Auntie Jill's Jillings

Dear Auntie Jill,
I’m wondering if I’m suffering from the heartless bastard syndrome. I met someone in chat who I thought was a really cool person. She claimed to have had a really tough life and naturally my sympathy went out to her. But as time went on I began to realise there was always some new disaster or tragedy in her life to the point where it began to stretch credibility. To cut a long story short I felt that our friendship was based on some kind of emotional blackmail. Am I being cynical or realistic?
Yours,
Doubtful.

Dear Doubtful,
No I don’t think you are being cynical. You have to trust your instincts, perhaps even more so in internet chat. Ignoring them is always dangerous. What you have described is not uncommon. It’s called:

Munchausen by Internet (a.k.a. The Sob Story Teller)
These are the people who lurk around innocently enough, and then, one day, tragedy strikes. Their dog, or parent, or maybe a close friend dies. Maybe the poster themselves finds out they have a terminal disease. And unless you're on 4chan, the group will generally rally around and shower them with sympathy. You send this person your prayers and well wishes, maybe a few dozen kitten pictures and you hope they will get through it.

Then, a week later, another tragedy strikes. Their best friend was raped, or paralyzed in an accident, or both. A few weeks after that, their father dies. The cat gets herpes, the list is endless.

Soon it becomes apparent that they are either living under an ancient Egyptian curse, or they're making it all up. It's so common that somebody has already coined a term for it: Munchausen by Internet. In Real Life it's called...Munchausen’s Syndrome.

The basis of need here is the same as the normal run of the mill attention-seekers and drama queens, however these people will only settle for the positive and sympathetic attention that comes with being sick or some other kind of distress. You know, without the whole "actually being sick" thing to bog them down. In some cases and perhaps in yours ‘Doubtful’ it’s a way of hooking you into the relationship.

Yeah, my house is on fire right now, it totally sucks.

In real life they can keep it up for years, because society doesn't make it easy to be sceptical. If you cast doubt on them and then later discover it was true, suddenly you're the biggest douche on the planet.

So Why Does it Happen on the Internet?
As easy as it is to pull off in real life, it's ten times time easier online where there's no simple way to fact-check the claims. So it doesn't take a balls-out liar or con man to pull it off. Hell, all you need to do is know how to type, and you have access to that same outpouring of sympathy all Munchausen sufferers get addicted to.

A famous case of cyberMunching was allegedly that of Kaycee Nicole, a 19-year-old with Leukaemia who turned out to have been created by 40-year-old Debbie Swenson. The Kaycee character posted daily for two years in an online journal about her struggle to live with her illness. She then "died" and only when there was no funeral people did people figure out it had all been a hoax.

And even then, Swenson could keep doing it elsewhere if she so pleased. She may be out there doing it right now. On the anonymous Internet, you can create a dozen different characters and when one of them starts to get boring the "parent" can just kill them off. This is clinically known as the LOST approach.

Trust your instincts Doubtful, if you think you’re being ripped off you most undoubtedly are.

Love,

Auntie Jill.