Bullying & Cyberbullying

[Neuropedia]

I've been thinking alot about bullying...

I was bullied alot when I was a kid because I was bad at gym and awkward and quiet and smart. People would say things to me like "you're ugly and nobody likes you." My friend with cleft palette was called "shovel face". As if she wasn't already traumatized enough about it. Both of us are only now realizing how much being bullied affected us.

As dorky as it is to use the term "cyber bullying", it is something that totally happens today. I'm pretty sure you've seen the stories about it on the news where some poor girl kills her self because some people did something... or spread around some unflattering pictures of her or made a "stephanie is a fat ugly whore" facebook group. A few days ago I was watching the news and it was a girl from nova scotia this time.

Tonight I was listening to cbc radio <insert neuropedia is canadian joke here> and they were talking about workplace bullying which ranged from some guy being killed in russia because he wouldn't give up his company, to a some office bullies who stole chairs and were generally rude. One guy who had his chair stolen sneakily got the bully in trouble with the vice president, and switched his snickery supporters' coffee for decaf. This, in conjunction with somethings I've seen going on lately, has brought up bullying again for me. And I was really hoping I wouldn't have to think about it after highschool.

Anyways so I did a google search for "cyber bulling" and I found this quote/definition:
"Cyberbullying involves the use of information and communication technologies to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behaviour by an individual or group, that is intended to harm others." -Bill Belsey
(cute point of interest, Bill Belsey worked at my first school (where I was being bullied ) and taught me how to use computers and showed us this website his friend made called 'google')



anyways so Ima go ahead and post some discussion questions for ya'll:

What do you think bullying is? what causes a bully to be a bully?
What do you think cyber bullying is? how is it different than bullying in the physical realm?
When does self defence against bullying become bullying? How would this look in the online realm?
How is a dispute different than bullying?
Do you think adults can still be bullies? what causes an adult to be a bully?
Can adults cyberbully other adults?
Would you lose respect for a friend if you found out they were bullying someone, even someone you didn't like?
Have you ever been bullied? how as it affected you?
have you ever been a bully? why?



but really just say what's on you mind, I think this is something that needs to be discussed openly, because I think there's a bit a bully in all of us, and we need to bring this out into the open and make sure we don't let our insecurities and wounds turn us into bullies


"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." - Plato

 

[aerosol]

this is a good topic. a friend of mine was affected by this just recently.

it's such shit. like, come on. is the internet full of 8-year-olds?

 

[Galileo]

What do you think bullying is? what causes a bully to be a bully?

I think a bully is someone who deliberately sets out to harm another person physically, mentally or emotionally. Bullies are anything from nasty kids in the schoolground to partners who abuse their husbands/wives/lovers. there can be all manner of reasons why someone does it, ranging from feeling insecure and weak themselves to peer pressure to enjoyment.

What do you think cyber bullying is? how is it different than bullying in the physical realm?

I think that more people can be involved in cyber-bullying, and in some ways it can be more degrading, since material posted over the internet can be available to a larger group of people. I think it's exactly the same as normal bullying, apart from the fact that physical torment is obviously not possible.

When does self defence against bullying become bullying? How would this look in the online realm?

I think if you set out to emotionally or physically take revenge on someone in a way that could harm them it is bullying. defending yourself in a fight isn't bullying, but actually trying to get your own back when the bully is not expecting it, that's probably bullying...the same is true of teasing the bully in return, if your remarks are designed to be emotionally hurtful.

posting things online, creating a hate group for the bully would be equally as bad....

Do you think adults can still be bullies? what causes an adult to be a bully?
Can adults cyberbully other adults?

absolutely they can. see how many partners bully their husband/wife....
I think cyber bullyijng is mostly a younger generation issue, but it will probably become an issue for older people as the facebook/twitter generation gets older.

Would you lose respect for a friend if you found out they were bullying someone, even someone you didn't like?

absolutely I would. bulllying is a low act, and having gone through it myself, I have no time for that crap.

Have you ever been bullied? how as it affected you?

I was bullied all the way through primary school and my first time at highschool. kids often picked on me because I had a physical disability that was very noticeable. I went to a mainstreem school and had to do things differently. kids don't like different...It makes them think that I'm not the same as they are...

to make matters worse I was different in the sense of liking different music and being interested in politics and things that young people just shouldn't care about. I liked classical music and history...

in highschool I had other problems too, like having to leave home because of my fucked up family, and all that was found out by other kids, and all in all it made highschool an utterly miserable experience for me. community services wouldn't move me from my current highschool even though I was being bullied and constantly reminded of what my family had done to me by nasty teenagers. effectively they told me that bullying was a part of life and I had to deal with it.
I ended up not wanting to attend school at all, truenting and eventually failing, all because I hated being around the other kids. it contributed significantly to my mental health issues when I was 16 and to the suicide attempts I made...

have you ever been a bully? why?

