Chris Pirillo Talks About Bullying

Chris Pirillo, an internet blogger and you tuber (is that the correct term?) created a vodcast on bullying that was both frank and smartly done. While it was done a while ago, it is still completely relevant. I hope you get something out of it.

Lori Drew Verdict Thrown Out

If you’ve been following the Megan Mier cyberbullying case, then this is big news. Lori Drew, the mother who impersonated a boy interested in Megan online only to bully her because Lori’s daughter didn’t like her. Eventually, Megan committed suicide due to the harassment.

Mrs. Drew was put on trial and convicted of misdemeanors in the case by a jury. But on July 3rd, when most of the country was not paying attention due to the holiday, the judge in the case overturned the conviction, basically letting Mrs. Drew off the hook. Why am I not surprised.

In an article in Wired Online, John C Abell writes that: 

But what if Megan had been taunted in private by a real teen for whom she had some feelings and hoped had for her? Suppose she had been told to her face that the world would be a better place without her, perhaps even to snickering and other body language that would rub salt into the wound? Suppose such an encounter had been witnessed, perpetrated in the schoolyard or lunchroom, escalated for the approval of the crowd who piled on and made the “Carrie“-like humiliation even more palpable?

In neither of these scenarios would a criminal prosecution be viable, it seems to me. Bullying with no physical contact is generally handled by school administrators and parents (when it is at all), not as a criminal matter but in ways that aim to modify the behavior of the tormentor and separate stalker and prey as best as possible.

While I agree in principle with the above argument, at what point do we start to take these bullying incidents more seriously? Just because the past way things were handled was OK, as modern adults I think we should try to enact change to both stop, prevent, and help those who are bullied and are bullies.

Picture courtesy of Wired.com

What Mrs. Drew did was egregious in my opinion. As an adult she should have known better. I can understand the above argument of children on playgrounds and not prosecuting them. But the argument to treat an adult who does this is not the same.

So nothing has changed for now. There is still no legal precedent to prevent cyberbullying and have it viewed as a crime. While Mrs. Drew may be ostracized by her community and the public, no time will be served and no punishment will appear in the legal books. One day, maybe that will change, but for today, it is a lost case.

CBS News Video on Bullying

CBS recently aired a video piece about a new study by doctors. It’s an excellent video that talks about getting more school and parent awareness. One interesting statistic from the study shows that 60% of bullies had one criminal conviction by age 24. More reason to help both the victim and the bully. See the video below. You may have to double click it to see it in YouTube since embedding is turned off:

Another Good Bully Blog

I came across another good bully blog called “PSSST! BULLIES ARE B-O-R-I-N-G!” In the about area, it explains it’s written by a mom of a boy who spoke up about a bully and the school did nothing. Not an uncommon theme in any of these bully story sites. Take a visit to the site. It’s got some good articles and links. The about section says:

I’m the proud mom of a young man who spoke up about the bully who was standing in the way of his getting an education. A wonderful kid, my fifth-grade son attended a well-respected private school in Dallas. And while his classmates were learning reading, math, social studies, science and other academic subjects, my son was struggling daily to manage a bully.

Once my son spoke up, it didn’t take our family long to realize the answer to the problem was to leave the school. The institution had no formal policy surrounding bullying, was unwilling to punish the bully, did not make the bully apologize, and was ultimately unable to curtail the bullying.

As the parents of survivors of bullying will tell you, that is a very typical experience. Schools seldom act effectively to stop bullying. If you think I’m wrong about that, go report the bullying at your school and see what happens. You may be surprised. We were. Never would we have dreamed that the school would value the bully over the student being bullied. This blog is an effort to help educate everyone about bullying, and hopefully make progress to stop it, so that kids who go to school to learn will be able to do so.

Close To Home

I have a very close relationship with my children (although they are not children much anymore). This is important to me to try to maintain and I believe important to them. One of the added benefits to having a good strong relationship with your children is that you get to know their friends. Some of their friends I have known since the day they were born and that gives me a good insight to them.

So, this weekend one of their lifelong friends who I have known since he was born came over. Out of all the years I have known this boy, he is always smiling and positive. He is a good kid, but bookish and shy, who is more comfortable reading a book than interacting with people. I have known quite a few people like this. They are shy and usually quite brilliant when you can talk to them.

