Cyberbullying, How Can We Cope With This Problem
“Bullying is when someone laughs at me and doesn’t want to play with me”.
“Bullying is when you’re discriminated against because you come from another country and no one wants to play with you because of that”.
“Bullying is when someone tells you that you are disabled; when someone punches you and when another person laughs at you; when nobody gives you an apology and after that you feel bad”.
These were the answers I received from my nephew and niece, ten and six years old kids, when I asked them what was bullying for them; two kids who have lived in flesh and bone what it means to be bullied by being different or just for the sake of being. Like them, there are many children and teenagers who have had to face difficult and sometimes violent situations which have affected them day by day, and they haven’t had the tools to cope with these problematic situations increasingly unbearable.
When I asked my ten-year-old nephew (who in his short age has experienced big life-changing events like moving to another country and starting a new school in a new culture), how he felt with bullying and the hurting words from others; his answer was: “sometimes, they make you feel worthless”. That was heart-breaking and made me feel powerless in front of a monster who gets bigger day by day, even more in this digital age, with an increase in the use of technology which is proportional to the level of cyberbullying in schools.
Anonymity, virality and identity supplantation are part of the mechanisms that are linked to technology, and this makes more complicated for us to cope with bullying, as this is a kind of violence that is difficult to perceive. In the last two years, in Chile, lawsuits on cyberbullying have been increasing up to 56%, and as long as the use of internet and digital devices increases, this figure increases as well, hardening for parents and grown-ups to protect children from the numberless threats present on the Web.
I wanted to delve into the topic, so I asked my nephew and niece if they knew the difference between bullying and cyberbullying; their answer was striking: “It is the same, the only difference is that cyberbullying is on Internet”. For them it is pretty obvious that the consequences of physical and verbal abuse are not minimized by the existence of a screen between the bully and the victim. We are talking about the same monster, just that in this case in a larger and more massive scale, and which it comes with the feature that represents one of the biggest risks of Internet: anonymity.
In this case, the best defence against cyberbullying is prevention, and it is ideal that parents and teachers play an active role in the process, supervising and participating in the digital activities of children. In addition, they must be mindful of generating learning spaces where children can understand that communicating in the digital world is as important as when they do it in the physical world; using security software to block inappropriate online content; as well as highlighting the good use of social media and taking advantage of the functions and tools that these services provide for acting against a situation of abuse. Among these tools we can include the denouncing channels and security centres of several social media like Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, TikTok, as well as the Facebook bullying prevention centre.
Be aware that these tools exist and using them can make a difference in the battle against bullying, which in the worst cases could drive someone to commit suicide. Likewise, it is important to be informed and conscious about the official denouncing channels and laws that exist to protect and prevent cyberbullying in your community.
