Irish Gov't Seeks To Rein In Cyber Bullying 211
An anonymous reader points out a story on the Irish Times that says "the Irish government is looking for ways to combat 'cyber-bullying' after data indicated that a significant percentage of young children are subjected to this kind of abuse via their mobile phone and popular social network accounts. The industry has been asked to come up with solutions for this problem and a government office is due to publish a guide on the issue in the near future. Surely this is a problem faced by children in all developed countries these days." Add "for the children" to the list of reasons to track the Web-site habits of mobile web users in Ireland.
Re:Just plain bullying (Score:3, Interesting)
I second that bollocks. However, three or four of our bullies were built like Biffa Bacon, one of them used an air-pistol to bushwhack other kids on the way to the sweet shop, and they were the main culprits in a group of 15-20 people. Kids who showed obvious transgender behaviour were basically permenent toast. Geeks frequently got hassled. None of the big kids who *weren't* bullies got picked on.
This is a *basic* problem. In adult life, sociopaths end up running countries, religions, and/or large amoral corporations. I'm guessing but willing to bet that a significant percentage of school bullies are sociopaths. Until we can reliably diagnose this and correct the tendency, we will continue to have a problem. Half-assed attempts to monitor and censor the web in a supposed attempt to combat this are just equal epic fail.
I think the previous one is backward (Score:3, Interesting)
Most people bend the wrist inward; that's wrong, you should bend the wrist so it is pushed outward.
It's been so long since I've done the report, that I think I wrote it backward in the example above, most people bend their wrist forward which pushes the vein inside and makes the suicide attempt less likely to be effective, you're supposed to bend your hand so the hand leans down so the wrist is bent inward, allowing better access to the veins to be cut.
I mean, I wouldn't want someone trying to commit suicide to use the original example wrong, have it fail to work and then sue me for giving them bad advice! :)
Re:Learn a lesson from America (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree. I was bullied a lot during school and it stopped when I actually threw the guy on the teachers desk. Sure, during the next break I got some but the fact that I didn't run away actually did the rest. Never had a problem again.
Bullying is just to easy. The consequences are minor and the work involved is negligible. Since you can't do anything about the work it takes, change something about the consequences.
What I never understood was that often teachers took the side of the bully. I always assumed that probably the parents of those kids weren't much better and the teachers were just afraid.
I, for one, will teach my kids that when someone tries to bully them they have to retaliate decisively, brutally and make sure everyone knows that crossing them means physical damage.
School is like the world during the cold war. You need to demonstrate your power just enough so you never have to actually use it.
Are there no harassment laws existing? (Score:3, Interesting)
The article mentioned how someone bullying someone else by causing their phone to ring "all hours of the day and night."
We have laws in the U.S., at least, that make it illegal to harass someone without a legitimate purpose of communication, by either excessively calling them or otherwise disturbing them for the purpose of making them upset. If they have this, then the victim of someone being called at all hours already has legal protections to stop this sort of thing if it's occurring, and no new laws are needed. If they don't, then perhaps this is what should have been done.
In fact, I like the way they're written here. If you call me, and use foul language to insult me, I can have you arrested for harassing me. On the other hand, if you call me, and irritate me so badly that I curse you out and insult you with the most degrading and harshest profanity I can think of, you can't do anything to me. Which makes sense: I didn't call you, you called me; if you disturb me, then you have to put up with my response to you. If you hadn't called me and bugged me, you would never have gotten the insult in the first place.
These are just attempts to grease the skids for more draconian restrictions on the Internet, using the boiling frog analogy. You can't drop a frog in boiling water, he'll jump out, but gradually increase the temperature and he'll sit there and allow himself to be boiled to death, or so the analogy goes. Make a huge grab for people's rights and they will squawk; nibble away in little pieces and they'll never notice until they're all gone, and by then it's too late, unless the "canary in the coal mine" starts screaming Chicken Little style at the beginning and refuses to allow even the first bite. (Talk about mixed metaphors!)
Re:Learn a lesson from America (Score:1, Interesting)
Wow, what a terribly bad idea.
Most kids get bullied because they're weaker than the bully else the bully wouldn't usually have the balls to bully them in the first place.
Your plan sounds like a sure fire way to get weaker kids starting a fight they can't win and getting even more seriously beat up or in the absolute minority cases where the bully is weaker than the person he's bullying claiming that it's him that's the victim and the real victim getting in trouble for it.