I have tried very hard not to be. but I can't say that I hadn't taken out my rage and depression on other young people at the youth refuge I lived at...
I certainly do not bully now and I hate to see others doing so.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

Being bullied as a child is terrible (I wasn't bullied myself), given that at that
age, all you really have to rely on is your place in school. And if you have no
friends, and also face constant ridicule, well... it can't be all that nice... It
pisses me off that adults allow things to be that way.

Once you're an adult though, I think you should be able to take care of stuff
like that on your own. If people aren't treating you very nicely, then it's up to
you to sort it out.

As with many things, I think bullying tends to be a case of "when you have good
things in your life, the bad things don't matter all that much". If the bullying is
intrusive, then you should be able to get it sorted out from authorities, and if it's
a more passive form of bullying, like a general "no-one likes you" attitude from
some community, then you can simply fall back on the good things you have (like,
support from a good group of friends or whatever).

And, as follows from this, if you don't have something good in your life, then even
passive bullying can take a very hard toll, leading either to total helplessness, or
such a desperation for something good, that you turn to self-destructive means,
e.g. drug abuse or whatever.

We really need to give children more things that they can derive a sense of meaning
from*, since, let's face it, expecting them to get this from their school social setting
doesn't always work...

*and, of course, the reasons for doing this are for more wide-reaching than the
prevention of the negative effects of bullying - it is crucial for the development
of the child as a whole. There is very little real opportunity to attain this sense
of meaning from any productive activity on our society.

 

[Matariki]

Bullying is repeated abuse and harassment (usually mental), cyberbullying is the same. A cyberbully is a troll. Self defense isn't bullying, but bullying is often a learnt behavior. A victim can become an aggressor by taking out their frustration on a smaller individual, or a bigger one if the aggressor is a leader of a gang. Adults can most definitely become bullies, this is often how kids pick up this sort of behavior to begin with, through domestic violence. Yes, I often lose respect and trust with an individual I know who bullies others, but I like to get down to the bottom of their behavior and try to understand it, and seek solutions.

I was a bully victim, mainly because of my Aspergers. I was bullied by both tutors and students alike, these days I have trouble trusting people and I find it difficult to work with any tutor without getting defensive (which is why I didn't go to school during my teens). I wasn't so much of a bully myself, but yes I did get involved in fist fights. Mainly out of self defense, the bully usually threw the first blow. Sometimes they would get bloody. Often my younger brother (who has low functioning autism) was bullied allot, I would step in and defend him by taking the blows. No surprise today that I fight in the ring. I was the school freak, my nickname was dumbo because I was a slow learner. My tutors told me there was no hope for me in the future and they would humiliate me in front of the class. I find it daunting these days to work in a class room environment, which has made going to university difficult.

For anyone that hasn't been bullied, be extremely thankful, bullying cripples lives.

 

[Saram]

It happened to me yesterday on this forum. He soured the milk (the forum) for me a touch for a few minutes. Its not a fair reflection of others here, and yet, temporarily I looked down on the forum, the vessel, for the unwarented animosity. But I chilled out, and sent him a private message, which was actually fairly generous from a karmic point of view. I could have, as you said, turned into a bully, or started a war of semantics, but I'm not into perpetuating destructive behaviour. His action just seemed so silly to me though. The day before I was taking care of a 38 year old woman with a two year old child. The woman was an 'open and close case.'. She was opened up, seen to be full of inoperable cancer and closed. I held hers and her husbands hands as the surgeon told them she had 2 months to live. I held them as they wailed with sorrow. Then I had to induce more pain on her, by sticking her with a thick needle in the hand so I could start a blood transfusion on her. That, and other diverse medical situations are suuch a regular occurance for me. I handle these situations skillfully, and compassionately, then to be bullied on here after that seems SO absurd. Bullies need to watch it, because they often don't really know who is on the receiving end, or what they are capable of with regards to retaliation. They also create bad karma for themselves.

 

[Feelings]

The bullying that I have done in World of Warcraft is so brief and mild that it's hardly worth mentioning except to say that I do have my slip-ups. I know right from wrong and I try to live that way, but I am human and sometimes I go about trying to fulfill my needs in inappropriate ways. In WoW for a few days I did go around killing lower level players. They would log their high level characters and I'd usually be able to kill them too, sometimes 2 at a time Also on the battlegrounds sometimes I would specifically target certain players just because I did not like them for whatever reason (this is where I'm either overpowered equipment wise, or skill wise to even be able to do this). This isn't such a big deal in WoW, because the negative consequence to the other player is basically just a brief annoyance. And this is all considered NOTHING compared to what other players were doing. I guess my motives were that I felt like exerting dominance over other people. I do have that desire, although I keep it suppressed and controlled very very well.

