THE CATFISH: Mhissy, who pretended for two years to be a man named Mike in order to get into a relationship with her enemy Jasmine.
WHY SHE DID IT: Revenge. “You did this why?” asks Jasmine. “Why not?” Mhissy replies, “It’s revenge.” Mhissy created Mike specifically to seduce Jasmine, hoping to keep her away from the man they were both romantically interested in. When Nev tries to negotiate the feel-good empathy-session that Catfish tends to wrap up with, it doesn’t work: Mhissy says she just wants Jasmine to suffer. Jasmine wants to beat Mhissy up.
Another insight into the mind of a vindictive hoaxer comes from Chelsea Browning, seen in the first episode of Catfish, who later spoke to MTV about the Manti Te’o scandal. Chelsea started her profile in hopes of getting revenge after being bullied. As she explains in the episode, she was cyberbullied by another girl and created the male model character “Jamison” in order to bully back. Since then, she has become an anti-bullying advocate.