Since my last piece on the cyberbullying taking place through Facebook, other sites targeting girls for their alleged flaws have been found. One identifying young women not considered “marriage material”. Another naming and shaming ‘12-year-old sluts’. Another for girls labelled “bitches”. British girl Poppy Bracey recently took her life as a result of a cyber bullying campaign against her. Poppy was 13. She was harassed for being “too pretty”. (Some commenting on the story said girls like this just need to toughen up). It seems no girl can ever be good enough. She must grow up trying to shield herself from virtual darts and real-life abuse, coming at her from every direction.
The piece below by Melbourne blogger Elizabeth (left) at My Spilt Milk (whose comments I have valued on my posts), is a passionate exploration of these online monuments to cruelty. Elizabeth nails the hypocrisy of Facebook in banning breastfeeding images while allowing sexualised depictions of women, harrassment and abuse to flourish on untold numbers of sites.
4 Responses
Can’t really make everyone happy. If you’re really serious about having your own way with FaceBook you can always start your own social networking site. I think technology progressed so fast it never caught up with education in schools. All I had was chat rooms when I was in high school. Need to teach kids that you can’t always believe what you read.
Suicide Prevention in Your Life