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A girl was allegedly asked by the 15-year-old attacker to video her assaulting a fellow pupil at Krugersdorp High School. She was also bullied online, which experts say is on the increase. Photo: Supplied
Cyber bullying in SA is on the increase. And psychologists and online experts warn that while the phenomenon is underreported, the country will see more and more cases as access to technology increases.
Research has revealed that just under half the 1 726 youngsters interviewed were victims of cyber aggression. One in three were victims of cyber aggression at school and 42 percent experienced cyber aggression outside of school.
The study was conducted by the Centre for Justice and Crime Prevention in 2009, surveying young South Africans from four provinces. In the survey, a quarter of the youngsters experienced bullying via cellphone text messages. And one in five admitted to having bullied someone via text messaging.
According to the survey, nearly 70 percent of those who had bullied others via text messages had been bullied themselves.
In order of frequency, voice calls, text messages, instant messages, e-mails, videos and photographs were the most common media used in the bullying.
Cyber bullying was brought to the fore when a 15-year-old Krugersdorp High School girl became the latest victim on January 30, when she was attacked by a schoolmate with a glass bottle after a series of online attacks by the girl and her friends.
The attack, on the school fields during break, was captured on cellphone, and the attacker was suspended. This week, the attacker returned to school.
On Thursday, a sister of the attacker phoned The Star, saying the attack wasn’t unprovoked, and that her sister herself had been bullied for a year.
She alleged that the girl her sister attacked was a member of a gang called The Barbies who taunted her sister because she was a “tomboy” and had mostly male friends at school. The schoolgirl is facing an assault charge and is expected to appear in court on Tuesday.
Dr Pieter Streicher, managing director of Bulksms.com, said cyber bullying had become a much bigger problem in the past five years.
It was growing because the use of technology was growing – and while not everyone in SA had a computer, most people had cellphones.
The more widely children were exposed to technology, the more cyber bullying would grow, Streicher warned.
“Nowadays every individual is a potential publisher. A child can record a video at school and put it on YouTube.”
While cyber bullying in SA followed international trends, said Streicher, in terms of intervention, the country was far behind. “There is certainly a need for all parents to skill up on technology,” he added.
Clinical psychologist Vanessa Hemp said she had been invited to speak at three Joburg schools this year on cyber bullying. “School psychologists are picking it up and struggling to deal with it,” she said.
How to prevent growing scourge
* Know which online platforms the child is on and know what they are doing online.
* Install a guardian like Netparent on your home computer where you can choose words that will trigger an alert for incidents of cyber bullying.
* Install mobile parental control software like mymobilewatchdog on your child’s cellphone so that you can see every text and picture message sent and received from your child’s cellphone, get alerts of unapproved activity and limit use of various applications. - The Star
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Anonymous, wrote
This is exactly an alarming issue for me as a parent and I am pretty sure that no parent wanted their child to be in danger. While reading an article on a blog, it mentioned that there was a service I could use to track my kids to be sure they were always in safe places. At the bottom it said I could follow the site anationofmoms and be entered for a drawing of 6 months free of the service. Not bad! http:anationofmoms.com201108protect-your-family-giveaway.html
Anonymous, wrote
My son was subjected to years of bullying because he had a quiet and soft nature, when the bullied child cant take it anymore and snaps, then suddenly they are the problem. My son is now big and tall, and there are still boys who try and prevoke him.... I have brought the problem to the schools attention, and then you get grade heads telling you he is a mommies boy. One day when he snaps, and really hurts someone, who will be to blame??
Irene Lancaster, wrote
there is more an more violence in schools. as a parent you have so many things to worry about and now you have to worry if your child is going to be beaten up at school to. a friend of mines son was assulted after school and was almost left brain damaged. something needs to be done.
Anonymous, wrote
@Henk an Gert from anon 11:30pm. No Gentlemen. It does make sense. This was simmering for a long time. I am not condoning violence, but it does make sense as to why things escalated up to this point. These are teenage girls....14-15 years of age. Suspension yes, discipline yes, but also acknowledge there is a very strong underlying cause to what has happened. There is a root cause.
Anonymous, wrote
Henk, wrote
Gert, wrote
@anonymous 11:30 - No, it does not make sense!!! For any pupil to attack another pupil with a bottle, whether provoked or not, is unacceptable!!! FULL STOP!!! Kids have always quarelled and will probably always do, but retaliating in this way is rather trashy and barbaric!!!
@LK, wrote
Anonymous, wrote
As a network administrator at a large school this is something I am very aware of and have personally experienced. I am sorry to say that often it is the indifference of parents which leads to situations escalating to this unfortunate explosive point. Often the indifference is not because of an uncaring attitude but because parents are unaware of the capabilities of the technology which their children use. Parents need to be aware of and know what the technology they provide their children with is capable of. They also need to educate their children about what good cyber manners are etc. In other words parents need to empower themselves before giving children "toys" which they themselves do not know how to use. After all - you wouldn't give your child a car if you hadn't taught them how to drive first.
Anonymous, wrote
If you dont teach your children to fight back once provoked digitally or physically then they will be bullied and will have a low self esteem for the rest of their life. Just one retalliation and they will not be bullied for the rest of their life.
Anonymous, wrote
Good to hear both sides of the story. Both these girls had been friends at one time. The girl who was hit admitted to her mother she isn't afraid of the girl who hit her. The principal said this incident was the culmination of a facebook BBM insult war that had been going on. The sister says the bottle attacker aka "Pinky" had been insulted by the attacked one "Barbiette" for some time. So this sort of makes sense.
Scam 2, wrote
Soon fathers will be fighting each other because of this bulllying trend, no man wants his family touched whether in offense or defence from an oustider. As the family protector or defender, it would normally eat you up if you dont react when another man touches your family member even if they the ones who did wrong. So an ego issue becomes involved too...too uch is at stake when a man's ego is involved
A mother, wrote
My grand daughter was also subjected to school bullying and in the process they fractured her nose, nothing was dona about it and I had to pay the medical expenses for her surgery. They should be suspended from school, and taken to a place where they are taught to behave in a dignified and selfrespected manner. Not like hooligans!
Anonymous, wrote
What has racism got to do with this article? If you had bothered to read the article it is about bullying increasing through the use of cyber technology. The two girls are used as examples. Not every problem in this country is caused by racism.
Anonymous, wrote
Anonymous, wrote
A bully is a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates smaller or weaker people. Let the children do a survey on bullying at all our schools in SA. I think we as parents will be shocked on the outcome
Terri, wrote
Apparently the attack wasn't unprovoked - who is lying here? ALL bullies should be punished, violence is not the answer to conflict, it just aggravates the problem. If this bully was bullied before, why didn't she report it? She, and her cronies, should be expelled, to make matters worse, this child who was victimised will probably now live in fear for the rest of her school career. It's amazing how people who commit acts of violence against others always try and portray themselves as the victims - there's no excuse for bullying at all!
Analyst, wrote
What is the first thing that comes to mind when you read about cases like this? You just want to hit out and teach the bully and her mother a lesson they will never forget. If government does not come up with a proper way of dealing with incidents like this, it will not be long before we see people taking matters into their own hands. Cases like this where justice is not properly exercised by relevant authorities are becoming too many.
The Lastword, wrote
Someone needs to remind these kids that one day they'll grow up and hopefully want to contribute to society. This kind of thing will stay with them forever thanks to the very medium they use to terrorise others.
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