In Neil's Blog entry, "Police Using Social Media to Catch Criminal", he wrote about how police can catch criminal by tracking them on social media area like Facebook and Twitter. This brought memories of the many "not smart" people who published videos of them beating up other people or doing very cruel things to others. Not very long ago some young people filmed themselves throwing things at a homeless man and calling him names. This happened in Alaska and the police caught them because they posted it online.
Thanks for bringing awareness to this Neil.
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Why Cyberbullying?
I've never blogged, prior to this, but I have used social media in the form of Facebook, research, and dating. One of the things that I love most about Facebook is that I can communicate with my classmates from the American Embassy School, where I graduated from High School in 1979. If I would have thought about the odds of getting in touch with so many classmates of a school that had 38 different nationalities 10 years ago, I would have said that chances were not good. I have had a Myspace page and had much more success with Facebook, as far as communicating with friends. That is the upside of social media in my life.
I did a lot of research for this assignment and found the abusive nature of cyberbullying very disturbing, which I believe is a direct result of the addictive nature of over-use of the Internet. Young people communicate with their friends and classmates, and this can be innocent. Adding that they open themselves up to the cyber world, where people can pretend to be other people or where young people have found another way of bullying, is a recipe for disaster. If, as an adult, I would have been bullied on Facebook I would simply block the person bullying me. However, it would still be hurtful. When I was in Junior High I remember being bullied by this girl that I didn’t even know. She did awful things to me—threw drinks in my face, pulled my very long hair, and called me names. It wasn’t until we matched up for a game of “fisty cuffs” that the abuse ended. I had enough of the abuse and decided to fight back. I wouldn’t recommend that to anyone. However, I can imagine what it might have been like if she would have had access to me via the Internet. The Internet and social media is very powerful weapon, in my opinion.
My heart sincerely goes out to the young people that are being victimized by cyberbullying. I recently watched a movie about a girl that was a victim of cyberbullying. Her best friend had created a fake boy, in order to pursuade her friend from liking another boy. The victim was so obsessed with reading the terrible things that were written about her (terrible things) that she got on the Web anyway she could. Her mother had banned her from using her computer at home. The girl tried to commit suicide but her attempt failed. It took a long time for her to recover from the incident but she did, including bring attention to cyberbullying.
The primary reason I started writing about cyberbullying is because of a recent event in which a young 15 year old girl, Audrie Pott, committed suicide due to cyberbullying. She was sexually assaulted by some boys who claimed to be her friends, while she was passed out at a party. It wasn’t until pictures of the assault showed up on various social media location that she actually knew what had happened. Not only was she raped but she was victimized, beyond comprehension. Students had used cell phones to share photos of the attack, which were horrific. This story broke my heart. After all the research I did, I found many other stories of teen suicides related to cyberbullying. Some of their names and photos are listed below.
Audrie Potts
Rehtoeh Parsons
Ryan Halligan
Giovanna Plowman
Amanda Todd
Megan Meier
Sadly, there are many more like these beautiful children.
More information to share:
- Alaska has a cyberbully law
- Alaska does not have an electronic harassment law or a school sanction law.
- http://www.stopbullying.gov/laws/alaska.html
Gaming and Watching TV
Johnson, S. (2001). Games. In S. Cohen, 50 Essays
(pp. 196-202). Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's.
Winn, M. (2011). Television: The Plug-In Drug. In S.
Cohen, 50 Essays (pp. 438-447). Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's.
In Steven Johnson’s essay, he takes
a controversial approach of describing the effects of video games and reading
in children. He states that children
should read more because reading expands the minds of children. He goes on to say that everyone should spend
time playing games or partake in other social media. The reason for the dull approval is that he
claims that reading improved cognitive skills and that playing videos improves
visual intelligence and manual dexterity.
Johnson is presenting an argument:
Reading and playing games increases mental capacity.
There are
negatives and positives of both positions.
I believe that children are spending entirely too much time on the
Internet and playing games. Reading is a
requirement in college and there is a lot of it. If children do not read and chose to play
games instead, that part of the brain that is used won’t be worked. This will cause actual reading to be
difficult.
Another
social media issue is that people are watching far too much television. In Marie Winn’s essay she addresses the
earlier studies and the problems associated with television today. In the 1949 there was a study done and stated
that “television will be an asset in every home where there are children.” They predicted that television would change
children’s habits.
This is
exactly what happened. Winn discusses
further there are multiple televisions in just about every household and this has
pulled families apart. In today’s family
units dad is probably watching football, mom is watching a cooking show, and
the kids are playing games. Winn goes on
to day the television, a form of social media, has become an addiction. She states that it is very similar to alcohol
and drug addictions. She offers a sound
argument that families spend less time together at due to watching television.
Both essays discuss addiction issues. I have
also surmised that technology (social media) has become today’s “babysitter”
and, unless the adults make changes to bring the families together, the
distance between teens and family with only grow.
Internet Addiction
Safetyweb.com. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.safetyweb.com/internet-addiction
This website is dedicated to
Internet safety and geared towards young people. In the web article, “Teen Internet Addiction”,
Internet addiction is defined and Internet addiction statistics are provided.
Internet
addiction is not unlike other additions—it is a basic loss of control that can
affect one’s life. Addictions cover other
aspects of one’s life like mental illnesses, abuse, and loss. Addictions are a “mask”. Statistically young people are more apt to
become addicted to the Internet but adults can also suffer from this. The web article claims that the abuse of the
Internet, in terms of addiction, that it adds to issues associated with bipolar
disorder, schizophrenia, and borderline personality disorders. This is according to the American Psychiatric
Association. Although, as the writer of
this blog, I cannot agree with APA position because they have an agenda of
pushing meds of young people, no matter what the stakes! I can only quote what the article
quoted.
What this
article also covers is the harmful effects of Internet addiction. One problems is the amount of time that is
spent online. It is reported that young
people can spend up to 80 hours online, gaming, and that some report spending
up to 50 hours a week on Facebook or other social media websites. This is not only dangerous, in the world of
victim v. bully, but it is unhealthy. It
can hurt grades, personal relationships, and future social skills. There are many problems with Internet
addition because young people should be engaging in other activities for
sports, reading, and hanging out with their friends.
The best way to help a child with Internet addiction is step away from the Internet yourself. Find other activities that the family can do together, maybe outside. Also, set time limits for the child to be on the Interenet. Again, as suggested by most sites that I have found--be aware of what your child is doing online and monitor how much time is being spent with social media. You might be surprised to find out that there is too much time be spent outside the family.
Self-diagnostic test (or you can take on behalf of your child / teen)http://www.warningsigns.info/computer_addiction.htm
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