Cyber
Harassment - Kids, Teens and Cyber Bullies
Cyber harassment
of kids and teens is a dangerous phenomenon that has been picking
up momentum recently. Where once parents had to contend with
the horror of finding out that their children were the victims
of schoolyard bullying, now they must still contend with that
horror along with a new kind of activity associated with bullying
on the Internet. This type of harassment
is no less severe simply because it may be just words written
on a computer screen. These hurtful words and degrading images
are damaging to your children’s mental health and must
be stopped before something serious happens.
Your
kids are expected to go to school to get an education and
this should be an enjoyable experience for them, one that
should provide them with the educational and social tools
to last a lifetime. Instead, the
cancerous growth of cyber bullying has created an environment
where children can no longer feel safe.
Even when the old schoolyard bullies were going around terrorizing
their victims, once the kids and teens got home they felt
safe. They did not have to think about the bully until the
next school day. Now we see everything is different. Bullying
via the internet never stops, and it continues
on relentlessly every time your children venture online. Internet
bullying invades the emotional space of your children, it
permeates all their thoughts, and it suffocates them with
anger, a sense of self-worthlessness and fear.
Don't
think that this problem will go away after a brief
wait. Don't think that it is just a phase that kids go through
because the implications are far greater than that. Like many
bullying victims, your children may feel terrified of their
bullies. They are going through what could possibly be the
most horrendous experience of their entire lives, far surpassing
anything they may have to deal with in the future. Cyber
harassment even plays havoc on the lives of adults
who are expected (to a certain extent) to have already developed
good self-esteem. Now compare that to how it feels to a young
person who has yet to develop any sense of self. The implication
here is that young people may not develop good self-esteem
or self-confidence because of such negative experiences
with cyber bullies.
Statistics
prove that in 2009 cyber harassment
is dramatically on the rise, and yet in many
ways it is an invisible crime because the identities of the
bullies may not be known. They could very well be kids from
the same school, or they might be adult bullies persuading
their victims to kill themselves. In many cases, cyber
bullies are not as easily recognizable as the old-fashioned
schoolyard bully where a parent can take the concern to school
and have the principal deal with the whole issue. Worse yet,
cyber
harassment can now be global
in scale, affecting many kids from many different neighbourhoods,
states and far away countries. Studies are now showing us
that this is happening all around the world.
New and
innovative methods of stopping this growing phenomenon are
now available. And as we've seen, without
the proper tools in place it would be difficult to fight back
or prevent tragedies. It is essential for each parent to seek
out expert help to combat this potentially serious problem.
For
more detailed information click
here
now.
Joe Medeiros
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