Risky Business
Kids are visiting websites and chat rooms that make dangerous behaviour seem cool—and the results can be deadly

BY CRAIG SEGAL

When Arielle Kohl of London, Ont., looked for help online to quit self-injury –- suffering from depression, for years she had been making cuts on her legs as a way of taking out her anger -— what she saw horrified her. There were dozens of websites supporting self-injury. (Arielle had first learned about cutting when she noticed a friend did it.) Some examples of what’s on these sites?

“Cut on a full stomach,” is one contributor’s tip. “Always down the road, not across the street,” says another, referring to the direction of the incision.

“I had finally decided to turn things around,” says Arielle, 21, who was a teen at the time; she had begun psychiatric counselling and was taking medication for her depression. Yet instead of finding help online, she discovered graphic, bloody photos that actually encouraged cutting.

This doesn’t surprise Vancouver-based Mary Graham, founder of S.A.F.E. (Self-Abuse Finally Ends) in British Columbia, a referral and treatment program for self-injurers. “There are lots of sites where kids talk to each other about how they self-harm,” confirms Graham. “They say talking about it helps them because they’re the only ones who understand. But what it does is give them new ways to self-harm.”

B.J. Thom, executive director of S.A.F.E. in Canada, says self-injury is growing among teens at “an alarming rate.” Her organization estimates that as many as 300,000 Canadians self-injure. The practice seems to be more common among girls and usually begins in early to middle adolescence. It can go on for years. (Arielle, for her part, stopped cutting herself three years ago.)

“It seems that every school counsellor who comes to my workshop says the number of students who self-harm is growing,” observes Graham. “And those are only the ones they know about.”

While there is no definitive proof of a link, it is the contention of psychologists, pediatricians and youth counsellors that hundreds of websites and chat rooms are fuelling an increase -— across Canada and around the world -— of self-destructive behaviours among youth. These include cutting, the “choking game” (also called the pass-out game, in which kids momentarily cut off oxygen to their brains to achieve a druglike high) and anorexia and bulimia. And while the Internet is clearly a tool for good, unfortunately practices once considered taboo are no longer hidden—except from parents—and that makes them seem more acceptable, even cool.

Take anorexia and bulimia. On the Internet there are “pro-ana” and “pro-mia” (short for pro-anorexia and pro-bulimia) websites that view anorexia nervosa in a positive light—a lifestyle choice rather than a psychological disorder. Suffering from the illness, and losing so much weight that they put their lives in danger, the last thing these girls need are tips on how to avoid consuming food—“drink lots and lots of water” or “adopt a dog and feed him your food.” Some pro-ana sites provide motivational messages: “Say it now and say it loud: I’m anorexic and I’m proud.” Still others contain photos of Kate Moss, Calista Flockhart and other thin, beautiful actresses and models to “thinspire” sufferers to avoid food.

“There are many very good websites that address food and weight preoccupation, including eating dis- orders,” says Merryl Bear, director of the National Eating Disorder Information Centre in Toronto. “But millions of sites perpetuate myths and misconceptions and falsely encourage dieting and over-exercise as ways of achieving health and happiness.” About one to two percent of Canadian females suffer from anorexia at one point in their lives; three to five percent will suffer from bulimia, according to Bear. Males suffer from eating disorders, too, though in smaller numbers.

In 2005, researchers at Stanford University found that 40 percent of adolescents who had been hospitalized for eating disorders had spent time on pro-ana websites. Dr. Mark Norris, who runs the eating disorders clinic at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Ottawa and who published a study last August on eating disorders and the Internet, says, “Some of the tips they provide, especially related to purging and laxatives, can cause serious medical harm,” noting the number of patients admitted to his clinic with eating disorders has risen steadily since the early ’90s.

And then there’s the choking game. Sharron and James Grant will never know for sure if their son, Jesse, learned about it online, but they believe their computer-savvy son might have gotten some tips by going to the Internet -— and with deadly results.

