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Megan Meier, Phoebe Prince, and, most recently, Rebecca Sedwick. Three tragic victims of suicide due to traditional – and cyberbullying.
When I started this three part series, I knew that bullying, and its online component, were two of the most pressing issues facing our nation’s youth. But I never could’ve imagined how topical the issue would become.
That last young woman, Rebecca Sedwick, jumped to her death in Florida last month after two classmates spent over a year “maliciously harassing” the 12-year old girl online, according to Sheriff Grady Judd as quoted by NBC . The two alleged bullies began harassing Sedwick after one of them began dating Sedwick’s former boyfriend, John Borgen, according to ABC. The news source quotes posts by the accused bullies telling Sedwick to “kill herself,” which she eventually, tragically did.
And what makes this story even more heartbreaking is that this is nothing new; many adolescents, including the two others mentioned above, have taken their own lives following traditional and cyberbullying, and, as of yet, little can be or has been done to stop it.
According to the Metrowest Adolescent Youth Health Survey (mentioned in Parts One and Two), cyber bullying is on the rise, and, in my area, is higher than average.
A lot has been said about cyber-bullying; its causes, its problems, its effects, and its startling increase in the United States ever since websites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Tumblr, and the rest came online from the millennium until now. One major topic of discussion is why cyberbullying seems so much more volatile than traditional bullying.
Of course, bullying in any form is harmful and unacceptable, but it seems that cyberbullying is all the more terrible. Some argue that this is because of social media’s immediacy. Behind a screen, above a keyboard, it is certainly easy to type one’s feelings in a rage without thinking of one’s words’ implications.
While this is certainly important, I feel that cyberbullying’s main evils arise from its inescapability. Traditional bullying tends to happen in school, or on the bus, or in other common areas. It’s awful, it’s harmful, but it’s limited to those places; it’s escapable. You can go to another area. You can go home. If worse comes to worst, you can switch schools.
But cyberbullying can happen anywhere at any time to anyone a bully wants to target.
So much of our teenage lives are online that logging off permanently or deleting an account is usually not an option.
So the question turns to: how can we stop this? Increasingly, schools are taking it upon themselves to turn the tide of cyberbullying. According to a very recent New York Times article on the issue, some schools use services that “filter and glean what students do on school [computer] networks.”
“A few [other companies],” says the Article by Somini Sengupta, “now offer automated tools to comb through off-campus postings for signs of danger.” The article goes on to mention the case of Rebecca Sedwick, brought up earlier, and her alleged tormenters. Citing the volatile posts made by the alleged bullies following Sedwick’s death, the article says “educators find themselves needing to balance students’ free speech rights into the dangers … of what they say in posts on Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr.”
And these educators and, more widely, the court system, have mixed views on the subject. What’s most debated is whether the information garnered by this monitoring can be used to punish a student. Some verdicts say that the information gained by surveillance falls within the school’s purview when it comes to preventing cyberbullying. Others say it goes against a student’s constitutional right to free speech.
No matter what view you or the courts have on the subject, according to the Times article, the technology is expanding. But is that right?
A private school chief from Phillips Academy in Massachusetts is quoted as saying “‘The safety and well-being of our students is our top priority, but we also need for them to have the time and space to grow without feeling like we are watching their every move.’” This happy medium sentiment is echoed by many;, students, teachers, parents, and administrators alike.
So, what of cyberbullying? It is harmful, it is increasing, and it is a tough issue to escape. Not only are the bullies ever-present online, but attempts to curb it result in very valid questions about the nature of privacy. In any case, and as I often say at the end of these blogs, the change rests with you. If you see cyberbullying, don’t be a passive bystander. Tell your parents or a trusted adult at your school. Who knows? It may help prevent another tragic, needless death like the ones that have become, horribly, all too common for our teenagers.
The post The Bully Pulpit, Part Three: CyberBullying appeared first on TeenLife.