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The first and most prominent celebrity victim of catfishing, former Heisman Trophy finalist Manti Te’o, has probably heard all the jokes, seen all the memes, and shed all the tears he can over the experience. Untold: The Girlfriend Who Didn’t Exist is a new Netflix documentary in which former football prodigy Te’o tells his side of the tale, more than nine years after Deadspin broke the news about him dating a lady who didn’t exist.
Te’o enjoyed near-mythical levels of renown from 2009 to 2012, which allowed scandals involving him to hold the attention of the mainstream media for longer than a news segment. The Netflix documentary emphasizes the achievements and undying compassion that would ultimately lead to his downfall. These include being a 2012 Heisman Award finalist, a five-star recruit, and the adored son of Hawaii.
By the time he entered the 2013 NFL Draft, he had already been roasted mercilessly by every news outlet and comedian for his online relationship with his false girlfriend Lennay Kekua, his claim that she had died (after finding out she had faked that too), and his subsequent admission of guilt. As a result of the revelation that Ronaiah Tuiasosopo had been hiding behind the Lennay persona, Tuiasosopo faced questions about his s*xuality and saw his first-round NFL draught stock plummet to the second round, costing him millions of dollars in missed earnings.
The prank is both a warning about the perils of blind dating and a window into how online culture has become ingrained in contemporary social mores. According to Te’o, “in 2009, nobody understood anything about catfishing,” which contributed to his gullibility, as he explains in the documentary. He claims that until that fateful holiday season of 2012, he had never heard the word that has now become a part of the vernacular of online daters everywhere.
After Te’o reported receiving a phone call from his recently deceased girlfriend, his uncle warned him that he may be the victim of a catfishing scam. Catfish, a documentary about a young person who fakes an online relationship, was released to theatres in September of 2010, but the term “catfish” didn’t become common use until the premiere of MTV’s reality show Catfish: The TV Show in November of 2012.
You’ve read enough negative articles and seen enough SNL skits about Teo’s fake girlfriend deception to think you know everything there is to know about it. Perhaps you’ve even created your own “invisible girlfriend” memes. This Netflix documentary, however, will show that Te’o’s problems extended beyond a few Facebook posts.
How was Manti Te’o Catfished?
According to the documentary, Te’o first met the person he thought was Lennay Kekua when he received a friend request on Facebook from a stranger as a freshman. Te’o innocently initiated contact by sending her a “Hi, I’m Manti” message. What wasn’t published at the time the fraud was exposed, but is explained in the documentary, is that he checked around for references, as any reasonable person would do if a hot stranger hopped in their inbox.
The star linebacker’s cousin revealed he had randomly texted and called the mysterious young woman after Kekua told him she knew his cousin Shiloah. Te’o claims their communication was infrequent over the next two years, disproving the rumor that he was in a relationship with someone he had never met for three years.
The documentary highlights several important points, including one that wasn’t generally covered: that Te’o’s fame prevented him from having an everyday college life. Moving from a “very strong Church of Jesus Christ congregation to perhaps the most predominant Catholic institution in the world” did not help the Hawaiian native adjust to life in the colder Midwest.
After Kekua told him in 2011 that her father wasn’t feeling well, Te’o admits in the documentary that he became somewhat pathologically selfless and fed off the sense that he was helping Kekua. Te’o and Kekua’s relationship blossomed as he learned that she shared his Polynesian heritage and religious upbringing. During Te’o’s time at Notre Dame, Kekua was one of the few persons he knew personally and therefore an easy target for manipulation.
After things heated up between them, Kekua tried every trick in the book to keep their true identity hidden. First, Tuiasosopo, posing as Kekua, texted the collegiate superstar saying his fiancée was on life support after a car accident, playing on Te’o’s desire to help. When Te’o would contact her at the hospital, he would hear someone breathing through a mask as if they were fighting for their life, and the con would reach dramatic dimensions. Then Te’o began to distance himself from her when Kekua told him she had miraculously recovered thanks to his daily discussions while she was purportedly on life support. The catfishing activity then took a dark turn.
Te’o claims that he learned of his grandmother’s death at 6 a.m. on September 12, 2012, from Tuiasosopo in his role as her brother and that he learned of Kekua’s death from Tuiasosopo in his role as his father. Tuiasosopo even pretended to be Kekua’s brother when he called Te’o’s parents to deliver the devastating news.
The documentary doesn’t reveal whether Te’o checked Google for an obituary for his lover Kekua or whether he asked any of the people he claimed to be related to find out where Kekua would be laid to rest. Te’o wasn’t catfished merely because he was naive or easily influenced (although there were a few teaspoons of each in this recipe for manipulation).
He fell victim to catfishing because his generosity made him oblivious to deceit, his homesickness made him yearn for someone from his native culture, and Tuiasosopo went to great pains to fabricate a dream that capitalized on all of these factors.
Who is Manti Te’o’s wife? Meet fitness enthusiast Jovi Nicole https://t.co/q7UbZSDfUL pic.twitter.com/nsxLAgoEF9
— New York Post (@nypost) August 17, 2022
Is Lennay Kekua A Real Person?
Without Tuiasosopo, Kekua does not exist. Tuiasosopo, a man at birth, thought they couldn’t be happy unless they lived as a female is one of the documentary’s most illuminating points. Tuiasosopo says they didn’t dare to act on these impulses in public, but Kekua served as a safe digital space where they could be themselves without fear of judgment. Diane O’Meara, a mutual friend of Te’o and Tuiasosopo’s, was the source of the images she used to con Te’o and other men into believing something they didn’t see.
The public embrace of the woman Tuiasosopo had always aspired to happen when their secret became rumor fodder and their identity was exposed. In the documentary, Tuiasosopo presents as a transsexual woman named Naya, using feminine pronouns and speaking more softly. In the wake of this event, Tuiasosopo relocated back to American Samoa and became deeply involved in the fa’afafine, a community that accepts everyone regardless of their gender expression or choice of clothing.
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What Happened to Manti Te’o?
In the wake of the Deadspin piece casting Te’o in a negative light, no NFL team selected him in the first round of the 2013 draught. Now that everyone knows he could have been easily catfished, the documentary reveals how the discourse surrounding Te’o at the time had little to do with his on-field brilliance and more to do with sports pundits and scouts being concerned about his leadership skills. He was picked by the San Diego Chargers in the second-to-last round, but the fallout from his false girlfriend scam was still being felt.
He had a rather unremarkable first three seasons with the Chargers. A far cry from the 374 tackles he racked up over his final three years of college, he only managed 204 during those three years in the pros. During one particularly illuminating segment of the documentary, Te’o reveals that he played his first three seasons in the NFL with a complete lack of feeling in his body. After seeking help from a therapist, he realized the source of the crippling feeling was his refusal to forgive himself for a past error.
The confidence that drove Te’o’s success was broken by his scandal, and this understanding is one of the final insights he gives us into his mental suffering with the girlfriend’s deception. Te’o’s contract with the Chicago Bears expired in January 2021, and he did not appear in any games for the team during 2021–2022. Even though Te’o has yet to find a team to play for, it is evident from this doc that he is no longer looking for validation or understanding.
