Cyber-Bullying

   CYBER-BULLYING

     by Leryl Mae de Belen

   As if getting bullied in personal is already bad enough, wait until you hear about Cyber-Bullying.

What is Cyber-Bullying?

Cyber-Bullying is an act in which a person uses technology to mentally harm another individual. It is one of the most common conflict a child, teenager, and even an adult could encounter. Once you become a victim, you know that whatever insult a certain person told you through the internet, can be possibly told to a group of people. In many cases, Cyber-bullying can hardly be stopped at all since it uses the internet, everyone and anyone can do it. There are commonly 5 different types of Cyber-bullying. They are listed and defined below:

1. Masquerading/Impersonation  

A common type of cyber-bullying. It's when someone pretends to be a different person so their identity will be unknown, and then, they start to bully another people by sending mean or false messages online. Of course, when the victim of the cyber-bully receives the message, he/she will be confused to who sent it. That is, however, if the bully chose to create an unknown identity. On the other hand, the bully can also choose to pretend to be someone from the victim's life. Which, can start a conflict between the victim and the impersonated person.

2. Outing

Is the type of cyber-bullying done when an individual shares a specific person's private information (a secret) online or by mobile phone. It can be through messages, videos, or pictures. This is where the bully shares out information about the victim to the public by either accessing the internet or by using mobile phones. Outing is all about sending a person's secret throughout the entire public.

3. Exclusion

When someone is intentionally singled out and excluded from a group, it is a type of cyber-bullying called Exclusion. Exclusion happens mostly almost to everyone because no one can ever know if he/she is singled out from a group if they really haven't known there was even a group in the first place. Once a bully does this to the victim, the bully will now be able to send rude messages and mails online to the group where the victim is excluded. The victim will have no idea of it all since he/she isn't part of the group.

4. Flaming 

Another common type of cyber-bullying. Unlike most of the types where the victim does not fight back or just completely ignores the abuse, in Flaming, the victim fights back, These are online fights/arguments between the victim and the bully. The bully starts the conflict by sending harsh messages or other types of posts to harm the victim. When the victim sees it, the victim will fight by posting back a post about the bully, may their posts be publicly seen. Happens usually on group chats where they both exchange harsh and angry comments.

5. Cyberstalking

Cyberstalking is a type of cyber-bullying that is done whenever someone individually sends out messages, emails, and other forms of posts to another individual privately. Cyberstalking commonly involves hurtful and threatening messages. Especially, messages where the victim is threatened physical harm. To people, it can be something creepy and annoying. What makes it creepy/scary is because in real life, it may result into real physical bullying because the bully can wait for the victim at a random time and place.

While there are only 5 common types of Cyber-bullying, some say that there are actually 8. Those three other types are: 

1. Denigration

Denigration is done mostly when a person sets up websites or creates home pages, profiles, polls, and blogs just to make fun at someone.

2. Trickery

Similar to Outing, only this time, it involves three persons in the conflict. The bully tells someone a secret of his/her targeted victim, and then the person whom is told the information is told (can be threatened) by the bully to spread it to other people. Meaning, the person who is told of the information is tricked by the bully to spread secrets. Which make him/her a victim as well.

3. Harassment

This is also a type of Cyber-bullying where a person repeatedly sends offensive, insulting, or malicious messages online to another person. It also has a similarity, namely Cyberstalking. Like Cyberstalking, the bully monitors the activities of the victim then sends a message to his/her victim possibly regarding to the victim's activities. The most common is sending viruses.

The Cause and Effects of Cyber-Bullying

Like every problem a kid,teenager, and adult has, Cyber-bullying can also result to depression, anxiety, embarrassment, stress, and other emotional stress. It can harm someone mentally and spiritually, and it can persuade a person to commit suicide due to depression the bully has inflicted him/her upon.

Here are examples of the cause and effects of Cyber-bullying:

A. Cause

1. Cyber-bullying can also simply be a victim's way to get back to his/her bully. They take their revenge through the internet so it could also be publicly seen.

2. To be able to get higher on social status(or social standing). People tend to participate in Cyber-bullying so they'd be more popular, and they want to show people who the "boss" is.  They want attention, so they start a conflict.

3. What other reasons causes Cyber-bullying? A person's boredom. Yes, that happens. When a mean person gets bored, he/she pick out another person to make fun of. Bullies make fun of their victims to get a laughter from the crowd.

4. Other people think that a certain person they dislike, needs to be punished by getting bullied. 

5. Some victims are actually bullies. When a bully gets to be too mean, the victims try to change a bully by changing the personality. How? they think that the only way is to be mean to the bully, turn the tables, and make the bully their victim instead. Hoping that the "real" bully would finally change their mean attitude.

B. Effects

1. Victims of Cyber-bullying tends to have low self-esteem. Because some victims won't fight back, they just shy away from the crowd, making them unable to stand out and speak what they want to say.

2. If you are a bully, beware. Being a bully will give you a bad reputation. Walk the hallways, and their first impression of you is that you're a mean person and shouldn't be taken as a good example.

3. Due to depression or embarrassment, some people tend to end their life by committing suicide. 

4. Victims become introverts. Victims will find it harder to communicate with people. Because of being a victim of Cyber-bullying, when they are teased/picked on, they immediately become sad/depressed, and to avoid that, they less communicate with people.

5. Problems in school. Victims will have the urge to skip school to avoid seeing the bullies, or the victim's grades may eventually get lower because they cannot think straight. They get anxiety from their bullies or they think about all the pain and embarrassment they get from the bullies, causing them to have problems with their studies and school activities.

Personal Insight on how to Resolve Cyber-Bullying

So, How can this be avoided,prevented and stopped? If you have ever been a victim of cyber-bullying, it's important that you do not simply care and listen to whatever negative messages they send you. If someone posts something bad about you, may it be in pictures, videos, or messages, don't EVER panic and get hurt. To avoid them posting a lot of mean things about you, block them. Like on Facebook, they won't be able to Cyberstalk you unless they see your posts. Block your bullies on Facebook so they won't know a thing about what you post. Remember: joke's on them, they are portraying themselves to the public as a bad role model. They post something bad about you? What will people think about them?? If there were ever posts, tell your guardians about it. Don't backfire by typing mean messages or posting foul things about them too, because ask yourself: 

What will THAT make of YOU?  You're so much better and smarter than that.

Never let them get under your skin. When you encounter the person who bullied you, simply smile at him/her. They'll be sooo confused why you're smiling despite of all the mean things they posted. They'll be shocked at your reaction, because they are probably expecting you to break down(which they'll laugh at). Yet, you didn't. Plus, you proved yourself a strong and brave person just by doing that. You took their insult like a joke. Don't let them get on your nerves, sweetheart. 

P.S. : Some information here are based on articles of different sites.
Thank you for reading! And remember: Stand your ground, chin up, and stay strong <3

You're not alone.