Instead of making cyber bullying a criminal offense, we should spread awareness about how serious the effects can be. Most of the people that act as a bully have problems that are worthy of receiving counseling instead of possibly being thrown in jail with murderers, rapists, and pedophiles.
A person does not have to have a profile on a social networking site. I have personal friends that deleted their Facebook accounts due to harmful words being said about each of them. They are fine and even enjoy life more without that website. Yes, e-mail is used on a regular basis due to work, school etc.But a person can easily block the sender, not open the message and/ or make a new e-mail account just for work that only employees or group project school partners know about. The person could actually have someone delete the messages for them such as a friend or a parent once they log onto their e-mail just to make sure everything upsetting or offensive are deleted.
Bullying in person, such as the typical pushing and shoving on the playground back in elementary school, is known as a normal part of childhood. Almost all of us have been bullied in some way, whether it is being called a name or maybe a new hair style being joked about.Should that bully go to jail? No, because they were honestly most likely NOT SERIOUS. Teenagers joke around, and whether someone wants to believe everything someone else says… it’s a personal problem.
A student with a bright future should not go to jail because they said a few things about someone online that the other person found offensive. For all we know, the person who said those things may not even realize that they were offensive until the court case. Making cyber bullying a criminal offense involves it being made into a law. Making this activity into a law would be extremely hard.
Would calling someone a “hoe” be considered “cyber bullying”? Would saying that someone “slept around at a party last weekend” be cyber bullying even if it was true? Wouldn’t it just be considered stating a fact? Would commenting harshly on someone’s prom dress be cyber bullying? There is no clear definition of bullying. Almost every website and person has a different definition, just like how everyone has their own opinions. Even if this activity was made into a law, it would still be broken. Think about the two Millbrook students that got into the car accident a few days ago.
The girl ied because of the drivers fault. The driver broke probation AND was drunk AND had an open bottle of alcohol in the car. Are there laws about any of these things? Yes. Do people, especially teenagers, still drink and drive? Yes. Teenagers love to be defiant.
Some see rules as being meant to be broken, while others abide by them. When it comes to cyber bullying, the person being talked about can chose to be the victim. When someone is cyber bullied, they have the choice to read it. They do not have to open the text message or log onto the social networking site or better yet, even have one.
One can easily block numbers and people electronically. Cyber bullying should not be a criminal offense because majority of the people that are involved in this activity are between the ages are teenagers are about to become one, meaning they are not done developing mentally, physically, and emotionally so they therefore have no idea what they are doing. Monitoring the bullying is too hard because someone can easily hack another’s account or even use someone else’s phone to text another. In this activity, one has a choice to become a victim.