The Grants had three children they adored, and owned a bright two-storey home in the close-knit town of Penetanguishene, Ont. The couple had moved here from Toronto in part because they thought it would be safer for the kids.

Their son Jesse had always been intelligent, energetic and happy. But in the winter of 2005, something changed. Jesse, then age 12, had regular headaches, bloodshot eyes, and had become aggressive. Sharron and James considered taking him to a doctor, but Jesse insisted he was okay, so they let it go. After all, he was an A student whose hockey and soccer trophies, sports equipment, computer games and books were all over the house. Jesse had read all the Harry Potter books in Grade 5 and had just gotten into C.S. Lewis. He was even a reading helper for kids in lower grades, and liked going camping with his dad and kid brother, Josh.

Jesse was in an especially good mood in April 2005 because his parents said he could go to Ottawa on his first big school trip. So Sharron and James were not anxious about him on Saturday, April 23, when Jesse was at home playing with Josh and a cousin.

When Sharron got home at 2:30 p.m. after running errands, Jesse wasn’t with the two other boys playing video games. She checked his basement bedroom, where he had his computer—and was confronted with a parent’s worst nightmare. She found Jesse with a computer cord tied around his neck. Sharron called 9-1-1 and James performed CPR, but it was too late.

“I knew it wasn’t suicide when I saw Jesse had cut the knob [plug end] off the cord,” Sharron says softly. “He was happy. He’d asked a girl to be his girlfriend the night before. She was his first girlfriend.”

The way Jesse died -— he had choked himself with a cord with the end sliced off, apparently so the knot would release after Jesse let go of it -— was evidence he’d been playing the choking, or pass-out, game. James and Sharron believe he may have learned about cutting off the cord’s end online, since there is an Internet community that trades such tips about the bizarre practice. “The end was a quarter inch from releasing,” says James. “The doctor concluded it was accidental asphyxiation. Jesse was a computer whiz. He knew loads of stuff that we can’t do. He might have picked up this tip on a website or from an email.” Jesse’s family learned after he died that he’d been playing the deadly game with his friends, and Josh.

Nobody officially tracks the number of choking-game deaths in Canada, but experts estimate as many as 1,000 people in North America die from it each year. Asphyxia games -— hyperventilating and holding your breath —- have been around for a long time. One version, auto-erotic asphyxia, is used by some men and women as a way of intensifying sexual climax. The choking game, done mostly for thrills and often in groups, does not derive from the darker psychological motives behind anorexia and self-injury, but the Internet is fuelling more extreme methods.

Google certain keywords and with a few clicks you’ll be connected to a spirited discussion about the choking game. One teen calls it “overrated,” while another provides chilling directions about how to play it.

Experts point to television programs such as Fear Factor to further explain the choking trend. They say death is simply not on the radar in this “I dare you” culture. Kids are adding ropes, belts, computer cords and plastic bags to the game, and many are playing alone, which is far more dangerous. Sharron Grant now believes that, for her son Jesse, the choking game was a thrill that went too far. “If he knew how dangerous it was, he would never have put himself in harm’s way.”

Besides supervising more carefully what their children are doing while online, parents need to look for signs of self-destructive behaviour, say child-care professionals. Some are obvious: Excessive exercise and developing rituals around eating are anorexia tipoffs. A rash of cuts on the body is a sign of self-injury. Bloodshot eyes, dizziness and red marks on the neck are indications of the choking game.

For several years, Yahoo and AOL have been shutting down self-injury sites on their servers. But this kind of information is still available in online chat rooms, which are much harder to police. And there is frankly no way to eliminate these sites altogether.

Jesse Grant would have turned 15 this June. After his death, Sharron and her daughter, Kristen, Jesse’s 25-year-old sister, set up www.deadlygameschildrenplay.com in January 2006, and soon had 100 members, plus visits from 60 countries a month. The site educates parents and kids about the dangers of the choking game, lists warning signs and reference material, and contains memorials to children who have died needlessly.

The site carries the following message: “If we can save one child from this game, then we have done what we set out to do.”