Cyber Bullying

[Aaron]

Cyber Bullying is getting worse and worse with the increase of social media platforms. Have you ever been cyber bullied and what would you do if you did?

 

[Demon_skeith]

I've had some people give me trouble over the net, but I just laughed at their attempts and got them banned.

 

[Henrywrites]

Cyber Bullying is getting worse and worse with the increase of social media platforms. Have you ever been cyber bullied and what would you do if you did?

I have been cyber bullied once on WhatsApp, and it was not an easy experience. I felt so bad at that point and wished that the ground would open so that I could sink in. It was not easy recovering, and I don't wish anyone to experience what I went through then.

 

[ZandraJoi]

I think most of us, to some degree, have been bullied & even cyber-bullied. Anytime one is berated, talked down to, treated like crap, that is a form of bullying.
While it hurts, as I’ve gotten older, I’m able to take the step back. Bullies bully to make themselves feel better. They have low self-esteem. While it won’t help the people they have hurt, it helps me at least forgive them more readily. But of course, forgiving does not mean forgetting. They will not be trusted again.

 

[linux.poet]

I don't think I've actually been through that. Cyber bullies and trolls tend to avoid me, because there's nothing for them to really latch onto in my cold and calculated posts. I'm not a very emotional person and can usually sort through people's disguises, so I'm not really a good target for attack.

It's the people who get triggered when people are mean to them, those people get bullied. I lost my faith in humanity a long time ago and I expect people to give me a hard time, that I'm going to have to push through their mental illnesses and uproot spiritual misconceptions to find what good still lurks within. I expect dealing with people to be hard work and not necessarily be pretty all the time. So most people can talk with me, human to human, without me excluding them or writing them off, and I like it that way.

 

[~ True Legend ~]

I think most of us, to some degree, have been bullied & even cyber-bullied. Anytime one is berated, talked down to, treated like crap, that is a form of bullying.
While it hurts, as I’ve gotten older, I’m able to take the step back. Bullies bully to make themselves feel better. They have low self-esteem. While it won’t help the people they have hurt, it helps me at least forgive them more readily. But of course, forgiving does not mean forgetting. They will not be trusted again.

💯 Life is too short to hold a grudge.
Let’s hope the bullies grow up and realise the error of their ways.

 

[Empire]

Nowadays, I feel like people online just want to be able to say the most horrible things with no consequences. So, they act like cyberbullying isn't a big deal even though it is, and they act like it's you're fault for getting upset or offended when it's actually their fault for not having enough empathy and/or social skills to care about other people's feelings.

 

[linux.poet]

Nowadays, I feel like people online just want to be able to say the most horrible things with no consequences.

I think there is a difference between wanting to talk about your life in an unfiltered way and wanting to bully, troll, traumatize, abuse, or harass someone else. The former, I condone and support - if we can't talk about the dark parts of our lives, we're being dishonest, putting on the mask, and we're not really being friends. The latter is unconscionable, and it is something that I will stand and fight against.

Possibly, we talk about horrible things online because we cannot do so in real life, or we feel safer discussing them with our online friends who have gone through similar experiences. However, we must understand that not all relationships need the same things. I don't use profanity with friends who can't take it, for example, and I still have friends like that. I have family members who judge me for my career choices up to the point of reacting violently against them and mentors who condemn my listening to metal.

Part of growing up is understanding what relationships you want and need in your life, and understanding that all relationships have limits in how much they can support you.

So, they act like cyberbullying isn't a big deal even though it is,

It is a big deal when it happens. I have written many posts defending victims from cyberbullies of various kinds. Most of the victims I defended were children.

and they act like it's you're fault for getting upset or offended when it's actually their fault for not having enough empathy and/or social skills to care about other people's feelings.

And I have met people who judge other people for not caring about other people's feelings, the people who get offended by that, and I have found them to be impossible to deal with. They attacked me for not caring enough about their feelings. This was merely because I was telling them truth that they did not wish to hear.

It would be wise to remember that, when the emotions are offended, that is because some belief is introduced by another that the person does not believe and is emotionally unable to process the conflicting beliefs. This shows a weakness in the person who is offended, who needs to process the painful contradictions in their head in order to produce a consistent and coherent belief system. Blaming the person that introduced the belief for their emotional pain is an unproductive response that will keep the person stuck spiritually until they move past it. Beliefs produce emotions - the beliefs are what is important and the emotions are merely the symptoms.

Where bullies, abusers, harassers, and the like do harm is that they misrepresent their own beliefs, deceiving others about their true beliefs. They also degrade the value of other human beings, which is unproductive. A human being who needs to process painful conflicting beliefs is not uniquely broken. We all likely have to do this, as we get conflicting messages about what to believe when we were growing up, so as adults we need to decide what beliefs belong to us. But abusers and harassers attempt to make us feel like fools for needing to go through such a process. They insult us for not being perfect instantaneously. This is reprehensible.

I am sorry for writing a post this long, and I may have read your post wrong, and if so I apologize for that as well, but the point I am trying to make is that you cannot lump together those three ideas (saying horrible things, being a cyberbully and acting like it is no big deal, and having no social skills because you don't care about other people's feelings). At the end of the day, I do care about other people's feelings...sort of. What I really care about is other people's beliefs and what they know, and I don't think that makes me a bully. It just makes me a Vulcan-like autistic wangdoodle badly in need of telepathic powers and pointed ears so that people do not mistake me for the villain.

 

[ZandraJoi]

Nowadays, I feel like people online just want to be able to say the most horrible things with no consequences. So, they act like cyberbullying isn't a big deal even though it is, and they act like it's you're fault for getting upset or offended when it's actually their fault for not having enough empathy and/or social skills to care about other people's feelings.

I agree with you! People are too offended by the slightest thing nowadays.
I know I am more bold writing & being online than I can be in real life due to being an introvert. However, some people take it to an extreme level. They cannot see the consequences of their words behind the screen. Even if they did hurt another, all they have to do is hit Ignore.

 

[Heatman]

Cyber Bullying is getting worse and worse with the increase of social media platforms. Have you ever been cyber bullied and what would you do if you did?

This is actually part of the reason why most people are not boycotting using social media platforms. There's so much bullying and toxicity from users on different platforms. I haven't been bullied but if I was, I will give it back 100x to the silly wacko.

 

[EthanDV]

I've never been bullied online. I can't say the same for my offline experience when I was in college. It's why I wouldn't want to be anywhere near school again.