‘You can’t dox people because they were sort of mean to you one time’: Viral TikTok sparks debate about doxing
A viral video showing several young women appearing to mock the person recording it has gone viral and led to a greater debate about doxxing, bullying, and the increasing lack of privacy people appear to have in public.
A couple of days ago, TikToker @jackielabonita posted a video she took while attending a Houston Astros game. Wearing an Astros jersey and what looks to be a replica Astros World Series ring, she strikes several poses to post on social media. But getting those photos takes time, and her efforts to capture those images caught the notice of two women sitting behind her. And not only did they notice, but according to @jackielabonita, they appeared to mock her for it.
“Watch my confidence disappear after these random girls make fun of me taking pictures,” @jackielabonita wrote in a caption that appears on the TikTok video.
@jackielabonita Please be nice #meangirls #meangirlvibes ♬ The Loser - Verzache
In the edited video, one of the women flips off the camera and appears to roll her eyes. She takes out her phone—@jackielabonita believes she’s filming— and says “Laaaaaaaameeee.” Both women make faces and start laughing. @jackielabonita says she can hear their entire conversation and that she can tell they’re talking about her.
“Feeling super self conscious,” she wrote. “I wanted to cry.”
@jackielabonita’s video went viral, and over the past two days, it’s been viewed over 34.7 million times; a reupload on Twitter was viewed at least 11.7 million times before the account that posted it went private. Cardi B was among those who shared an opinion on the video: She quote-tweeted the Twitter reupload and commented, “I would of put that ring to use.”
It didn’t take long for people on TikTok and Twitter to identify the two women in the video and contact their alleged employers. Screenshots shared on social media indicated that one business was review-bombed on Google. Those reviews appear to have been removed, but the business is now listed as being “permanently closed.” The two women have deleted their Instagram accounts.
In a deleted TikTok that’s been reuploaded by other TikTokers, @stephano_z—who is dating one of the women—had harsher words for @jackielabonita, who he accused of posting the video for social media clout; he walks through the video, indicating that one of the women felt uncomfortable by @jackielabonita filming them. He shared footage of some of the harassing comments they received and adds that he finds it ridiculous that he has because the women don’t want to be on camera.
“The fact that you’re getting away with this with a fake story, getting people on your side, getting people harassing the girls in this video is absolutely disgusting,” he said. “Not to mention the things that these girls could lose just because you want some likes and followers on TikTok.”
In a different video, he called out the people review-bombing the business because they believed it employed one of the women in the video and asked them to take the reviews down.
“Also, for all of y’all leaving hate, I just don’t understand how y’all are standing against bullying and then literally cyberbullying every single person that’s not even involved in this and going as far as to take down a company, just because y’all thought she worked there,” @stephano_z said. “We just need to be better. Being completely honest. We as a community need to do better.”
@stephano_z I will never turn my comments off and i stand by what i say. So feel free to ask me anything
♬ original sound - Stephano
Jocelyn Carreno posted a video about the situation because, for a time, TikTok’s search bar seemed to suggest that she was one of the women making fun of @jackielabonita in the video because one of Carreno’s videos was a top result. As a result, Carreno was bullied for a time, despite other commenters pointing out that it wasn’t Carreno.
“I don’t know guys, just don’t spread hate,” Carreno said. “Get your facts straight before—you guys are coming at someone else because it was clearly not me. We look nothing alike, which is so funny because I’m like, dude, how? This girl and me look nothing alike.”
@jocelynxcarreno My sister and cousin were supposed to be here but stuff happened. This was a funny yet scary experience, never thought all those hate comments would actually get to me yall! There was a alot of people that began to realize that they got the wrong person and erased their comments, also s/o to those strangers that stood up for me in the comments. And for those who were commenting, very sad because you guys came at total strangers that had no idea of what was going on. #spreadlovenothate #jackielabonita #bullyingawareness #fyp ♬ original sound - Jocelyn Carreno
On Twitter, people called out the women for how they acted and imagined how they’d act in that situation, as much of the same information floating around TikTok ended up on Twitter too.
But the conversation went beyond the question of bullying and questioned whether it was OK for people to dox the women in the video and contact their employers to try getting them fired.
“So many people on here and tiktok just simply do not believe that people who acted like kind of a dick one time still have a right to work and support themselves,” @mandolakes tweeted. “Not even someone being a bigot, just acting kinda shitty when filmed in public = you don’t deserve to have a job.”
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