Cyberbullying – another child lost

Cyberbullying is fast becoming the scourge of social networks.  e-Safety is many things, with many risks and significant concerns, and there is a lot of scaremongering surrounding e-safety.  But when it comes to the death of a child through suicide there is a rage inside of me which is continually fuelled through the apathy of social networks.

Once again I read the news only to see another child that has committed suicide due to being bullied via a social network; this time because her hair wasn’t right and didn’t wear the right fashion clothes – she was 12 years old!

When I am invited into schools to talk to children, staff and parents I always make the point that technology is not the problem.  It is very easy to blame social networks; continually in the media you will read, “Facebook this,” and, “Twitter that”, (don’t get me started on Ask.FM).  Behaviour is the issue, not the technology – but there is a fine line.

Behaviour issues aside (that will be another post), social networks have got to be made to stand up and take responsibility.  Although technology is not the issue, the technology is the medium of communication, and if you provide a medium for such despicable behaviour to take place then you share a responsibility, a liability – there is no argument.

I’m sure yet again we’ll hear the corporate spin:

“There are too many users, we can’t watch them all” – it’s called scaling, it isn’t rocket science.  When you started off small the safety of users should have been one of your prime considerations.  As your user base goes upwards, you scale your resources upwards.  You are making a financial fortune from your users, put some of it back in.

“It’s not our responsibility” – arrogance to the extreme.  It is your responsibility; you are facilitating the communication.

I could go on and on, but this would simply turn into a rant.  The bottom line is this: the apathy of some social networks is diabolical.  There is nothing more important than the safety and wellbeing of a child; the fact that you have put up a safety advice page does not absolve you from your responsibility.

There are some great charities and organizations doing some fantastic work, particularly educating children and young people, but this is an issue that needs a multi-pronged attack, where behaviour can be tackled with education, technology and moderation.

I am seriously considering an e-safety campaign to get these social networks to sit up and listen, and to force this apathy out into the open, but quite honestly I’m not sure what good it would do when going up against big corporations.

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