Web Site Where Students Slung Vicious Gossip Is Shut Down

A Web site that spread explicit and malicious rumors across Southern California campuses was shut down Friday after sparking an unwelcome explosion of electronic gossip and adolescent angst.

On https://www.SchoolRumors.com, middle school, high school and college students--the majority in the San Fernando Valley--posted graphic messages full of sexual innuendo aimed at individual students and focusing on topics such as the “weirdest people at your school.�

The online bulletin boards had been accessed more than 67,000 times since mid-February, prompting a sense of despair among scores of teenagers disparaged on the site and frustration among parents and school administrators.

At schools across the Valley, administrators reported having to comfort students throughout the week as the site gained popularity. At Cleveland School in Reseda, “a student was very suicidal, and her friends actually stopped her from harming herself� after her name appeared on the Web site, said Principal Allan Weiner.

The creator of the 2-month-old site could not be reached Friday.

SchoolRumors.com’s Denver-based service provider blocked access Friday afternoon, but executives could not be reached to explain their decision. Invite Internet warns on its Web site that its servers will not allow “content that could be reasonably considered as slanderous or libelous.�

Even so, word was already spreading among Valley students about a similar site hosted with another company--underscoring the difficulty of controlling offensive speech on the Internet.

The number of such sites is impossible to quantify, but the Student Press Law Center estimated in September that there were more than 10,000 underground student sites online--with more showing up every day. SchoolRumors.com parallels a story line from the Fox Television show “Boston Public,� which featured a Web site that bashed students and teachers.

Gossip has always been a part of the high school experience, from rumors whispered in the halls or exchanged in late-night telephone calls to insults scrawled on bathroom walls. But the power of the written word in a medium as far-reaching as the Internet is much more profound, said Woodland Hills therapist Veronica Thomas, who treats children, teenagers and families.

“It’s not just a few of the kids at school; it’s the whole world,� Thomas said. “That makes it more real, because it’s written and accessible. Anybody could log on and see what they said about you. What’s written remains, haunting, torturing these kids.�

One crying student, whose address and phone number were published on the site, was barraged with calls from people calling her a slut and a prostitute, Weiner said.

Another student spent more than half the week at home after she was disparaged on the site, said her friend Danny Caudillo, a senior at Birmingham High School. He posted his schedule on the site and invited the rumormonger to confront him in person. No one showed up.

Legal experts said the kinds of accusations posted on SchoolRumors.com could qualify as libel.

Common insults on the site included calling girls “tramps,� “sluts� and “whores,� often describing explicit sexual acts. The more specific the insult, the more likely a court would be to find the statement defamatory, said James Chadwick, a partner at the law firm of Gray, Cary, Ware & Freidenrich in Palo Alto.

For boys, the standard insult was to call somebody “gay.� A false allegation of homosexuality could be considered defamatory by a California court, Chadwick said. Even if true, such statements could be considered an invasion of privacy.

Whether the statements are legally libelous “depends on both the context and the content,� Chadwick said. The site warned visitors that “the rumors can be true or false,� but the person who created the site could be liable for damages, Chadwick said.

Just who that is was unclear Friday.

SchoolRumors.com was created last December and gained momentum in the last two weeks.

“You’d be walking through the halls and somebody would say, ‘Did you hear what they said about so-and-so on SchoolRumors?’ � said one junior from a Valley public school.

“So we start going on there. At first it was funny, but then it got really crude . . . shocking, disgusting. You could see people you knew being hurt by it.�

Even the most sincere efforts of principals sometimes backfired. Stephanie Connelly, principal of Notre Dame High School in Sherman Oaks, discussed the site with students Wednesday, but her talk gave the site some unintended publicity.

“Isn’t it funny how nobody knew about this site until our stupid principal warned us not to go on it,� one Notre Dame student wrote on the site. “If she didn’t want us to go on it, why . . . did she tell us about it?�

At Robert Frost Middle School in Granada Hills, outraged students wrote an editorial for their biweekly school newsletter, the Wolfpack, calling for control of “gutless� rumor Web sites.

“How do you feel when someone puts you down in a place where all your peers can see?� the editorial said. “Well, that is exactly what rumor Web sites do. . . . Spreading rumors on the Internet is very wrong. It hurts others and can cause many problems. These hurtful sites must be controlled at once!�

Frost Principal Robert Frydman said many of his students expressed shock and indignation about the site, which he described as despicable.

Marleen Wong, the district’s director of mental health services, said the site spotlights the lack of parental supervision in many homes.

“Here is where adults need to know what’s going on,� Wong said. “It really calls into question the amount of adult supervision children are getting. If the computers are in the kids’ rooms, perhaps they should be moved to a family room.�

She also blamed the popular culture that children are tuned in to, from rap singer Eminem to graphic TV and movies.

The Columbine, Colo., school shootings two years ago came up on the site, reminding educators of the two teenagers who killed 13 people before shooting themselves. They had been planning the massacre in their bedrooms, unbeknown to their parents--and posted their plans on the Web.

Students said that adults should not be shocked by their language and behavior--that it’s a reflection of the conduct grown-ups have displayed and the culture that children have been exposed to.

“Listen to the lyrics to the music we listen to . . . the movies, shows like ‘Temptation Island.’ That has a big influence on kids,� said one student. “I know kids that laugh at disgusting movies, that eat up stuff like ‘Temptation Island’ . . . that desensitizes us. It’s like, what do you expect?�

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Times staff writer David Colker contributed to this story.