Bullying in a New Era

 The New Way to Bullying

Tyler Clementi , Megan Meier, Alexis Pilkington, Ryan Halligan, your neighbors son, someone’s daughter - the list could continue on and on. These childrens' lives were taken by their own hand but not without the help of their cyber bullies.  The bullies tormented these poor children so badly that they felt they had no way out but to end their own lives. Bulling has taken on a completely new face (or should we say faceless) with all the new media available to children today. They hide like cowards but yet still have the upper hand. The constant degrating texts, IM's, emails can be more then most children can handle. Hopefully, they have an adult available to them to talk about the issue or a way to move past it. 

"Cyberbullying is when someone repeatedly harasses, mistreats, or makes fun of another person online or while using cell phones or other electronic devices."

Gone are the days when a bully would confront you in person and unfortunately at times things would get nasty. But things got settled, we moved on and we grew up. I was bullied in high school and it was at times tough to handle. I looked into changing schools but realized I didn’t want to leave the great group of friends that I did have.  I confronted the girls that were being nasty to me.  Things got better but I have to say thankfully at that time in my life, I didn’t have to contend with any cyber attacks.  Bullying is/was looked at as part of growing up but we don't have to let that be the way our children have to experience their childhood.

According to i-SAFE Inc., a leader in Internet safety education, more then 42% of children have experienced cyber bullying at some point while being online. 1 in 4 have had it happen more then once. There is a lot of fear of being cyberbullied according to a study done by Pew Internet & American Life Project on 12 to 17yr olds asked 34% of the teens surveyed experience sadness or fear related to online harassment which can lead to depression, anxiety, substance abuse, or other psychological problems. On the other side, 53% of kids admit having said something mean or hurtful to another person online. More than 1 in 3 have done it more than once. 

 

 

Parents are the first form of defense to stop this. The hard part about that is most kids don't want or feel they can tell their parents at the risk of more bullying. Some ways to help stop bullying  according to Safety Watch are:

• Keep an open door policy
• Don't overreact to the situation
• Ask questions
• Be understanding 
• Do not retaliate
• Save all evidence
• Know your School's Policies
• Monitor communcations
• Consider counseling

   With new media going into the hands of our children at younger and  younger ages, many feel the best practice is to teach children at a younger age of what is expected of their use of the device. There are now classes offered at some schools about internet protocol. Hopefully, these senseless acts can stop and children can enjoy their childhoods.