How would you handle this?

[dumpsterDiver]

So your belief is that Bob is lying ?
This is the crux of my disappointment in the kid. If he harvested an octopus not on eggs, then I see nothing wrong with what he did, it might not be great that he did it, but as stated it was legal and so be it, but everything I've comment on is based on the initial post on this thread that says the octopus was guarding eggs.

That's a totally different situation to me and is just not excusable.

By-the-way -- since he harvested this octopus for food, where was his cooler? He typically just throws his catch in the bed of his pick up truck?

Maybe he had not researched this site and was not planning on taking the octopus and did it as the opportunity presented itself.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

So your belief is that Bob is lying


This is the crux of my disappointment in the kid. If he harvested an octopus not on eggs, then I see nothing wrong with what he did, it might not be great that he did it, but as stated it was legal and so be it, but everything I've comment on is based on the initial post on this thread that says the octopus was guarding eggs.

That's a totally different situation to me and is just not excusable.

By-the-way -- since he harvested this octopus for food, where was his cooler? He typically just throws his catch in the bed of his pick up truck?[/QUOTE]

Maybe he had not researched this site and was not planning on taking the octopus and did it as the opportunity presented itself.

According to Dylan's interview, he went there specifically to hunt this octopus. Dozens, if not hundreds, of divers knew where this octopus was.

The downside to all this is that now, rather than sharing the location of these dens with our fellow divers, we're going to have to keep that information a closely-guarded secret.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Deep Down Diver]

There's plenty of regret to go around ... none of us involved in this incident expected it to turn into anything more than a local squabble over a shared resource.

The Thread that started it all was closed on the original forum. The same might transpire on scubaboard. Read the shutdown at
Northwest Dive Club • View topic - Octopus hunters in Cove 2 ...

Bob is a very sophisticated internet user who knew exactly what he was doing in harassing this kid. Look at his credentials on ScubaBoard and on the NW Dive Club website. He is the linchpin to the cyberstalking crusade.

NW Dive Club
Grateful Diver
Posts: 4520
Joined: May 15, 2006

ScubaBoard
NWGratefulDiver
Join Date: Feb 2002
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Bob’s first post on 10/31/12 was to a small club forum where he describes the “hoodie” wearing young guy. The description reminds of George Zimmerman’s seeing Trayvon Martin in a hoodie. Shooting of Trayvon Martin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The guy is young ... maybe 20'ish. He was wearing a hoodie that said "Tahoma Lacross" on the front and "Mayer" on the back. I'm assuming that's his last name. He drives a red pickup truck. I'll post the pictures when I get them ... probably later tonight or tomorrow. If anyone can identify this guy, I think we all need to know who to watch out for.
Northwest Dive Club • View topic - Octopus hunters in Cove 2 ...

Not satisfied, Bob went after the kid on ScubaBoard on 11/1/12

I don’t know what he did on facebook and other sites.

Scubaboard readers should be grateful to Bob for lessons about the perils of cyberstalking to address this.

Scubaboard readers should be grateful to Bob for showing how internet lynching can have repercussions back to the lynchpin and other lynchers.

Scubaboard readers should be grateful to Bob for demonstrating that respect for hunters that follow the law is wise.

Farther down is the post today on the NW Dive Club forum that sent Bob scrambling for cover before the thread was closed.
Northwest Dive Club • View topic - Octopus hunters in Cove 2 ...
[h=3]Re: Octopus hunters in Cove 2 ...[/h]by davidguilbault » Sat Nov 03, 2012 4:29 am
Hello.

I joined this forum just so I could share this post. I read through this thread and it disturbed me greatly.

This furor is a lesson on how quickly a character assassination can happen on the Internet. Most divers who posted on this 17-page diatribe about the killing of an octopus in Seattle did so before they actually knew the facts.

Don't really want to weigh in about the morality of hunting or the childish bravado of hunters. But I do want to say that it worries and distresses me when so many people can wage an attack on someone so quickly, based only on hearsay.

