, when the section was reinstated, the abuse continued.

‘Tattle,Life was viewed on a computer in school, and children and parents alike made cruel comments in person based on what they had read online. Even without a phone in her own hand, the abuse continued,’ Sophie told the Mail Online in an interview following her daughter’s death.

‘It was the most unhinged thing from people who know nothing about me’

One lifestyle influencer, who we are calling Lauren, discovered she was featured on Tattle.Life in 2019, after seeing journalist Sali Hughes’s video about being targeted on the site.

‘I read through my entire thread that night, for the first and last time,’ she tells Metro.

The comments Lauren received in the early iterations of her thread were mean-spirited, but escalated as she scrolled further.

‘People said horrible things that I was overweight, or that I was underweight, or that I looked like a man,’ she remembers.

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While she hasn’t looked at her thread since, other people have informed Lauren at just how personal some of Tattle.Life had become, threatening to spill into the real world.

‘I was told to kill myself. People had tried to contact ex-boyfriends. They called the RSPCA to report me about my dog. This trolling had become stalking,’ she says.

‘It was the most unhinged, abnormal thing from people who know nothing about me.

‘I’ve had friends completely debilitated by trolling on the site. They’ve been forced to stop posting, which means they’ve lost their income. It’s completely ruined their lives.

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‘If I have adult friends who struggled with it, there’s no way anyone could expect children to cope with this level of hate.’

It’s not surprising that anyone who experiences online bullying will feel the impact, but it can be markedly more difficult for young people to deal with, explains Dr Emily Crosby, Child and Educational Psychologist.

‘They are more likely to believe the comments as they have not developed their self-confidence or self-worth yet which makes them more likely to be influenced,’ she tells Metro.

And while targeting a child may seem extreme, the anonymous nature of a site like Tattle.Life can encourage an escalating scale of abuse – Sophie’s lifestyle may have been the initial target, but her children soon became collateral damage.

”Often those who do not have a sense of belonging in the offline world take to online to seek this,’ Dr Crosby explains. ‘The internet allows people to use all hours of the day and hide behind fake names which makes access to this type of behaviour more readily available. Such language and hate speech escalates as they are so fast paced and each comment influences further comments.’

Tattle.Life claims to have a ‘zero-tolerance policy to any content that is abusive, hateful or harmful’. A statement on the website reads: ‘A team of moderators [is] online 24/7 to remove any content that breaks our strict rules – often in minutes.’

However, Jess claims that her numerous requests to get content removed were not acted upon.

This was the same case for Northern Irish fashion retailer Donna Sands and her husband Neil, after they were viscously trolled on the site. So the couple managed to hit Tattle.Life where it hurts – in the courtroom.

They argued that the website had ‘profited as a space where users could defame, harass, stalk and attack others online’ and were eventually awarded £300,000 by the Northern Ireland High Court.

Their case also saw Sebastian Bond, vegan cooking influencer and author, unmasked as Tattle.Life’s owner. Yet, despite the ruling, Tattle.Life is still active.

It has previously been reported to have 12 million monthly visitors, with Bond reportedly making between an estimated £180,000-£500,000 a year from advertising revenue.

According to Jess, who explores the motivations and stalking tactics of those who frequent the site in her upcoming book Click.Stalk.Destroy: Inside the minds of online stalkers, there is a massive misunderstanding.

‘Traditional stalkers tend to operate alone. On Tattle.Life, there are hundreds of them. They operate in groups, which means they receive positive reinforcement for everything they post from other stalkers. Being horrible or intimidating is normalised, and they become desensitised to it over time,’ she explains.

‘They create a fantasy that they are actually social justice warriors, and what they are doing to their victim is righteous. It’s why these threads tend to start with something small and petty, but that small thing cannot sustain that sense of moral grievance for long. So they find something else and it starts to escalate.

‘Tattle.Life has effectively turned trolling and stalking into sport,’ she adds.

Following Princess’ death,a letter from Ofcom has demanded answers from Tattle.Life regarding compliance with new Online Safety Act, a 2023 UK law requiring platforms to protect users online.

What will happen next for Tattle.Life remains uncertain; as of last year, Bond faces an additional 40 libel lawsuits against him, while regulatory powers may exert pressure for the website to close.

Meanwhile, Jess believes those who use the site should be confronted with the reality of just what they’re doing.

‘Just because they’re doing this sat at home with a glass of wine, doesn’t mean what they’re doing isn’t criminal,’ she says. ‘They are sadists. They are destroying people’s lives, and they’re enjoying it.’

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