Cyberbullying

In recent times I have read several articles that identified the use of social media for CYBER BULLYING. Cyberbullying is the use of the Internet and related technologies to harm or harass other people, in a deliberate, repeated, and hostile manner.^[1] As it has become more common in society, particularly among young people, legislation and awareness campaigns have arisen to combat it.

A very recent incident involved two teammates playing for the Miami Dolphins in the National Football League (NFL). What was thought of as typical teammate hazing has turned into a teammate leaving the team to seek help for his mental instability and another player being suspended indefinitely. It has been reported that the suspended player used social media and texting to berate and harass his own teammate. A summary of this incident can be can be read on the NFL.COM website.

Other incidents have prompted suicides by the victims of this form of bullying. A recent incident in Lakeland, Florida led to the arrest of two young girls ages 12 and 14 for cyberbullying causing the suicide death of 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick. Details of this case were read on the Time.com website. It seems that the increase use of technology has made it easier for people to attack others because they have KEYBOARD COURAGE. Keyboard Courage is a term I use when people communicate thoughts while behind a keyboard that they normally would not in person. It is not necessarily negative. In some cases a person could demonstrate their affection for another person via email, text, Facebook, Twitter or even a dating site  that they could not say in person. In these bullying cases, people are harassing others 24 hours a day. If you had a bad day at school you could go home and not deal with those harassing kids until the next day or you were free for a weekend before you had to face them again. Today there is no escape when bullies have your email address, Twitter handle, Facebook account or any social media account. They have access to your family, your friends and possibly even your employers.

The next example is an odd one. It is a case in which a young lady from Michigan dressed up as a Boston Marathon runner who survived the terrorist bombing attacks for a halloween costume. The woman posted pics of herself using several different social media outlets for everyone to see. She may have used poor judgment  thinking she had come up with a very creative halloween costume but it inspired a significant amount of backlash. People respond not only with thoughts of disapproval but responses with hatred and threats of violence. Someone had found images on the internet to determine he home address or telephone numbers to continue the threats offline. She did not think she was going to get any responses that she did but they were so bad that her family has also received threats and she has lost her  job. Is this cyberbullying or is this people standing up for what they think is socially acceptable?