Several middle school students in western New York created a Facebook event invitation Oct. 21; they invited 60 of their friends to participate in a plan to torment a fellow sixth-grader the next day. As the result, 10 accepted the invitation and some of the students posted offensive comments; one even proposed to kill the boy. When the mother of the proposed victim became aware of the event, she contacted school officials. This is common news for many communities across the nation, and many are unaware of what cyber-bullying actually is. Cyber-bullying is the use of cell phones, instant messaging, e-mail, chat rooms, or social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to harass or intimidate someone. Cyber-bullying is often done by children and teens, who have increasingly early access to these technologies. According to the Cyber-bullying Research Center, there are no federal laws against cyber-bullying and there are only 5 states which have laws against cyber-bullying. Due to this point, it’s becoming obvious that there should be some federal and state laws made against cyber-bullying due to its harmful effects.
Cyber-bullying is one of the major important causes of depression in teens, mainly in high school and middle school teens. If a student is bullied in online, it can have a direct effect on their attendance in school and even in their study habits. Sometimes cyber-bullying fuels prejudice in areas such as race, religion, and sexuality. It’s an effective way to destroy a teenager’s confidence which may lead to some suicidal thoughts.
There are no effective laws against cyber-bullying that prevent or help eliminate the problem. If legislators were to create punishments against cyber-bullying, suicide rates among teens would be lower than the present 19%. Effective laws can give retribution to the families of victims and restore the broken judicial system that allows these crimes to continue. Megan Meier, 13, hung herself after being harassed by...