It barely ever happens, but I have had moments where I'm typing something on this forum, and I think to myself "I think I'm bullying this person". This only happens as a reciprocal effect, where I think the other person has done something unfair or malicious towards me. It's never long and drawn out, usually a quip or 2 is all before I regain control of myself. However, if I deem the other person to not be "weaker" than me, then it's not bullying, it is being open about resentment (which I am!).

Yeah I was bullied in high school and I did not like it. It's quite bad for a person's psychology and it takes a long time (like 10 years) to really get over.

I can be quite heartless towards people who I think are deserving of bad things in return for bad things they have done. I have decided upon a 'justice before mercy' philosophy. So I would be thrilled if a friend were bullying such a person. The only way I would lose respect for a friend though, would be if that friend mistreated ME personally. As long as they are a good loyal friend to me, I will likely be able to accept their flaws and vices.

 

[Korg]

I think a bully is someone who deliberately sets out to harm another person physically, mentally or emotionally. Bullies are anything from nasty kids in the schoolground to partners who abuse their husbands/wives/lovers. there can be all manner of reasons why someone does it, ranging from feeling insecure and weak themselves to peer pressure to enjoyment.

I'll echo Galileo as far as the definition goes.

As far as why - well, we're human. Like it or not, our social order is a stratified one and bullying reinforces one's standing relative to others. I think it's more tolerated among kids because they've not yet accrued the life skills or resources to compete in a modern meritocratic system where culturally instilled status symbols are held in higher regard than one's innate ability to exert brute force (physical or otherwise). So in the absence of said symbols, we expect them to revert to lizard brain methods like fists, taunts and the like. Or if they're really young, stealing other kids toys during playtime.

EDIT: to be clear: I am not making a case for bullying or looking at whether it's right or wrong. I'm just offering an explanation for why it exists. Although I do think decrying it as unethical (save for extreme cases) is short sighted as it really just seems to be intrinsic to who we are as a species.

 

[invisible]

i have acted as a bully a few times in isolated sorts of incidents both as a child and as an adult and it was difficult for me to come to terms with it and recognise it for what it was, but also very rewarding. i have also been bullied incessantly throughout my life and it almost destroyed me, still here though! i think people do bullying behaviors ultimately because they feel insecure or unstable about something about themselves or their lives.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

I can be quite heartless towards people who I think are deserving of bad things in return for bad things they have done. I have decided upon a 'justice before mercy' philosophy. So I would be thrilled if a friend were bullying such a person. The only way I would lose respect for a friend though, would be if that friend mistreated ME personally. As long as they are a good loyal friend to me, I will likely be able to accept their flaws and vices.

This MIGHT be justifiable if it is clear through the act of "justice" that
the message being sent is you are being treated this way due to the
way that you treat others, and hence acts as a counterforce for their
behaviour, both in themselves and its general manifestation.

However if it's just a case of "I don't like this person, they're a dick, so
let's be a dick to them for fun!" then the act is totally unjustifiable.

 

[Feelings]

This MIGHT be justifiable if it is clear through the act of "justice" that
the message being sent is you are being treated this way due to the
way that you treat others, and hence acts as a counterforce for their
behaviour, both in themselves and its general manifestation.

However if it's just a case of "I don't like this person, they're a dick, so
let's be a dick to them for fun!" then the act is totally unjustifiable.

Not as a deterrent, not for personal amusement, and not even for vengeance. For a metaphysical concept of fairness. You get what you give.

 

[not sure]

I agree with most of [MENTION=3230]Galileo[/MENTION]'s post. Yes, I have been bullied successfully by people with power over me. However, I have been resisting bullys since I was five years old when I an upper school girl accused me of stupidity and not knowing my own age. I had switched from public school to private and was placed in the class for four year olds. The intention was to evaluate my performance and then properly place me. Anyway, this upper school girl thought it would be fun to humiliate me. I don't really remember what I said to her but I remember that I was angry and that my tongue let loose. I supposed I must have smoothed her down like water sandpaper on rough wood because years later she still nods to me when she sees me. Ha ha.

 

[Artsu Tharaz]

Not as a deterrent, not for personal amusement, and not even for vengeance. For a metaphysical concept of fairness. You get what you give.

Doing karma's job for it now, are we?

I find it interesting that you see things that way. Is this a common T approach
to morality? (I remember a question in an MBTI test being "Do you value justice
or mercy?" for T vs. F respectively). So you're like... identifying the person with
their actions, and saying that since this person has acted a particular way, they
should in turn have that action done back to them. Treat others as they treat
others, rather than treat others as to better them.

