Australians are a competitive bunch, which lets us punch above our weight at international sporting events. But one thing we’re a little too good at apparently is Facebook bullying.
According to a study by the Ipsos Social Research Institute, of the 24 countries surveyed, Australia was the worst place for bullying over social networks like Facebook, and fifth overall for bullying online.
According to Ispsos director Ryan Williams, the study showed that Aussies aren’t quite as amicable on social networks as they are in chat rooms or on mobiles:
“According to parents, Australian children were less likely to experience bullying in an online chat room, via email, or on their mobile phone, compared to global averages -– but were more likely than any other nation to experience bullying via social networking sites, such as Facebook.”
It’s not really a stat to be proud of. Remember that if you or your kids are the subject of bullying online, Kids Helpline is always there to help…
[News]
David
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:24 AMOk is it just me that thinks people really need to step up and take account for there actions and there kids actions?
They had on the radio just the other day about how bad cyber bullying is etc etc and they are running multi million programs where cops go into class rooms to teach kids on how to deal with it.
This isn’t bullying in the class room we are talking about ITS ONLINE. Its much harder to tell someone to bugger off in real life then it is to hit a simple “block” button on facebook MSN etc.
Someone gives you shit, hit block delete and hide? Also the report button. Job done you don’t see anything from them any more…Yes there are ways to get around the block…Then you just re-block the new account..but most kids aren’t smart enough to make multiple accounts.
Hell even most mobile phones these days have features to block out numbers for free…
Sam D
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:58 AMAs somebody who was bullied at school, I totally agree with this. Would much have preferred being bullied online. If it gets bad, just don’t log in to FB or whatever, easy, I’ve removed myself from being bullied. At school, well, not much to do there.
I also wonder what these kids are going to grow up like. There are plenty of bullies in workplaces (some people call them managers), with all of this “stamping out of bullying” they’re not going to be able to deal with it.
light487
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:32 AMThe problem is “mob mentality”. In a mob/crowd, people tend to lose their individuality.. only the strong personalities stay reasonably constant and true to themselves. In a mob, the individuals become a part of the whole, rather than individuals in close proximity to each other. Online, or in forms where identity is masked, this mob mentality grows stronger and more profound. People can and will do things that they would normally find unethical, disgusting or wrong, when they are caught up in a mob mentality.
When you are online, your identity is masked.. sure, you may have your full name on facebook but you are sitting behind a computer and your physical body is masked and protected. It doesn’t take much for this to transpose into a mob mentality. Psychologically speaking, your identity is masked and you become part of the whole.
hh
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 5:24 PMThis does not excuse anything…
steve
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:34 AMI do not waste my time on Facebook. It is full of narcissists and attention whores. Give me phone or email or a meet at the pub anyday!
Blake
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:42 AMWINNING!
eckythump
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 10:15 AMOne word! Bogan’s!
Johnno
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 8:40 PMBogan is?
Steve
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:34 PMPeople have become far too infatuated with this ‘social network’ and I find it to be the total opposite of ‘social’. It will be the downfall of society and I hate to think what would happen if a hitler type got ahold of everyones data. People are sheep and sign up due to peer pressure, and that is sad. I am 20 and in high school it was all the rage, I tried it for a few weeks and closed it – best thing I ever did.
light487
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:55 PMFacebook like any social network used responsibly and for what it was intended for originally, works well and is a handy tool to keep in contact with people who share similar interested and have relationships (professional, social, family) with you. Some people need to maybe take a step back from it once in a while, stop playing all those silly games, getting caught up in the mob/herb mentality and all that.. but it’s still a wonderful piece of soft-technology in its own right.
Steve
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:58 PMI think it is pathetic the reliance people have on it. Email/phone/instant messaging all do the same thing, and better, with more privacy. For some reason people think they need to keep in contact with these hundreds of people when really they do not give a shit about them and are just getting an overload of useless information. A quick phone call is a far more personal and shows that you truly care about that person. I can think of much better things to do with my time than make small talk on fakebook.
