Luckily, Nev and his buddies were kind and understanding towards his catfish with the purposes of the documentary being to make others more aware of this phenomenon and not to bring justice to Angela. The documentary's perception of catfishing reminds me of a TED talk with comedian James Veitch. James Veitch decided to reply to spam email and engage in a lengthy conversation with the person at the other end, not much unlike Nev with Facebook. The spam email conversation begins with a message talking of a business proposal Veitch might be interested in, a proposal that involves a shipment of gold. Veitch, in all the seriousness he can muster knowing the email's authenticity, asks for more details. Veitch's comic side shows as the last thread of emails display funny code words that Veitch has asked to be used to for privacy in their business interactions.
Veitch at the end of the video presents a statement on the morality in what he has done:
"I don't think what I am doing is mean. There are a lot of people who do mean things to scammers. All I am doing is wasting their time. And I think any time they are spending with me is time they are not spending scamming vulnerable adults out of their savings, right?"
Veitch replies to scam email for the purposes of entertainment and public awareness, just like Nev. Veitch never tries to contact the person behind the screen and confront them so the conversation on morality must shift back to Catfish. Nev does take the offensive and go to visit Angela, but he spends much of the rest of the documentary showing how Angela lives. Nev sits and talks with Angela while Angela sketches him as he tries to understand her position. In summary, catfishing and other forms of online scamming are not morally right. Catfish advises caution when using the web and a suggests to look at the person behind the profile before judgement take place in instances of catfishing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QdPW8JrYzQ
2 comments:
This offers an interesting perspective on catfishing. I think most of us can agree Angela was wrong to lead on Nev, but Veitch's situation is more complicated than that. Veitch is actually catfishing an online scammer by posing as a potential customer. His behavior reminds me of the Old Testament "eye for an eye" policy. He's like: "Oh you tried to scam me? I'll scam you!" This makes me wonder if he's any better than the scammer. Of course he's not running a humongous scam like the actual scammer is, so he's got that going for him.
@Megan Morrison
You bring up an interesting point. James Veitch is seemingly catfishing the catfisher. I still question whether that makes Veitch as bad. The scammers are after money and identity. Veitch is just after their time and hopes a few laughs will come along the way. I know ends don't always justify the means, but the fact that Veitch uses these emails to remind others to be wary of scammers must stand for something.
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