Is Cyber-Bullying Just as Bad as Face-to-Face?

Cyber-bullying is a form of harassment made using electronic devices and most commonly on social media. It is especially common among teenagers because that is when most people start using social media and going more frequently.

Nearly 43% of children have been bullied online, and 1 in 4 of them have had it happen on multiple occasions. Furthermore, 70% of students report seeing frequent bullying online. 68% of teenagers agree that cyber-bullying is a serious problem that has become more prevalent in recent years, due to the increased usage and importance of social media amongst pre-teens. Inevitably, 81% of young people think bullying online is easier to get away with than bullying face-to-face. This is bad, because it means that the issue cyber-bullying is not being treated with the same level of seriousness as traditional confrontational abuse.

Cyber-bulling can take many forms such as sending unkind messages, threatening emails, stealing a person’s account, pretending to be someone else online to hurt another person, or even taking a picture without the person’s permission and posting it on social media. These all demonstrate the extent of harm that can be caused simply by the click of a button, perhaps making it worse than face-to-face harassment.

You may be thinking about what we can do to stop cyber-bullying, or at least decrease the number of cases. Firstly more children should start talking about it to an adult so that the victim knows that it is not their fault and that they have done nothing wrong. However, initially, they should confront the bully and tell them to stop. Then the victim should take further action if the bullying continues.

To conclude, I believe that face-to face bullying is detrimental, but not as bad as cyber-bullying. When it comes to cyber-bullying, it is more discreet and the bully can do more harm online than face-to-face. So if you do know anyone who is a victim of bullying, ask them if they want to talk about it and try to help them. If you are a victim of bullying yourself, are you sorting it out? What can you do to prevent it from happening again?

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