Cyberbullying

Originally posted by Piggle Humsy
Well actually you can, there is the ignore button and it hides everything that person does. I know, I've used it. Even hides PM's.

So there is ways to avoid them in open forums too.

And I agree you shouldn't have to shut everything off and hide away but there are ways to avoid it. You can talk to your friends on msn and block people who aren't friends. You can join other forums where the bullies aren't.

There are always ways around it.

And I am talking about online bullies only, not ones that see you in offline.

You're correct for certain types of social solutions but not all and the most common ones.

Things like Facebook.

Just because you block someone on Facebook does not mean they magically stop bullying you. It just means you cannot see what they are doing and they cannot see what you are doing. But does that stop the bully from continuing to bully you with people who may know you? No. And that has actually happened in real cyberbullying cases that have gone to court.

People like to think, naively, that "online" stuff is not reality. That's not true. There is an abstraction layer between the social interactions, for sure, but that's not going to stop people from feeling things negatively done to them, online: our brains, no matter how rational, are not going to be able to stop that.

These things are social tools and there are social implications from those tools. Bullying can be a result from these tools. Simply using "ignore" or "block" is not enough if you know more than 1 person on all of the internet. Bullying can continue.

Originally posted by Piggle Humsy
Well actually you can, there is the ignore button and it hides everything that person does. I know, I've used it. Even hides PM's.

So there is ways to avoid them in open forums too.

And I agree you shouldn't have to shut everything off and hide away but there are ways to avoid it. You can talk to your friends on msn and block people who aren't friends. You can join other forums where the bullies aren't.

There are always ways around it.

And I am talking about online bullies only, not ones that see you in offline.

Originally posted by Piggle Humsy
Well actually you can, there is the ignore button and it hides everything that person does. I know, I've used it. Even hides PM's.

Socking is accessible, especially now that most socks do not receive bans. I don't think you fully understood what I meant.

So there is ways to avoid them in open forums too.

It's not as effective as, say, an overly specific example such as MSN. Also, finding information online is easy so there are a variety of ways for people to track you and harass/bully you.

And I agree you shouldn't have to shut everything off and hide away but there are ways to avoid it. You can talk to your friends on msn and block people who aren't friends. You can join other forums where the bullies aren't.

I agree mostly, expect I strongly disagree with your last sentence. The point is that you shouldn't have to leave because a bully is harassing and abusing you within an environment you share. As I stated, I think that's a large part of how bullies are successful. It infringes your right to express yourself where you wish to due to abuse.

That's not a way to manage it but rather being forced away from a community you enjoy because someone is being abusive.

There are always ways around it.

I agree but I think you're conflating ways to manage bullying and ways to give into and perpetuate a bully's methods.

And I am talking about online bullies only, not ones that see you in offline.

Likewise.

I normally just feel sorry for the insane life the bully must live with their obsession with following a person. They must truly be ridiculously low in confidence and seriously messed up in the head. Both sides of such a terrible situation need help. The bullied need to realize that life is nothing but a long road of bullying and that taking people's opinions to heart is pointless.