Rewrite: The Digital Side of Bullying

                New media outlets have opened the floodgates of younger generations to broadcast themselves and their talents across the world with a click of a button. Websites like Youtube and Facebook offer a prototypical platform for these children to post anything bad or good. The bad drama created on theses sites is known as, “cyber-bullying.” In the case of Megan Meier, a 14 year old teen, a mother of an ex-friend belittled and bullied her on Facebook, using a fake profile, till she took her own life. These new media outlets for teens offer a great way to stay connected to friends and show the world there talents; however they can be a perfect platform for cyber bullies to perform their brainless acts of belittlement upon others. In reality, no one sets up to be a cyber bully.

                In another case dealing with Facebook, a young girl enrolled at Stonewall Jackson High School in Manassas, VA created the Facebook page called “Stonewall Hoes.” On this page she posted nine pictures of certain girls, also enrolled in the high school, putting slanderous comments describing the pictures of them. When students saw the page it created an outrage among the school. The pictures of the nine girls destroyed each of their reputations among their peers and discriminated each of them. The creator of the Facebook page is being charged with harassment by computer and could face up to a year in prison.

Video of Stonewall Hoes Case

                The case of Megan Meier and the “Stonewall Hoes,” are only a couple examples of cyber-bullying. The platforms of Facebook and Youtube offer plenty of good reasons to use them, but when people take advantage of these sites for the use of cruel acts against someone it goes to far. Megan Meier was a 14 year old teenager with her life ahead of her and when a mother of an ex-friend tries to get in the middle of the situation between the two teens it crosses the line. Danah Boyd states in regard to the mother who created the fake Facebook profile, “Deceiving children is problematic to begin with, but doing so by tapping into their emotional weaknesses is outright deadly.” The mother bullies Megan with insulting comments on Facebook pushing Megan to her death. This example is not only harassment on a computer but assisting in a murder by a mother who should have never used a fake profile to get into her child’s problems. Danah Boyd offers her own opinion on the matter writing, “by choosing to ‘teach her a lesson,’ Lori acted in a manner that was both ethically and morally inappropriate.”  In the “Stonewall Hoes” case the creator did not cause the death of any of the nine girls but, smashed most of the girl’s reputations within the school. Harassment does not stop at “physical harassment,” it now needs to be looked at on a technological level. Both of these examples provide different outcomes that could possibly happen when cyber-bullying affects a person or a group. Cyber-bullying is a new digital crime that can come about on multiple media platforms that needs to be looked at more in-depth due to the effects it can have on people.