Well, when he walked in I could really tell that he was unhappy. He actually seemed angry and withdrawn. It definitely bothered me, because I had never seen him like this. I asked my son what was up and he told me that the boy was being picked on pretty bad at school and that he was pretty down about it.

Feeling Alone

This boy was exhibiting physical aspects to this. He was withdrawn and seemed untrusting of all of us. He certainly wasn’t going to talk to any of us about it. It really worried me. Lately I have seen this from several friends of my sons. Not that surprising, because they are in that age point (10-14) where I recall the worst bullying happens. In the couple of instances where the parents did open up I offered to be a mentor to their child and talk with them about both my experiences and theirs. Both times I received the same reaction from the parents.

‘Oh no…thank you, but he doesn’t want to talk about it.’

Of course that goes against what I think, that he should talk about it and understand he is not alone. That others have gone through and are going through this. That help is around them. But I don’t say anything. How can I? I’m not the parent and they need to decide what’s best. So how do I educate the parent to help their son or daughter? What can I do? I guess that’s the question that I’m asking. Any suggestions from the peanut gallery? The biggest thing to me is that they don’t feel hurt. That they know they are not alone. It’s really hard to watch it happen around you. What can we do to make it better?

Bullying Past to Present

The term bullying and what it means has changed dramatically over the years. Many years ago, the bully would always fight with fists or words and in person. Today, the bully can be anonymous on the computer or calling your cell phone. Hiding and attacking without notice.

It’s pretty scary to not know who is attacking you. How can you fend off the one you don’t know. You go to school or work and everyone is a suspect in your mind. That’s just not fair. I thought this video called “Bullying Then and Now” did a good job showing how much has changed in just a brief amount of time.

Click here to watch the video

The Perceived Threat Syndrome

Lately I have been thinking about an observation I have dealing with people who have a history of being bullied. It’s something that I call “Perceived Threat Syndrome”. My supposition is that people who have a history of being bullied react as if they have been threatened when the other person dealing with them didn’t do anything to cause that reaction.

For example, someone might be making a suggestion to this person and the person sees the suggestion as a threat to them, instead of the intended suggestion. That person lashes out accusingly to the other person as if being cornered by a bully. Has this happened to you? Or are you someone with a history of being bullied who has people tell them that they perceived a comment as a threat when it wasn’t? It seems like I have witnessed this by many people who I know were picked on in their youth.

Given my interest in the long-term effects of bullying, I am interested in your opinion on this. Do you believe that someone who is bullied deals with fight or flight issues as an adult? This perception of being threatened and not trusting those around them is one I am interested in looking into further. I wonder if there is a correlation between those that were bullied in their youth and a lack of trust of others as an adult. If so, what kinds of issues can this cause to individuals and to society as a whole? Please share your stories and opinions.

Childnet Cyberbullying Video Is Must See

As a video producer I always like to see a video produced for kids that doesn’t talk down to them and is high quality enough to meet their critical eyes. That’s why it is wonderful to see that a video about the damages that Cyberbullying can do not only speaks to them on a personal level, but on an emotional level as well.

The video is called “Let’s Fight It Together” and it was produced by Childnet International. Take a watch and show it to your kids.

Cyberbullying Statistics Tell The Story

In a 2008 Survey of 2,000 middle-school students from a large school district in the U.S., findings show that approximately 17.6% of middle-schoolers have experienced cyberbulling of some type. The survey by Sameer Hinduga and Justin W. Patchin reveals some facts about how many of our youth have experienced cyberbulling.

Other statistics from this report show that almost 10% of these middle-schoolers have recently experienced some form of cyberbullying. Cyberbulling as defined by Hinduga and Patchin for this survey is:

Cyberbullying is when someone repeatedly makes fun of another person online or repeatedly picks on another person through email or text message or when someone posts something online about another person that they don’t like.

There are many other statistical findings from their survey and they have also written a book on the subject. You can visit their website at www.cyberbullying.us to learn more about this survey and the book they wrote on the subject.

Judge Postpones the Lori Drew Sentencing

As a follow-up to yesterday’s blog, the judge in the Lori Drew cyber-bullying trial delayed sentencing of her. Judge Wu said that he needs to spend more time researching the defenses argument to throw out the jury verdict.

You can read the detials in the article on Wired.com.