The young diver was accused of illegally killing a nesting, defenseless female octopus, taking her away from thousands of eggs, causing her death and the death of a generation of octopi. It should be noted that the prevailing understanding now, after some actual news reporting, is that the diver had a license, the octopus was a legal kill and that it was not a nesting mother.

It's the former journalist in me that likes to set the record straight. This young man is getting death threats and says he has been told by his employer to not return to work after his leave of absence. He is also being banned from a variety of dive shops and has been called every name in the book. He says his ambition to be a rescue diver is now thwarted, as some dive schools are denying him admission. Don't know if that last is true or not.

In a radio interview (Listen to podcast - Pod Player - MyNorthwest.com) he gave defending himself he claims everything he did was legal, and that he took the octopus both as a subject for an art drawing class requiring something from nature and as food. He says he has eaten some already, shared some with family and friends and has 50 lbs more in his freezer. (Everyone who has posted in this thread ought to listen to this radio interview.)

Meanwhile his Facebook and MySpace pages have been harvested to be used as fodder for all kinds of accusatory assumptions and insinuations. He has become a pariah, all before the facts were fully known.

And Pacific Northwesterners, as they are wont to do, have been wagging their fingers in self-righteous umbrage, name-calling and slandering before actually hearing from the hunter/fisherman to understand his side of the story.

Apparently, as I understand it, the divers who started the Web fire of personal destruction considered the fish in the cove where the young man was fishing to be their "protected pets." The man was apparently unaware of that or the sensitivity of the area for local divers. Wildlife authorities, on the other hand, say the man had every right to be fishing in those waters for whatever catch he desired, regardless of what anyone else thought of his actions. In fact, a game warden says she inspected his catch and found nothing illegal.

For his part, the young man said that the two divers who initially approached him, challenging what he was doing with a live octopus, were rude and aggressive. He did what many would do, and gave the rudeness and aggression back.

The two challengers didn't like the young hunter's attitude and decided, with no evidence other than his defensive, sarcastic responses, that he had killed a nesting mother. They took to the Web to launch a concerted campaign to identify the young man, invade his online presence, destroy his reputation and damage his relationship in the dive community.

Unfortunately, what they posted was simply not factual and caused slanderous damage. They bear responsibility for whatever destruction they brought to this young man's life. Hopefully they will accept that responsibility. The young man says he won't go back to that cove to fish again, respecting the wishes of the local divers, but will continue hunting for octopus, as is his legal right.

Even though the facts are now pretty much known, the demonizing of this young man continues. He says he hunts and butchers animals to eat. He has posted videos of those activities. But, comments on various news organization threads now describe his livestock slaughterings as animal torture.

I've seen a couple of his videos. They show an immature man butchering his food and playing around with his meat. You know, like hunters posing gleefully with their prized kills.

Remember, an awful lot of people, especially young people, now post just about everything they do online. This young man's video postings are being distorted.

Whether or not we ought to be killing animals for sport, food or any other reason is another kettle of fish altogether. (But, I do like my calamari, cow and pig.)

In any event, this should be a lesson to all of us online to do a little research, get the facts, give a story a little time to develop before we start sharing unfounded accusations and insinuations. And one should never start charging people with supposed heinous acts without ever giving that person an opportunity to explain their actions.

This first came to my attention through a Facebook posting where the poster said his intent was to embarrass this young diver. The original posting on this thread was a blatant threat against the young man and the dive businesses he frequented. Without a doubt it was an invitation for others to invade the young man's privacy.

When one begins to wrongly accuse someone, without having properly vetted the facts, it can quickly escalate out of control and cause real personal damage that might not ever be undone. These accusations need to stop here and now. In my opinion, this thread has been an embarrassment for all involved.

