"Internet bullying is a fact of life" article on MSN news

http://tech.uk.msn.com/socialvoices/blogpost.aspx?post=131cb4e6-5d89-420d-bc04-784081af7d4c

according to the article, over 50% of us have received online abuse but the article takes a view that online bullying is a fact of life and people need to deal with it.

but with the Defamation view being given a 'second reading' in the House of Commons, and acts such as SOPA being proposed, do you think governments are going too far in trying to censor abusive material on the internet? how far do you go with these things? and why is the law not consistently applied? that guy who was jailed and kicked out of university for tweeting racist abuse, but i am sure there are thousands upon thousands of cases equally as bad on the internet which havent been investigated by the law.

the internet benefits the world greatly but comes at some costs, with this being one of them. i think abuse should be handled on a case by case basis. but generally speaking, where the abuse doesnt impact on direct impact on someones life, authorities shouldnt intervene. personally i think the internet is the one true place of freedom in our world and intervention should be used sparingly.

whats your opinion on the article, and the general issue of internet bullying and freedom on the internet?

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1

PheonixRiver

On public domain you will always be open to abuse

Sadly many people don't realise this

Reply 2

marcusmerehay

Depends how you define bullying - there are clear differences between banter, taking the piss, and being genuinely abusive.

Reply 3

username564415

Hey look that person is abusing me online... Block

My god that is difficult

Reply 4

internetguru

These politicians have some how managed to alter the idea of freedom of speech to not include offensive stuff. Well the fact is the ability to be offensive is part of being free and as long as we can't do it we are not free.

Reply 5

Martyn*

Bullying is a fact of life. Anyone who has ever gone to school should know this.

Reply 6

a.partridge

^^^ ALL PRICKS! can't stop the internet bully muahahahah

Reply 7

OMGWTFBBQ

Original post by Nick1sHere

Hey look that person is abusing me online... Block

My god that is difficult

This. People need thicker skins.

Anything too extreme is already covered by harassment law.

Reply 8

Snagprophet

There's different types. There's the invasion of privacy of bullies at school who attack someone online and there's the random trolls who say anything to put down a random individual who they'll never meet. People can also take all of these types of bullying/trolling in different ways. Some feel tormented and lonely, others laugh at them. I think the more random trolling is a fact of life of the anonymous internet. The one where people you know IRL is a real social and personal problem.

Reply 9

Kiss

Awwwwwwwwwww!!!! Did some random person you've never met hurt your feelings over the internet? :frown:

You poor thing!!!!!!!

Reply 10

Movember

Original post by Martyn*

Bullying is a fact of life. Anyone who has ever gone to school should know this.

was everyone at your school bullied then? :s-smilie:

Reply 11

Bonged.

who the **** has been bullied online? don't log in!!!!!

bit like getting "bullied" by Stephen Fry if you don't like QI. Change the channel mother****er.

Reply 12

Harry Callahan

Just because it happens doesn't make it right, does it? Some of cases on Facebook and the like are pretty tragic, even though they should have come off the site as soon as the bullying began.

Reply 13

Chumbaniya

The internet can be, in so many cases, a pretty horrible place. You will find a lot of people expressing incredibly racist, homophobic, sexist, violent, degrading and unpleasant views which they would never dream of expressing face to face. But I don't think this means that the internet needs more censorship. We all use the internet by choice, and if we want, we can restrict ourselves to sites which moderate any user-generated content (this forum, for example), or where we need to allow people to contact us (most social networks). Aside from non-anonymous cases where a person is attacked by people they know, usually through social networking (this is already covered by existing harassment/defamation laws), I think internet users should accept that if they're interacting with anonymous strangers online, they are going to come across people being mean to them in a way they might not experience in real life, but any responsible internet user should be aware of the fact that the views of anonymous strangers should never be taken seriously unless you explicitly choose to.

Reply 14

Martyn*

Original post by Movember

was everyone at your school bullied then? :s-smilie:

It happened to almost everyone. The first requirement to initiation was head flushing down the toilet.

Reply 15

mrshinyshoes

Original post by OMGWTFBBQ

This. People need thicker skins.

Anything too extreme is already covered by harassment law.

Exactly, a few trolls is just internet banter aha, if it gets too serious then the police e.t.c can step in, but they shouldn't be being called in over a few comments from some annonomous guy.
Especially xbox live that gets along just fine, what really gets me is when people can give it out, but go crying when they get some back :/

Reply 16

mrshinyshoes

Original post by Martyn*

It happened to almost everyone. The first requirement to initiation was head flushing down the toilet.

Is that swirlys that were always talked about at primary school but never actually happened? :tongue:

Reply 17

Martyn*

Original post by mrshinyshoes

Is that swirlys that were always talked about at primary school but never actually happened? :tongue:

It never happened at primary, but it did at secondary - to a lot of people.

Reply 18

Captain Jack

On the topic of online bullying, the BBC's Rory Cellan-Jones wrote an article two days ago that really dug into sites with anonymous accounts, saying anonymity fuels bullying. Which is interesting on TSR where you could argue that having completely anonymous accounts for everyone helps prevent targeted bullying. I can understand for fake accounts on Facebook or anonymous moany comments on blogs but he does mention forums too.