Blog 3.3

                Can cyberbullying inflict more pain than physical attacks? Many individuals would like to disagree but not me. In “The Net Is The Real World”, Jake Simms and Larry Magid talks about how cyberbullying can inflict mental wounds that is far worse than physical attacks. Individuals who are bullying may not see the amount of pain they are inflicting on the victim through the internet.

            On Sept. 22, a young Rutgers student named Tyler Clemeti killed himself. Three nights prior to the suicide, the young kid asked his roommate to have his dorm room to himself. The roommate suspected a gay sexual act was going to occur so he decided to turn a webcam on in the room which was being watch live on the internet. When Tyler found out about the ordeal, that is when he wrote a goodbye message on his Facebook account and then jumped off of the George Washington Bridge.

            The amount of individuals that use the internet is astonishing. If someone is being cyberbullied, this tends to hurt them a lot more due to the vast amount of people that are witnessing it via internet. On Facebook, I encountered that my now ex-girlfriend was cheating on me. I realized this because she had posted pictures with another guy kissing. This devastated me due to fact that all my friends and family saw this happening. It is sad to say but a lot of people, including myself, care what others think.

            The internet is a big wall that an individual may stand behind it. In other words, bullies that use the internet would say things they wouldn’t in a real life confrontation. This is done every day in many situations such as someone calling another person to argue over the phone, leaving a letter to bully the victim, or even someone driving in a car cursing at a person walking. It’s a shield that most bullies like to use due to the advantage that it gives them by protecting them.

            A bully may never know how much the victim can endure before reacting to desperate measures. That is why bullying through the internet is far worse than something physical. A fight may occur in a face to face situation. The bully can see how much pain he is actually placing the victim in; as per internet you cannot. Through the web, there is a thin line in which it may not be seen. That is the problem with bullying through the internet.

            Through personal experiences and research, the web inflicts far greater pain than any physical bullying.  The situation that occurred in Rutgers with the invasion of privacy to cyberbully is just one out of many. This is occurring way to often and needs to be addressed. So as for the question whether cyberbullying can inflict more pain than physical attacks, I strongly believe it does!