hate crime?. If you break it down, neither Ravi nor Wei are directly responsible for Clementi’s death. It was a suicide, open and shut. The motivation behind it was extreme shame.

Ravi and Mei were indeed responsible for invading Clementi’s privacy and thus should be punished for that. The real cause of the suicide is how Clementi viewed himself and whether he was out or not.

The article doesn’t say anything about his outed status but if he was closeted, it would explain his emotional state. The root cause in this case would be the perceived rejection that Clementi might have thought he’d experience.

….. I think you’re right in saying that that his death was suicide but he would still be alive if not for the actions of those to two sick individuals. To me, they are guilty as if they pushed him off that bridge themselves.
You’re also right in saying that we don’t know whether he was out or in or ashamed or not about being gay or what his perceptions of his family and friends might’ve been if they had found out. But no matter how he felt, he didn’t want to be embarrassed in such a shameless manner, especially if he was still in the closet. Would any of us liked our parents to find out by way of sex video online? I don’t think so. It is an extremely sad case this one. I feel we shouldn’t be question why Tyler committed suicide, instead we should be asking why two sick people decided to invade someone’s privacy like that and feel the need to broadcast it for all to see? Why did they think it was the right thing to do? What were their motives for doing so? And more importantly, how can it be prevented from happening again?

Silly gay backlash. They have took ????
Sheesh…
Bad as saying ‘he got bit..’

Anyway..

These bullies will have to live with the consequence of their actions. The article doesn’t mention to what extent the two were simply playing an unkind prank or not. Either way, they can hardly be accused of murder.. It wasn’t premeditated nor intended to cause a homicide. The fact that the teenager chose to end his life as a result of an emotionally charged situation is moot. Most gay people go through psychological intimidation of some sort (direct or indirect) but we/they don’t all jump off bridges. I feel immense sadness for him and his family, and also anger at the bullying of his room mate, but this shouldn’t be a cause for a murder charge! The gay backlash is no better than the bullying!