The

Undeniable

Ruth

®

…and the Ruth shall set you free!

  • Is That Legal – Freaky The Scary Snowman

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    Ruth Carter

    Freaky The Scary Snowman
    Photo by Freaky The Scary Snowman

    Freaky The Scary Snowman is an ingenious spectacle on the East Coast. Freaky is really a shell of a snowman made primarily out of chicken wire and insulation foam. One person puts of the Freaky costume and stands unassumingly on the sidewalk. When someone walks by, Freaky turns his head or his whole body and scares the bejezus out of them. One of the other masterminds tapes these incidents and compiles them into YouTube videos.

    I’m biased when it comes to Freaky. I think he’s hilarious. I look forward to every new video.

    Recently the guys were filming Freaky in Providence, Rhode lsland and they were approached by a police officer. The officer told them that the guys had to leave because the police had received “a lot of complaints” about Freaky and that people were “falling off the curb.” None of the recently released videos showed anyone falling down. The most I saw were people stepping off the curb. It made me question the legalities of Freaky the Snowman.

    Does Freaky Commit Disorderly Conduct?
    I think that’s a stretch. Disorderly conduct in Rhode Island involves engaging “in fighting or threatening, or in violent or tumultuous behavior.” I don’t think being a barely moving snowman counts as threatening behavior, even if it results in people being momentarily frightened.

    What About Blocking the Sidewalk?
    You can commit disorderly conduct if you obstruct a sidewalk in Rhode Island; however, Freaky isn’t big enough to obstruct a sidewalk if he’s standing up. A person could easily share a sidewalk with him.

    Can Freaky Scaring People be an Assault?
    In Rhode Island, you commit assault by putting someone in fear of physical contact, without ever laying a finger on the victim. People who are scared by Freaky sometimes raise a fist as if to defend themselves when they see him move. That could be evidence of assault. I think Freaky’s best argument is he doesn’t have any arms to hit with which to hit anyone and he usually turns in place towards the person. He rarely gets physically closer to the unsuspecting person than the person voluntarily put themselves.

    Could Freaky Face Civil Charges?
    I would think this could be a bigger concern than criminal charges. There is lots of footage of people stepping off the sidewalk when they’re scared. If a person stepped off the curb and into oncoming traffic, the Freaky guys could be held liable.

    Freaky doesn’t have any arms. If he falls there’s no way he can break his fall or prevent himself from falling on whatever’s in his path. There was an incident where a man punched Freaky out of fear. Freaky fell like a stone and took out a small child. Don’t worry, the kid was fine. If someone ever gets hurt by a falling Freaky, the guys could be at least held partially responsible.

    I’m not completely convinced that the Providence Police had enough evidence to make Freaky leave, but I think the guys made the right choice to move on. The end of their latest video shows Freaky in Newport where a police officer was standing on the corner laughing while Freaky was down the street, scaring people passing by.

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  • I Was Cyberbullied – Part 4 of 4

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    Ruth Carter

    This is the final installation of my four-part story with cyberbullying. You can read it from the beginning here. Back to the story . . .

    After finals were over, I filed a formal report with the Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities. They said there was nothing they could do at that point, but that people like her engage in the same behavior repeatedly. They suggested that I send my bully an email informing her that any future contact was unwanted and would be reported to the university as harassment. If she contacted me again, it would be actionable. I disagreed with their assessment, but I sent my bully the email.

    Seclusion & Serenity by Iwona Erskine-Kellie

    Thankfully, my bully only had one more semester of school and we didn’t have any classes together. If we had been in any of the same classes, I would have asked the school to make her change. It was still nerve-wracking to see her on campus, but we never had direct contact again. Last I heard, she moved to California. Shortly after graduation, I blocked my bully and my other former exec on Facebook. Doing that made me feel like I was closing the door on that chapter of my life.

    I had an unsettling experience last week with my bully – she asked to connect on LinkedIn! I was surprised she would want to be a connection given her animosity towards me. I suspect she uploaded all her contacts to her LinkedIn account and requested to connect with all of them, not thinking that there might be people in her contacts list that she doesn’t want to be connected to. I looked for the ability to block someone on LinkedIn and was shocked to learn that LinkedIn doesn’t provide that ability. The best you can do is deny someone the ability to connect with you. I expected them to have a stronger anti-harassment provision. I would like to block her on that site too, but that is not an option at this time.

    So there’s my story. It was hellaciously stressful to be the victim of cyberbullying. I’m so grateful that I had support from my friends, my family, and the law school. I can’t imagine how much worse it could have been if I had to endure it alone. Unfortunately, that’s what happens to too many children. They’re ostracized from their peers and they’re too afraid to ask for help from their parents or teachers.

    To all the victims of cyberbullying, I know it’s hard to admit that you’re being bullied, and I know it’s scary to ask for help, but do it. You don’t have to go through this alone and you don’t have to continue to be the victim.

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  • I Was Cyberbullied – Part 3 of 4

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    Ruth Carter

    This is the third part of my four-part story with cyberbullying. You can read it from the beginning here. Back to the story . . .

    Walking Away by Jeremy Raff-Reynolds

    At that point, I was done with her harassment. I investigated whether I had options for recourse through the school given that I was experiencing student-on-student harassment and all the emails were sent over the ASU email system. My research revealed provisions of the Arizona Board of Regents Student Code of Conduct that prohibited harassment and discriminatory activities.

    I set up a meeting with the Assistant Dean of the law school where I explained what had been occurring and showed him all her emails. By then the semester was drawing to a close. He and I decided that the best course of action was for him to meet with my bully after she was finished with finals to discuss the inappropriateness of her behavior. At the end of the meeting, I turned over my copies of the emails to him to put in her permanent file. If anyone calls the school to ask for a reference for my bully, they may be told a report was made against her for cyberharassment.

    My bully reportedly left town immediately after her last final, so the assistant dean was unable to get her into his office for a meeting. Instead, he spoke with her by phone. According to him, she wasn’t very receptive to what he had to say and didn’t take any responsibility for her behavior. Shortly after the call ended, she made the following post on Facebook:

    “ruth carter is a giant cunt and a poor person. tell the world I said this.”

    She must have realized that creating that post was a poor decision and removed it, but not before I took a screenshot of it and sent it to the school.

    The assistant dean and I were astonished by her behavior, and I had concerns about her level of impulsivity. I still had one final to go, and the finals schedule is post publicly, so she had access to information regarding when/where I would be on campus. We weren’t certain that she had actually left town or that she wouldn’t come back.

    We decided it was be better to be safe than dead. To protect my physical safety, we decided it would be best if I took my last final in a different location, so I took it in a windowless room, by myself, where only one other person knew where I was.

    Read the conclusion to my cyberbullying story in Part 4 of I Was Cyberbullied.

     

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