It's a confession... or almost. Education Minister Pap Ndiaye said Thursday on BFMTV that the suicide of Lindsay, 13, who killed himself after being a victim of school bullying, is "a collective failure".
"Obviously, this is a collective failure, the death of Lindsay, her suicide, it is a tragedy for her loved ones, for the National Education and for the country, as for the suicide of any young person," testified Pap Ndiaye Thursday evening, a few hours after the family of the teenager announced that they had filed a complaint against the rectorate and Facebook.
Four complaints filed
Three complaints were filed against the management of the college, the academy of Lille and the police officers in charge of the investigation for "non-assistance to person in danger", detailed Thursday the lawyer of the family, Me Pierre Debuisson, at a press conference in Vendin-le-Vieil (Pas-de-Calais), where the schoolgirl was schooled.
A fourth targets the social network Facebook "completely failing" in terms of content moderation and the fight against "hate speech", according to the lawyer, denouncing the continuation of harassment against Lindsay, especially on Instagram.
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"It's a chain of events: the main instigator of the violence was first temporarily excluded on November 14 (...) then definitively excluded on February 27 and we end up with the tragedy of May 12, "reported Pap Ndiaye on BFMTV, referring to the problem of "cyberbullying", which in this case took over from bullying at school.
The "responsibility" of social networks
For Pap Ndiaye, social networks "have their share of responsibility". According to him, it is necessary to "put them under pressure in a more accentuated way". "With other ministries we will consult and act extremely firmly with regard to social networks because beyond what they can say, we know that their reaction is too slow," he said.
In a statement, Pap Ndiaye promised to "invite to exchange the main managers of social networks, in particular the Meta France group (Facebook, Instagram), Snapchat, TikTok and Twitter, in connection with the Ministry of the Interior and Overseas, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry in charge of Digital Transition and Telecommunications".
The minister also said he was "personally" following Lindsay's suicide. Citing the judicial and administrative investigation, he assured to draw "all the conclusions with regard to the staff if necessary and especially the general conclusions on how we can move forward".
A "reinforcement" against harassment
Pap Ndiaye announced a "strengthening of the anti-harassment cell". Referring to the hotlines on cyberbullying (3018) and bullying at school (3020), he explained that "the resources allocated to them will be increased to recruit more psychologists, social media experts and listeners".