Lucas
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 3:03 PMThe reason you feel this way, and I’m sorry to say this, is you’ve simply misunderstood Facebook. Its not meant to be a completely deliberate tool where you directly contact your close friends like you do with phones or email. Instead its more on par with being in a schoolyard, where there are tons of people that you can just be with and talk and enjoy yourself. You don’t get that once you leave school, and sometimes you can have that in your job if you’re lucky, but Facebook is a great way to keep yourself in an environment like that. We are social creatures, and calling a handful of people deliberately is not socialising.
light487
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 3:22 PMI tried just uploading my holiday pictures to Flickr for my family and friends to look at but they never did more than a few times.. but if I upload them to Facebook they all look and comment and so on. It’s a social network.. centralised, shared information network..
If you end up with 100′s of people on your “friends” list that you don’t even like, then that’s your bad not Facebook’s.
Just This Guy ...
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 3:54 PMMaybe I’m missing something obvious here.
I’ve always wondered how anyone can possibly be bullied via Facebook.
If you don’t like what someone is saying on your FB feed, UNFRIEND THEM and anyone else you don’t want to hear from.
It’s not like they can keep following you around the neighborhood to keep hassling you!
Steve
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 3:56 PMwell if you are comfortable with all your information sitting around being sold then thats fine you continue on your ways. I have better things to spend my time on and am not interested in high school politics and small talk which is so often seen on facebook. I just think facebook has become far too invasive in society and there is not a day go by that I dont hear about it. tv shows, radio etc are all praising it as the greatest gift to the world, and I and many others want nothing to do with it.
4web
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 6:23 PMsocial sites always impact on teenagers . Now-a -days good filtration process.
makes stuff more safe.
smurfydog
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 7:49 PMI’m one of those not at all interested in using social networks online. I have never signed up for one and I don’t intend to.
Having said that, I can see their appeal, and I also think I understand somewhat the casual “schoolyard” nature of a lot of interaction that goes on between users.
It’s easy for adults to say “just unfrien/block the bully” or “just stop using FB”, but these are children we’re talkng about.
Clearly, the massive education programmes that have been in place for several years just aren’t working.
At least I assume there have been massive education campaigns. It’s certainly been talked about an aweful lot ofer the last few years.
Perhaps the problem is that there aren’t any?
Either way, young people largely don’t approach the world the same way as rational adults, and many need help learning how to control their online interractions with others.
This includes parental monitoring of online behaviours, education at home and in school, education for parents about how to do this, and reinforcing the idea that they should tell an adult if they are having problems.
Iain
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 9:31 PMThis study concerns me as the reporting on it gives no indication how they came about those statistic. Australians have proud tradition of giving mates grief as a sign of affection. To simply assume out of context that any comment or sequence of words is bullying is a worrying trend.
Teachers (of which I am one) and more importantly parents need to communicate with kids and teach them how to recognize bullying compared to trolling or humor, or the concepts of freedom become mute to the nanny state of the minority that think people shouldn’t be mean because it isn’t nice. To much of the net is vicious to just let children use it without supervision, we shouldnt let them go to the pub by themselves and it’s the same with th net.
smurfydog
Thursday, January 19, 2012 at 3:32 PM“To much of the net is vicious to just let children use it without supervision”
Should be Too much, not “to much”
– Iain, please see me after class. ;p
Callie R
Thursday, January 19, 2012 at 7:01 PMI think people are forgetting a valid point here. I was never bullied myself but a sibling of mine was. When we were kids, if we were bullied we could go home after school and once we were outside that gate and home we were “safe”. We didn’t have mobile phones and we didn’t have the internet.
Going home to play video games or read books was the safehaven and sanctuary. Now though, short of formally enforcing that your kids turn off their mobiles when at home and limiting their internet access, that distinctly separate definition between “school bullies” and “safehaven” is gone.
You also need to factor in that today’s children have essentially never known a world without internet access – for us we remember going without so we still have the skill and conviction to switch off and walk away. When it’s always been there though? Significantly harder to walk away especially with the rise in “internet addiction” amongst school children that get anxious and agitated when closed off from the internet and the world it provides.
Parents have a big responsibility to support their children, but they also need to make sure that they don’t hold their children to our generation’s ideals because how we dealt with bullies doesn’t work in our children’s society.
light487
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:31 PMYes, running away from and ignoring the problem always helps.