This absolutely wouldn't work unless the person dealing the punishment was someone in a position where they clearly could give the bully a response they deserve like a teacher. Even then this does nothing to ensure the teacher is giving the right kids their punishment and opens the door for adults that just like beating kids for the sake of it to get away with it. Whilst bullying wasn't an issue I can think of numerous occasions where at school I got blamed for someone else pratting about or view versa because the teacher didn't really realise what was going on.
Bullies are all to often popular kids too so it's not like you can even rely on consensus amongst students.
Of course, when the kids really do snap because of bullies, i.e. Columbine and Virginia tech. they're suddenly referred to as phsycopaths too. Whilst I don't suggest the victims of these tragedies deserved to die I do think perhaps one of the better ways of dealing with bullies is not to call these kids crazy phsycopaths but to call them what they were- normal kids that'd just been pushed that step too far. Calling them psycopaths means other kids will think "Oh they were just a bunch of fringe nutcases, that'll never happen here", call them what they were and kids might think "Hmm, I really don't wanna bully this kid to the point where he comes in and guns me and all my friends down".
It's a problem that's larger than just school though, I recall a recent BBC article that suggesed 1 in 4 people in the UK have been victim to workplace bullying, and I'm not convinced that bringing kids up to deck their boss is necessarily the best idea here either. In my experience bullies get their just desserts in the end either way, a kid that bullied me in school (albeit mildly, nothing I ever gave much of a damn about but enough for me to hate him) is now in prison for robbery. An old boss who refused me leave once or twice when he was in a mood and told me "You're never getting a promotion or any training whilst you're under me" just because he was a dick is stuck in the same old job where he's been turned down for promotions that have been handed to outsiders 3 times now whilst I've moved on elsewhere and am getting paid more but still see him regularly enough to be able to rub that fact in his face.
Finally, some people are lifes natural victims, I think we could do as well to teach these people a bit about bucking up their attitude, appearance or whatever to get themselves out of this rut than deal with the people bullying them because people like this will only go on to be bullied by the next if you deal with the current.
Re:Just plain bullying (Score:5, Interesting)
if you cant learn to stick up for yourself as you are growing up god forbid when it comes time to step into the real deal where people are cut-throat just put a nicer face on it.
Let's have a Skinnerian look on this: rewarded behavior is repeated, punished behavior is not. Behavior that elicits no response, either good or bad, is not repeated, but that's learned slower.
To make bullying stop, you either have to not respond at all, or to punish the bullies. How could you punish them? Beat them up? I've done that a few times, doesn't work; plus, you get punished for it when people tell on you. Call them names? They don't care. Break their stuff? They'll enact their revenge. They're always better armed than you, because there are more of them. When ever you try standing up for yourself, they tread on you some more, and the "justice" system treads on you as well.
Then you can do nothing. That makes you an easy target, and it means you effectively don't mind them calling you names, punching your lunch out of your hands and onto the floor, breaking your stuff and being violent towards you.
You're saying that people should either fight an unwinnable war, or let themselves be conquered without offering any resistance. Right?
Ironic you've posted anonymously (Score:3, Interesting)
It's ironic the person who says bullying doesn't exist and you should learn to deal with it hasn't got the courage to post with even a slashdot identity, but as anonymous coward.
Suggests they are too scared to stand by their posting, are frightened of being bullied?
Re:Learn a lesson from America (Score:3, Interesting)
If you're too weak to even harm the big bully, pick one of the weakest bullies (those that are always around the big bad guy) and beat him. Hard. Bloody. The rest will take the hint that even if they can beat you, it's going to cost them a broken lip at the very least. Then they'll leave you alone.
The great enabler (Score:3, Interesting)
Bullying is bullying, whether it happens by means of computers or not, and it is never a pretty sight. The thing about computers and the internet is that they enable people to have a far longer reach and a greater impact; and it doesn't just enable "the good guys", unfortunately. So when they talk about cyberbullying, it isn't just some lame excuse for imposing new censorship, there is actually a very real problem. In the days before the internet, bullying in the school at least stopped when you got home; but now it is on your telephone and on the internet, and with the use of simple scripts you can make it go on non-stop without any effort at all.
