Feeling a little ashamed of myself...(not gay related)

[silkfrog1292]

Oh my....i wonder if i should post this....sorry if this seems long and totally unrelated to LGBT issues.

So yesterday i went camping with a few of my friends, we all stayed at this little house in the country, and it was all nice and fun.

Now, among my friends we have this habit of fraping each other when we found each other's computer unattended with the facebook on. It's all intended to be a bit of harmless fun, and most of the time we laugh it off together.

But yesterday, one of my friends (let's call him A) left his computer unattended and went outside to do something. We proceeded to post an elaborate frape on his facebook. A few minutes later A returned and probably sensing something was wrong because of the laughter coming from within the house he started banging and scratching on the door (note: we locked the door after he left). After a few minutes the noise subsided and was replaced with silence. We all knew that something was not right, and A's girlfriend (let's call her C) ran out the door after him.

They were gone for a few hours, and nervous as we were we messaged C, and she replied that A was angry at us for taking practical jokes too far and for locking him out. Later that day A eventually came back, but he refused to talk to us and locked himself away in another room. The only person he was willing to see was C.

That night we retired early. But as i lay in bed that night i began to think about what i did that day. Was the joke really taken too far? was that any different from bullying? we all took part in it, and it was funny at the time, why didn't we think about the consequences at the time? what would be the impact on our relationship with A in the future?

This morning things sort-of returned to normal, but tensions' everywhere, and A still seems very removed from us. It's probably a good thing if we could break up the camp early to relieve the tension and put some space between us, but sadly as this trip was organised by our school we can't exactly end it when we want to. We've got four more days ahead of us.


Sorry I just need to get it out as today the guilt started to set in and it's kind of confusing and hard to bear.

[Lexington]

You don't mention if you apologized. If not, that's what to do. Don't couch it in "it was just a joke" or "you overreacted". Just say "I'm sorry we did that stuff on your Facebook."

Lex

[silkfrog1292]

Yeah...we apologised that evening and the next day. He accepted it, but i think he's still kinda angry as us, i don't know...

[Lexington]

It's understandable. Stay open, but don't push the interaction.

Lex

[Chip]

I might be in the minority, but I've always felt that practical jokes aren't very funny. Basically, the humor in those sorts of things (locking people out of their house, etc) works only because everyone but one person is "in the know" and the humor comes from the one person being on the outside.

I think about how I'd feel if someone did that to me, and, for the most part, I wouldn't appreciate it or find it funny. I think most people who *do* laugh along with it do so to "fit in", not because they think it's really funny.

Now some little, short, harmless things... that's one thing. But things that go on for more than a couple of minutes, or that can have any lasting impact... those I'm not in favor of. Again, that may be just me, but it's always been the way I've looked at such activities.

[midwestgirl89]

I agree with Chip in that I have never found facebook pranks to be funny. A may have been upset because people often have family and coworkers as facebook friends. I'm not sure what the facebook status said but it might take him a little while to cool down. Also the sense of being out of control can really get to people. I do think facebook pranks are too far. That being said, I bet your relationship with A will be mended soon if you are sensitive to his feelings (which it sounds like you are being).

It's over with now and all you can do is apologize, which you said you did so that's good. Give him some time to get over what happened. He felt like an outcast when the prank took place and got his feelings hurt but with time, he'll come to realize you are sorry and he will get over what happened. Just be careful next time about any practical jokes. They can dig deeper than we know.

Don't put yourself down too much because everyone messes up. Almost everyone has hurt another person's feelings. Your friends messed up but that's okay. Give yourself a break and I hope things with A get better soon.