Cyberbullying Our Way to Hell
A teenage girl gets e-mail from classmates telling her she should just kill herself. She does. A college student is unknowingly filmed during a sexual encounter and his roommate puts the video up on the ‘net. He kills himself. Cyberbullying, it’s not just another buzzword.
Cyberbullying is using information technologies (cell phones, internet) “to send or post text or images intended to hurt or embarrass another person (National Crime Prevention Council).” Taking secret videos of your roommate’s homosexual encounter, posting them on the internet, and tweeting everyone you know—inviting them to watch—pretty much fits this definition. Sadly, the student who did this so humiliated his roommate, that the young man dove off the George Washington Bridge into the murky waters of the Hudson River.
This particular incident brings up two problems, the already mentioned bullying and the stigmatization of homosexuality. Perhaps a video of the young man with a young woman would have also prompted him to take his life, but does anyone believe that?
The schoolyard bully that we all knew and hated has become a monster that can reach into our lives and destroy us in moments, exposing things—not necessarily true—to an international audience. We could rail against parents who have raised children who would do such a thing, and mourn The Golden Rule. What we should do is reform our society into one in which every member treats every other member as they would want someone they loved treated. I am not naïve; I don’t believe this will happen. Naïveté would be believing that respect could be mandated or legislated.
Respect, after all, is the problem. People who don’t respect themselves, can’t respect others. If we respect our fellow citizens, it wouldn’t occur to us to film them during embarrassing moments or goad them into suicide with ugly threats and mean behavior. Respect is not a school subject, and very few schools are equipped to deal with teaching it because it has been so long neglected.
Continued on the next page
Follow Technorati