No one has a monopoly on "right" and "wrong." What we all have are laws. None, as far as I can ascertain at this time without further investigation, have been broken here. If you want to change the existing laws about octopi hunting, have at it. But, don't demonize this young man for doing what is accepted under the law.

For now, quite a few apologies are in order. And those who have caused damage in anyone's life have a responsibility to undo that damage.

Thank you all for allowing me to post on a forum to which I don't belong. I felt this thread was not about diving, but about fairness and the destruction caused by facile, false accusation. For the record, I'm scared to death to go under the water.

Hope all is well with you and yours.
Cheers for now.
David Guilbault
Last edited by davidguilbault on Sat Nov 03, 2012 4:47 am, edited 1 time in total.


Could a civil lawsuit be coming?

Could worse be coming with this Washington state law?

RCW 9.61.260: Cyberstalking.

[h=2]RCW 9.61.260[/h][h=1]Cyberstalking.[/h]

(1) A person is guilty of cyberstalking if he or she, with intent to harass, intimidate, torment, or embarrass any other person, and under circumstances not constituting telephone harassment, makes an electronic communication to such other person or a third party:

(a) Using any lewd, lascivious, indecent, or obscene words, images, or language, or suggesting the commission of any lewd or lascivious act;

(b) Anonymously or repeatedly whether or not conversation occurs; or

(c) Threatening to inflict injury on the person or property of the person called or any member of his or her family or household.

(2) Cyberstalking is a gross misdemeanor, except as provided in subsection (3) of this section.

(3) Cyberstalking is a class C felony if either of the following applies:

(a) The perpetrator has previously been convicted of the crime of harassment, as defined in RCW 9A.46.060, with the same victim or a member of the victim's family or household or any person specifically named in a no-contact order or no-harassment order in this or any other state; or

(b) The perpetrator engages in the behavior prohibited under subsection (1)(c) of this section by threatening to kill the person threatened or any other person.

(4) Any offense committed under this section may be deemed to have been committed either at the place from which the communication was made or at the place where the communication was received.

(5) For purposes of this section, "electronic communication" means the transmission of information by wire, radio, optical cable, electromagnetic, or other similar means. "Electronic communication" includes, but is not limited to, electronic mail, internet-based communications, pager service, and electronic text messaging.

 

[CT-Rich]

cyber bullying, now isn't that frowned upon here on SB?

---------- Post Merged at 01:45 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 01:40 PM ----------

No matter what he has done it is legal in the eyes of the law.

So what give you and your friends the right to track him down on the internet and harass him?

Next time someone sees you speeding they should get as many people as they can to harass you on FB, SB and every other social network there is out there.

I hate to point this out because I am not a fan of harrassing others, but there is freedom of speech. If this guy is acting like d*ck, and behaving in a way that destroys a community area, you have a right to voice your opinion. Ask around about him, make his instructors aware of his behavior. I don't know if the dive shop wants to do business with someone that undermines thier business by killing off a local attraction. He may have a right to kill these animals, but you have a right to disagree with him and voice your opinion... Feel free to make a stink. And I doubt he has an army of followers. Most likely he has a dive buddy that allows him to do it. Turning up the heat on him may well turn off that support.

 

[Zieg]

Any bets on how long this stays open now?

 

[TSandM]

There was some nasty cyberstalking that took place, but Bob didn't do it. Bob and another of my friends posted the photographs and the story in a number of places -- I think the backlash exceeded anything they expected to have happen.

What this young man did wasn't illegal, but something doesn't have to be illegal to be wrong. It is abundantly clear that he violated the norms of the Pacific Northwest diving community -- and what he did was found interesting and noteworthy enough to be aired on TV, make the front page of our local newspaper, and make it to national media. A great many people, including a number who actively hunt on scuba, have found his actions reprehensible.