And the other thing about doing things on the internet is that it is more anonymous - it is so much easier to be cruel to a person you don't have to watch, unless, of course, you get a kick out of seeing others in pain, and it is a lot easier to avoid getting caught. At least right up to the point where some kid chooses to end their life, which is a problem on the increase.
I don't think the schools or service providers can do anything about the problem on their own. It is something that requires the whole of the community to work together against it; and that is yet another thing the internet has has an influence on: there isn't a lot of community feeling left. On the up-side, however, the internet could potentially be used to mobilize the community against this kind of thing.
People keep droning on about the nanny state and how everything would be better if the government just stayed out of everything; but how would that be better, when nobody in the community are willing to get off their soft arses and solve the problems? We get a nanny state because we, with our inaction and unwillingness to take part in a community, ask for it. I think it is verging on the contemptible to whine and complain about state interference when people don't even try to do it better themselves.
Re:Learn a lesson from America (Score:2, Interesting)
This is about the kids who do not have it within their power to fend off bullies, and end up being systematically abused for years, or even their entire lifetime.
Your Dad's solution was correct:.confront the bully, preferably in a very public way, and force them to feel what it's like to be humiliated, or at least make them fear that they will face retaliation instead of complacency if they target you.
For most who are bullied, fighting back is not possible because they have never been given the tools necessary to do so. Those tools are knowledge: Knowlege of self-defence, knowledge of "what do to" when you receive a bullying text message.. which again is simply standing up for yourself, right in the bully's face.
Your suggestion that the bullied beat up the bully and "post the video to YouTube".. uhm.. DUH.. that is BECOMING the bully. That doesn't solve the problem.. it makes the bully angry, and makes him want revenge, potentially escalating the violence rather than ending it.
Putting a bully in some kind of painful wristlock in front of a crowd, and warning him that you won't hold back next time, is all you need to do. The level of violence cannot exceed that of defence. It's when that occurs, that the bullied becomes the bully.
The saddest thing of all in relation to bullying, is that almost all of the most serious bullies, at least where I grew up in the U.S., become police officers so that they can bully people as much as they want, and hide behind a badge to do it.
Re:Are there no harassment laws existing? (Score:3, Interesting)
There are real world rules and playground rules. On the playground you should be able to get into fights, even bad fights, without immediately being a criminal. Children have to learn. Bring lawyers into it and you give more power to the bullies because they are the ones who will be actively trying to use and abuse those laws.
I'm not sure I agree with this (Score:1, Interesting)
Parent says:
"
All these stories of geeks being bullied in high school via the internet is rather pathetic.
The idea that someone is traumatized by not being able to visit facebook properly and they get bad texts makes you seem so soft that I don't know when to begin.
Bullying is when you fear for your safety. When the big kid(s) push you against a wall and threaten to beat your sorry ass. Although a soft geek may be loathe to admit it, there's a lot to be said for growing a set of balls and physically confronting someone.
Might as well confront the person sending you bad messages because if they were actually tough kids, they would threaten you with a beat-down to your face.
But I fear most of you are so spineless that you won't even get it. Bullying is something that is as old as man (and even older). Primates establish a pecking order. If you're being picked on, you get in the other person's face, even at the risk of taking a beatdown yourself. Fear is far worse than the reality of getting punched in the face. Although like I said, the idea that someone who is into sending you "bad" messages could deliver a beatdown is pretty small.
Learning self-defense skills is vitally important in this world. Always was, always will be."
I'm not sure I agree with this, although I see the logic.
Re:Just plain bullying (Score:3, Interesting)
You can't teach manners. Manners are something you learn by watching others you respect.
Bullys typically have respect for no one, they are taught out of fear. Teaching one out of fear means they won't learn by typical methods, because they are always being scared of something.
Typically, a bully has a father that's an asshole. Typically. Or no father at all, and a mother who is a whore. Either way, a simple 2X4 upside the bully's head will work wonders. It DID for me in 7th grade.
--Toll_Free
Re:Just plain bullying (Score:3, Interesting)
"rewarded behavior is repeated, punished behavior is not"
Haha, oh how 1950.
You can't really just say that with out following up on what punishment and reward is.
There are people that go into prison many times because that is the reward, to them.
There is another option:
Intelligent resistance. Use your head, use social skills, learn to understand what the real goal is, and when you have won.
There are ways to destroy someone utterly.
Give some false information to the college they hope to get into, plant some weed in their locker and tip off the principle, all kind of things you can do to destroy them. Just be smart about it.