People Against Cyber Bullying And Harassment

Missouri

The suicide of a 13-year old girl Megan Meier who was the victim of an internet hoax greatly raised the awareness of cyber bullying and its consequences in the state of Missouri. Governor Matt Blunt went so far as to create a task force whose sole purpose was to study and create laws regarding cyber bullying.

As a result the Internet Harassment Task Force now stands as a shining example for other states around the country. Missouri has also toughened their laws on the matter, upgrading cyber-harassment from a misdemeanor to a Class D felony.

Physical, Threatening, and Cyber-bullying.

Name-calling and teasing “In many classrooms teasing and name-calling are the most common forms of bullying. Unfortunately, because they don’t leave scratches or bruises and often happen when there are no adults around, they can go unnoticed by parents or teachers.” This comes from the source above, The Canadian Safe School Network. Likewise, people can hurt us physically and that is more noticeable by others and can be stopped. Verbal bullying is harder to identify, but should be looked out for.

Exclusion is another form of bullying. In an elementary school setting it could be as simple as not letting someone play with you at recess. In a high school type setting, exclusion occurs when people do not include others. This is fairly easy to recognize and one of the easier ones to fix.

Physical bullying is one of the easier ones to handle. Some kids in a high school may not know how to handle an uprising problem with knowledge. There solution is kicking and punching. Sometimes kids feel like they need to dominate others through hurting them, which is never okay. Teaching kids the proper way to deal with situations is a good way to stop this kind of bullying.

Threatening is very scary because you never know if they bully will carry out the threat. It makes people feel uncomfortable and alone.

Cyber-bullying is one of the worst kinds. It leaves permanent records of abuse on the internet for everyone to see throughout the world. This is made worse by the fact that most bullies tend to be more mean when they aren’t face to face with the person they are bullying.

These are all types of bullying that you may not have recognized. I hope we can all stray away from these types of abuse.

Unfortunately, recent bullying statistics show that bullying is on the rise among young adults, teens and children. The rise in these bullying statistics is likely due to a fairly recent form of bullying seen in recent years called cyber bullying. This type of bullying has gotten immense media attention over the past few years sighting instances of cyber bullying pushed too far, and in many cases leading to cases of teen suicide or death. Many bullying statistics and studies have found that physical assaults have been replaced with constant cyber assaults in the form of bashing, rumors and other hazing content targeted at a single student or group of students.

Bullying statistics:

•About 42 percent of kids have been bullied while online with one in four being verbally attacked more than once.
•About 35 percent of kids have been threatened online.
•About 58 percent of kids and teens have reported that something mean has been said about them or to them online.
•Other bullying statistics show that about 77 percent of students have admitted to being the victim of one type of bullying or another.
•The American Justice Department bullying statistics show that one out of ever 4 kids will be bullied sometime throughout their adolescence.
•46 percent of males followed by 26 percent of females have admitted to being victims in physical fights as reported in one report of bullying statistics by the Bureau of Justice School.
Other bullying facts:

•As these bullying statistics indicate, bullying is just getting worse in American schools. Many studies have shown that increasing domestic violence at home are leading to an increase in bullying online and at school.
•Researchers note that one way to help begin to lower these bullying statistics is to tell an adult when it is happening.
•According to the i-Safe American survey of students bullying statistics, about 58 percent of kids admit to never telling an adult when they've been the victim of a bullying attack.
•Another way to stay safe from bullies is to inform the school if the attacks are taking place on school property or have something to do with the school.
•Ignore messages sent by cyber bullies.
Based on the bullying statistics we found, it is clear that cyber bullying is on the rise more so than any other type of bullying. Many students report seeing these types of bullying in chat rooms, social networking websites like MySpace.com and Facebook.com.

There has also been websites dedicated to targeting a student or group of students. Many bullying studies revealed that students who are part of a minority group of students based on their gender, race, socioeconomic status as well as sexual preference are reasons other students use to harass and cyber bully one another. Many of these students are forced to deal with at-school bullying and have it follow them home as they see hurtful comments and rumors being said about them throughout the Internet.

While this isn't always a school-related issue, many schools are cutting down on this type of behavior from occurring at school by limiting computer time and prohibiting many of the social websites used to spread the hurtful information.

Because of the wide-spread amount of bullying it is more important than ever for parents and teachers to check in with children about bullying. Many students might be afraid to tell an adult or parent, which is why parents and teachers need to be aware of the signs of bullying and to pay attention to what is going on with their child or student. Another one of the best ways to handle bullying to help lower these numbers reported in bullying statistics is open communication.

Students and children should be encouraged to tell a trusted adult, parent or teacher about any kind of bullying attack. It is the best way to help stop the situation from getting worse and to help prevent bullying from targeting more and more victims.