Cyberbullying 2: The Return

[Thasifrew]

Facebook tragedy

Synopsis: 13-year old girl kills herself because a Facebook boy pretended to like her for awhile, but didn't really like her.

Tragic, yet profoundly stupid.

a) Facebook: worthless socialite crap.
b) Child on Facebook: purposeless and dangerous.
c) Adults mingling with children on Facebook: um, disturbed? One order for cinderblock to the head, please.
d) Child refusing to log off Facebook: how stupid can a person be?
e) Killing herself because Facebook meanies (see comment "a") said bad things about her: words cannot express my contempt.

I want to feel sympathy. Even pity would be appropriate. But I just can't. The gleeful cruelty of teenagers is so well documented that this event is downright mundane. A group of kids made someone feel bad enough to kill herself? Shocking.

[Rijiny]

I think you missed the part where they said it was the other girl's PARENTS who did all of this. I think its absolutely horrible what they did to that girl, and if you think that words don't hurt you're very wrong. Especially for a young girl who has low self-esteem and a history of depression.

I know how this is first hand because my 14 year old neice tried to kill herself last week over an argument with her boyfriend. Girls are emotional enough without problems like being overweight to add on to it, and that particular age only compounds the problem because the hormones make it that much worse.

You would be surprised how hard it is to be a teenage girl.

[Aristotle]

Originally posted by reysan

I want to feel sympathy. Even pity would be appropriate. But I just can't. The gleeful cruelty of teenagers is so well documented that this event is downright mundane. A group of kids made someone feel bad enough to kill herself? Shocking.

Don't apply an adult standard of behavior to a child.

Children are not developed mentally, physically, or emotionally. There are actually parts of their brain that have not finished their development.

That is why children are prone so such horrible reactions to cyberbullying (among other things).

That is why this is indeed a terrible tragedy and it cannot just be tossed aside with a "stupid emo kid" excuse.

[Pyrosama]

Originally posted by reysan
Facebook tragedy


I want to feel sympathy. Even pity would be appropriate. But I just can't. The gleeful cruelty of teenagers is so well documented that this event is downright mundane. A group of kids made someone feel bad enough to kill herself? Shocking.

What pains me is that if every adult had the passion to protect all children like we feel the need to protect animals in this world, we'd have a lot more of us doing our duties and coming together as the "village" to try and change the brutality that seems to have taken off as mainstream social corralling and bullying of the unfit.

How do you grow compassion and sensitivity in your own children when we as a society put innocent animals before children?

Think about it. If this were a story about a group of people caught beheading an adorable puppy dog and setting it on fire for entertainment...there would be public outrage. But, because it was a troubled and depressed child...just another emo incident...people need not be shocked over it?

I'm afraid for all of humanity NOT when I hear of such news, but when I hear of such insolence over it.

[Thierran]

Just a point but the incident happened through MySpace and not Facebook. I have a 14 year old sister, she is what I guess people would call an 'emo-kid' through her dress and music tastes. She had a MySpace account before the 'legal' age and it did worry me, but after much arguing and screaming she gave in and deleted it. I introduced her to Facebook as I am happy with the setup and restrictions placed on profile and picture viewing.

The internet is just another medium for kids to bully, I remember not long ago it was the use of video phone to record kids being smacked around in the playground and before that there has always been, and will always be, the verbal taunts and degradation favored by bullies all over the world. It's not a problem because of the internet - it's a problem because of society and the people in it. No doubt the children of the parent-bullies have bullied, and will continue to bully in the future and thus create a whole new generation of bullies.

[Thasifrew]

My cynicism has offended some, and I can live with that because I'm a jaded adult. Do something about it: prevent children from being on the 'net. It is acknowledged that children do not think as adults; why then are we allowing them into an adult playground? If adolescent girls are susceptible to harm by words, why allow them to be barraged by venomous messages? We would not let a teenage girl hang around a hooker bar; we would not give a teenage boy a loaded handgun and tell him to play with his buddies in the woods. The 'net, and social sites in particular, are no less dangerous. This girl was driven to suicide; if she hadn't been, the week after she would have been lured away by a sexual predator. It will happen again. Keep me from sneering at a child's corpse by keeping the children close to you Off The Internet. It's a killer.

And for the record, I like animals even less than I like children. Keep puppies off the 'net, too.

[Graeblyn]

Originally posted by Pyrosama
What pains me is that if every adult had the passion to protect all children like we feel the need to protect animals in this world, we'd have a lot more of us doing our duties and coming together as the "village" to try and change the brutality that seems to have taken off as mainstream social corralling and bullying of the unfit.

How do you grow compassion and sensitivity in your own children when we as a society put innocent animals before children?

Think about it. If this were a story about a group of people caught beheading an adorable puppy dog and setting it on fire for entertainment...there would be public outrage. But, because it was a troubled and depressed child...just another emo incident...people need not be shocked over it?

I'm afraid for all of humanity NOT when I hear of such news, but when I hear of such insolence over it.

Now, I am not an animal activist, or even a vegetarian, but the above argument is a bit.... umm... wrong is the only word I can think of to describe it.

People do not hunt millions of children down and kill them for sport. Even if you want to throw in abortion to argue this point, these animals aren't even killed primarily for any other reason then the killer enjoys it. We would be appalled if children were killed, or even abortions performed for this reason.

Many animals are raised to be killed for their pelts. Do you see a huge number of women walking around with human skin jackets?

Animals may live their entire lives in tiny wire cages with no amusement and only water and the same meal every day. Would we really tolerate this for children?

The main reason, I imagine, people are not as shocked by this story as we otherwise would be is that parents regularly leave the responsibility for spending time with their children up to computers, game consoles, and television. For some reason, people can't seem to get it through their junk food addled heads that they need to actually pay attention to their children. Frankly I don't understand why people have kids if they are going to spend the next 18 to 20 years just ignoring them, but then, I have to admit I have no kids of my own. Perhaps if I did, I too would just park them in front of an electronic box for a couple decades and expect everything to turn out all right.

[Rosuav]

Originally posted by Graeblyn

Animals may live their entire lives in tiny wire cages with no amusement and only water and the same meal every day. Would we really tolerate this for children?

No, we wait until they grow up, and then put them in office cubicles.

Originally posted by reysan
Do something about it: prevent children from being on the 'net.

And for the record, I like animals even less than I like children. Keep puppies off the 'net, too.

In our house, all our computers are effectively on the 'net (behind a router, of course, so there's a measure of protection, but the world wide web is basically unrestricted). By rule of authority, not technology, children in our family are not permitted to access the internet unwatched, until they have proven their trustworthiness and reliability - it's a privilege granted gradually (eg certain specific tasks can be done unsupervised, before free access is granted).

And I'd keep puppies off the 'net too... but I don't think they need to be KEPT off. They'll stay off by themselves... hmm, someone needs to come up with an updated version of this list...

[Katidyd]

Will the adults be liable for her suicide?

[Rijiny]

No, they said something about there not being a law that they can pin on them for breaking. I read the full article about what happened exactly and it made me sick to read some of the things that they said to her. Things like "Nobody likes you, have a nice rest of your life, the world would be better off without you." They knew her for years so they KNEW she had a history of depression and stuff, and pretty much half of the neighborhood knew about it. Some mother came clean about it because her daughter felt guilty about knowing about it and actually being a part of it in some way. The parents of the dead girl took the ski ball set that the people responsible had given them, smashed it up and put it on their yard with a sign that said merry christmas on it. It was completely nuts but the people come up with excuses trying to clear themselves of it. Horrible how some people can be, I'd have done much worse than smash up a skiball table if someone did that to one of my kids