Megan M
eier, at 13, committed suicide after being teased and harassed on myspace by someone posing to be a 14 year old boy. The "boy" was really a 49 year old woman named Lori Drew. There were no laws against what Lori Drew did, and that brings us to consequences.
Though the nation gasped at the thought of Drew receiving no punishment in such behavior, it stands to argue that we cannot punish someone when there is no law against it. California is working on creating a law against online harassment, but it is tricky. How can lawmakers even begin to write a fair law against something the victim can just turn off?
"What does it mean to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress? Such wording opens a Pandora`s box, because any sharp trial lawyer could claim that anything conveyed through electronic media is somehow intimidating, harassing, coercive, or distressing."
- quotes from op-ed article in The American Thinker
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So what are schools to do? Do schools have the right to punish kids for doing something for which adults have no consequences? If they do it at school, then it may break the acceptable use policy for computer use, but if they do electronic harassment outside of school- what then?
What do you think? What's legal? Please share your comments.
Read the story of Megan Meier
this happens all too often! at the middle school where i work, a 12-year-old 6th grade girl girl whose family is from central america was tormented and teased for "bringing the swine flu here" and for being a "pig with swine flu". she wrote a suicide note, but fortunately did not go through with it. the group of girls bullying her tried to get at her via myspace, but because her parents do not allow her to have an account, they resorted to texting her. the harrassment had been going on all year long, and the girl stopped bringing her phone with her. her mother found the phone the day she wrote the suicide note, and fortunately her mother was able to intervene to help her daughter and bring it to the administration's attention. the girls were suspended from school for three to six days, depending on their "level of involvement". one girl's parents challenged the suspension, saying that the kids were "just being kids" and trying to learn about current events. i recently spoke with the victim of this harassment, whose goals in life now include getting the best education she can, learning to lose her accent, and learning how to be meaner so she can stand up to mean people better. before this, she wanted to be a teacher.
ReplyDeletesmall schools, strong communities, families with foundations -- that's a great place to start to protect our children.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately I do not think we can depend on the school system to regulate cyberbullying, especially with all of the othe issues they ae faced with on a daily basis. They do a pretty good job of blocking all the "chatting" type sites, but beyond that I think it would be impossible to stop. They should however, contact parents whenever there is suspicion of cyberbullying. Parents need to take responsibility for whatever their children are doing on the internet. They should be monitoring their facebook, myspace, blogs, etc. on a regular basis and blocking those sites when there is inappropriate content posted. This is an issue that has to be dealt with at home.
ReplyDeleteWow. Thanks for sharing your views and your stories.
ReplyDelete