I think, personally, that this approach to morality is deterrent based in a sense,
in that you're putting energy into weakening the side of bad* by doing bad to it,
and thus lessening the ability of such bad to propagate. However, to say that
this is the motive would no doubt be a projection of my way of viewing things,
and perhaps a confusion of intended vs. actual effects.

In your mind, this notion of fairness probably makes total sense in a way that I
simply can't comprehend. Moral differences are quite fascinating.


edit: * though actually, I think a large part of why this approach appeals to T's,
is that it doesn't actually rely all that much on the notions of good and bad

 

[Nixie]

I was often the new kid at school because we moved a lot when I was growing up--akin to an army brat. The best stategy I found was to develop a "I don't start fights" mentality with "but I will finish them" attitude. I had a close friend at one school who was bulied terribly. I think that some of that behavior has to be learned at home. I remember the helpless feeling of watching certain girls making my friend's life terrible. At that age, it is so difficult to deal with and seems to beget more violence or the bullied person become defeated. I got into lots of fights that year because she was my friend and I don't regret that one bit.

 

[the]

IDK why bullying needs to be subcategorized. Being a bully is being a bully, no matter where you are at.

 

[donkeybals]

Well, I've experience bullying and cyber bullying. Well actually only cyber bullying. And only on this infj forum. Cut it out guys..

 

[donkeybals]

Tonight I was listening to cbc radio eh? and they were talking about workplace bullying which ranged from some guy being killed in russia because he wouldn't give up his company, to a some office bullies who stole chairs and were generally rude. One guy who had his chair stolen sneakily got the bully in trouble with the vice president, and switched his snickery supporters' coffee for decaf. This, in conjunction with somethings I've seen going on lately, has brought up bullying again for me. And I was really hoping I wouldn't have to think about it after highschool.

What do you think bullying is? what causes a bully to be a bully?
What do you think cyber bullying is? how is it different than bullying in the physical realm?
When does self defence against bullying become bullying? How would this look in the online realm?
How is a dispute different than bullying?
Do you think adults can still be bullies? what causes an adult to be a bully?
Can adults cyberbully other adults?
Would you lose respect for a friend if you found out they were bullying someone, even someone you didn't like?
Have you ever been bullied? how as it affected you?
have you ever been a bully? why?

1. Bullying -> to make dominate another being, bully does it to feel good about themselves for thez power and control
2. Cyber bullying -> same deal, but less harmful, you can just log off your computer, although things like slandering another person is possible, and is illegal to do
3. Self Defense for bullying -> punch them in the face. In an online realm it looks like this *punches in the face*
4. Self Defense to bullying -> when you punch the bully in the face, he/she falls and you start kicking him/her.
5. Confrontation different from bullying -> intent. Bullying goal is to attack and dominate a person, the intent is a dispute is to solve something
6. For sure!!
7. Yes
8. Only on this forum. I cried last night.
9. Yes. Example. In the game diablo II I was a higher level than a lot of other characters and they had to cross a field to get to a dungeon. I'd attacked this one guy and picked up his gear. Once I picked up all his gear, he kept trying to get to the dungeon but I kept killing him. I did it to piss him off.

 

[Feelings]

9. Yes. Example. In the game diablo II I was a higher level than a lot of other characters and they had to cross a field to get to a dungeon. I'd attacked this one guy and picked up his gear. Once I picked up all his gear, he kept trying to get to the dungeon but I kept killing him. I did it to piss him off.

So that was YOU!!

 

[Jill Hives]

I have been bullied and have been the bully. I do my best to not be the bully anymore. When I was the bully it was in like 6th grade and I felt like it would make me feel better after being harrassed myself to make someone else feel like shit. But it really didn't.

 

[Feelings]

Doing karma's job for it now, are we?

I find it interesting that you see things that way. Is this a common T approach
to morality? (I remember a question in an MBTI test being "Do you value justice
or mercy?" for T vs. F respectively). So you're like... identifying the person with
their actions, and saying that since this person has acted a particular way, they
should in turn have that action done back to them. Treat others as they treat
others, rather than treat others as to better them.

I think, personally, that this approach to morality is deterrent based in a sense,
in that you're putting energy into weakening the side of bad by doing bad to it,
and thus lessening the ability of such bad to propagate. However, to say that
this is the motive would no doubt be a projection of my way of viewing things,
and perhaps a confusion of intended vs. actual effects.

In your mind, this notion of fairness probably makes total sense in a way that I
simply can't comprehend. Moral differences are quite fascinating.

At some point I realized that trying to make the world a better place is like shoveling shit against the tide.