The most controversial topic of today’s time, social media and bullying, has gained more coverage than ever during the lockdown due to the idleness of many. Because of this, both action and reaction have equally increased.
Before diving into the pros and cons of the topic, let us have an insight upon its basic definition. Wikipedia’s definition of cyberbullying states that “Cyberharassment is a form of bullying or harassment using electronic means. It has become increasingly common, especially among teenagers, as the digital sphere has expanded and technology has advanced. Cyberbullying is when someone, typically a teenager, bullies or harasses others on the internet and in other digital spaces, particularly on social media sites. Harmful bullying behaviour can include posting rumours, threats, sexual remarks, a victims' personal information, or pejorative labels (i.e. hate speech). Bullying or harassment can be identified by repeated behaviour and an intent to harm. Victims of cyberbullying may experience lower self-esteem, increased suicidal ideation, and a variety of negative emotional responses including being scared, frustrated, angry, or depressed.”
With this information in mind, let’s now break down a few points and dive deeper into it.
Firstly, there is a widespread concept that social bullying currently is giving way to gender war. Feminism and misandry have been unapologetically entwined into the strings of social bullying. People strongly believe or are made to believe that sharing stories, defaming people in comments, tags, personal messages or making pages solely for the purpose of harassment would do justice or help in bringing about a change to the mindset of people. People are being lashed out at for putting forth their opinion or perspective. The way anyone sees or analyses a situation is entirely dependent on their upbringing and how they have been subjected to certain experiences in life. They react on grounds of certain personal agenda when they see something and it is not possible to actually be in someone else’s shoes. Right to freedom of speech allows everyone to put forth their ideologies or to opinionate on a certain agenda on general terms without specifically attacking a person or community. However, nowadays if people do not want to agree with someone’s thoughts or address an issue, instead of leaving it alone, they prefer trolling or going against it. Basically, constructive criticism no longer exists and harassment is directed towards any person who practices their right to be an absolute radical thinker.
Gender isn’t even the issue, although it is made to look like it. Both men and women receive equal hate for their personal views. I would repeatedly like to stress that direct criticism towards a person without his/her consent unless being proven guilty by the law, needs to be shunned absolutely. Nobody can share or repost pictures without the prior permission of the person involved in it or troll and spread hate against them in the community. People taking a stand on such behaviour and creating awareness for it is completely acceptable and the first step towards it should be to report the account or the particular content that is spreading hate or vulgarity against community guidelines.
Cyberbullying is not even closely related to feminism/misandry or has anything to do with it. People have highly mistaken these two entirely different social issues. The types and kinds of social harassment extend to a wide range. Be it sending nudes to someone or blackmailing individuals online to trolling publicly, are all forms of cyberbullying that is subjected to all genders alike although in different ratios. Social bullying has tremendous negative impacts and proves to be quite toxic especially on young teenagers who are the most volatile to social media because of their age. Not only are they not mature enough to decide between wrong and right but also lack experiences of the harsh realities and atrocities of the outside world. So let’s make the virtual world a safer and better platform for them to use and reduce the negativity out there.
To summarize, the problem is not when someone decides to speak up about something that is wrong. The problem arises when people take the law into their own hands and direct all the wrongdoings towards a singular person. Yes, that person is guilty and yes, they should be held accountable, but it is not up to us to decide. It is up to the law enforcement bodies to address the issue and proceed with it. Rather than using social media as a platform to bring an individual down, it must be used as a stage to shine light upon the important issues. For example, if someone posts about someone sexually assaulting them, rather than being focused at encouraging people to curse the assaulter, the person raising the issue should focus on informing whether the issue still occurs or not, how it is not the victim's fault, what they can do to deal with it, and lastly inform the authorities about the person privately so that an investigation can be carried out.
However, it is not a perfect world and not everybody will stick to rules and morals and this will always remain the case in some way or the other. The most we can and should do is try to make a difference in how social media can be an asset to change mentalities rather than an asset for personal attack.
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