The good side of this is that we may get the area where he was hunting designated as a no-take-on-scuba zone, which would be a very good outcome. The bad side is that we have seen the immense and pretty uncontrollable power of the internet and social media . . . it's like a gun where, once you have pulled the trigger, you have no control over how many bullets get fired or where they go. I have been guilty, a few times in my life, of manipulating some power I had access to, and launching them at someone whose actions I deplored. But in those days, it was one-on-one, and the process stopped there. Nowadays, it's frighteningly easy to start a mob, and I think everybody who has been involved in this issue locally has learned something about that.

 

[DaleC]

So what? By that measure, Bob should have never posted this thread. He opened it up to the world asking how we'd handle it and with that we have the right to voice an opinion. If you don't like that, then go away and don't read it.

Why should I go away. Just because you disagree doesn't mean I need to stop reading. Frankly, what you post doesn't make sense.

 

[Ana]

There was some nasty cyberstalking that took place, but Bob didn't do it. Bob and another of my friends posted the photographs and the story in a number of places -- I think the backlash exceeded anything they expected to have happen.

What this young man did wasn't illegal, but something doesn't have to be illegal to be wrong. It is abundantly clear that he violated the norms of the Pacific Northwest diving community -- and what he did was found interesting and noteworthy enough to be aired on TV, make the front page of our local newspaper, and make it to national media. A great many people, including a number who actively hunt on scuba, have found his actions reprehensible.

The good side of this is that we may get the area where he was hunting designated as a no-take-on-scuba zone, which would be a very good outcome. The bad side is that we have seen the immense and pretty uncontrollable power of the internet and social media . . . it's like a gun where, once you have pulled the trigger, you have no control over how many bullets get fired or where they go. I have been guilty, a few times in my life, of manipulating some power I had access to, and launching them at someone whose actions I deplored. But in those days, it was one-on-one, and the process stopped there. Nowadays, it's frighteningly easy to start a mob, and I think everybody who has been involved in this issue locally has learned something about that.

yeah lessons learned uh? but hey best of luck on your area getting a no-take-on scuba zone.

I like the analogy of the gun, very special gun you are referring to, responsible gun owners usually KNOW how many bullets they are releasing and where are they going. In this case seems like Bob did pull the trigger of that special gun.

wow, I'm really shocked you people don't realize this was the wrong wrong approach, we are definitely communicating at different baud rates

 

[SeahorseDeb]

How fair is it to kill a nesting mother?

Jim, We can only take male crab in season and with a license, and we know they are there by the hundreds in certain areas. (I'm not going to say where so the idiot doesn't find the location) So I humbly ask, why aren't female GPO's protected in that manner??

Just my 40 psi worth!!

 

[CT-Rich]

Having had a chance to read more of this thread since I posted my original comments, I will add that it is not clear what this kid actually did. I would seem that if this was a widely known nesting octopus, a few of the knowledgable locals could easily check the area to determine the likelihood this was a nesting female. Did he deserve the pooh storm created around this story, again I have no idea. Was it a smart idea to harvest a GPO in a popular dive spot? this depends... I would be worried if I came across a seemingly tame game animal close to a heavily used dive spot. The same logic woul apply if I went to florida and had a giant grouper swim over to me while spear fishing. I might suspect that this animal was just not scared of divers, or actively seeking them out.

Should a diver be raked over the coals for doing something thoughtless and destructive?

I've seen it happen on SB plenty of times. I have even made comments about divers increadably bad form. I don't always feel good about these threads, but there are consequences for thoughtless acts. This guy violated societal norms and was called out on it. If he had backed over kitten and then laughed about it would have justly caused outrage, provided it became widely known. He harvested in an area that is generally reguarded as off limits. This storm will pass and he will lay low for a while and resume his life, changed, I would expect.

If the state makes a law that codifies what the dive community had already considered the norm, maybe that is a good thing. If this is an object lesson about respecting local dive customs, that too is a good thing. If it is a warning about unintended cosequences of the new media, again, a good thing. There is plenty of good that can come from this. I have a feeling that the kid used poor judgement on a number of levels. hopefully he will be better for it.