This week we have been looking at
the horrible sides of the internet, we have been discussing cyber harassment and
cyber stalking.
We looked at a report that was
done in 2011 as part of a national stalking campaign. The Electronic
Communication Harassment Observation (ECHO) report defines cyber harassment as:
‘the intimidation, repeated or otherwise, of one individual by another or a
group perpetrated through or utilising electronic means’. The ECHO report
defines cyber stalking as: ‘a course of action that involves more than one
incident perpetrated through, or utilising electronic means, that causes
distress, fear or alarm’.
This is most commonly described
as cyber-bullying and something that is talked about a lot amongst young people
today. And with the help of the masses of social media networking websites such
as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter as well as instant messaging mobile services
such as Blackberry Messenger it seems to be a lot easier for bullying to take
place in the virtual world amongst young people.
However, I think the most
shocking thing I found when looking into this report was that cyber bullying wasn’t
just something that affected teenagers and adolescents. In fact people between
the ages of 30 and 39 had the highest cyber stalking figures. Whereas children
aged 14-19 were the third lowest age category with only 60-69 years and 70-74
years reporting lower figures.
Cyber bullying has been in the
media a lot recently following the tragedy of Amanda Todd, a 15-year-old girl
from Canada who committed suicide after experiencing cyber bullying that
ruined, and ultimately ended, her life. Amanda Todd’s is an extreme case but
unfortunately not an unfamiliar one nowadays. Amanda was a young girl and like
many other young girls wanted to fit in, she made mistakes but was not allowed
to forget hers. She was followed by her online stalker, she moved schools but
the bully was persistent. Amanda uploaded this video on YouTube just weeks
before she was found hanged at her home, she wanted to tell her story but also
to help other kids and other parents who might be going through the same thing.
The Cybersmile Foundation is the
first cyber bullying charity set up in the UK. The Cybersmile Foundation was
set up by a father after his daughter was the victim of cyber bullying, their
aim to educate young people about being safe when being online as well as
campaigning to change legislation of the internet so that cyber bullying will
be treated as a criminal offence.
Cybersmile work with Ever Young,
a pop band from the Sylvia Young Theatre School, who are currently travelling
up and down the UK performing at schools to spread the word about Cybersmile
and raise awareness of cyber bullying to reach out to help victims but also to
discourage bullies.
Bullying is something that will
occur no matter what age you grow up in, however, I do think that with the
excess of technology available to young people today it is a lot easier for
bullying to take place. I also feel like it is a lot easier for the ‘quiet ones’
to have a voice online where they can be anyone they want to be and say
anything they want to say with virtually no witnesses. But with the help of
places like Cybersmile hopefully we can tackle this issue and even reach out to
those who aren’t necessarily our first thoughts when we think of cyber bullying
like those 30-39 year olds from the ECHO report.
All the links I used are listed
below:
·
http://www.beds.ac.uk/research/irac/nccr/echo
·
http://www.beds.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/83109/ECHO_Pilot_Final.pd
·
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/10/16/amanda-todd-youtube-cyberbullying-story-before-suicide-targeted_n_1969308.html
·
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2218532/Amanda-Todd-Anonymous-names-man-drove-teen-kill-spreading-nude-pictures.html
·
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_of_Amanda_Todd
·
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/amanda-todd-suicide-girls-mum-1379909
·
http://www.amandatodd.net/
·
http://www.cybersmile.org/
·
http://www.everyoungmusic.com/#/home
No comments:
Post a Comment