Have You Been Abused Or Bullied On The Internet


R

Red Baron

Guest
Have you been abused or bullied on the internet, I have and I wont say were but I think I know why, if you get a chance to meet these people they are just like you or me, it seems when they get behind the key board there dark side which is usual hidden emerges
It seems we are all still barbarians under the facade of being civilised
 
I have been called a dishonest little shit!

It was great fun :)

C'mon Red Baron, relax :) When someone attacks I imagine them as little pimpled kids swearing at their monitor. I fit in the category "hairy woodworker" and laugh hard when imagining they would yell at me personally :D

That quote from Monk I posted in the other thread says it all, imo ;)
 
lulzfish said:
I think PV has. Can't remember.
The Internet's actually the best place to be harassed, because you can just ignore people and go on your way.
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No you can't! That's blasphemy. When someone insults you on the internet, you have to stick around and defend yourself! The approval of a bunch of strangers you will never meet is the single most important thing in the world!
 
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All the time!

If I want a laugh I just head over to gp32spain, always some comical hatred towards me there.
 
WizardStan said:
No you can't! That's blasphemy. When someone insults you on the internet, you have to stick around and defend yourself! The approval of a bunch of strangers you will never meet is the single most important thing in the world!
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Some of my best friends are people I've met online, and while I've met a majority of them in person there are also some I haven't. The idea that someone is a stranger and that your interaction with them is inconsequential until you see them face to face is subjective and a little arbitrary. You could argue that the approval of other people in general isn't something you should strive for, but that isn't what you're arguing. What you imply is that we should react differently to insults online than we would insults over other media.

I think the biggest problem with interactions online is precisely all of the people who think that if you can't see someone's face then they don't exist or that nothing counts. Imagine how someone like Helen Keller, who had considerably more limited options for communication than we have available to us, would have felt if she thought that the entire world were strangers to her.

All communication just boils down to transfer of information, and you can convey an awful lot of information online. Many argue that since text inhibits inflection it necessarily masks emotional undertone, but I would counter that it allows a more natural context for conveyance of detail which helps to overcome this. The actual limitations will vary greatly from person to person, and writer to reader. The fact that many people find written works to be more expressive and fundamentally fulfilling than TV and movies alone stands contrary to this.

But even if that weren't the case, if so desired you can easily transmit voice and video images in real time, and I know most people don't lament missing the remaining senses of touch, smell, and taste in their casual encounters with others. I think what it really boils down to is not an inherent inability to communicate but a lack of accountability and fear of consequence. Basically, people can say what they want to others because the other person won't be able to easily threaten physical harm or some kind of social retribution. And in a way, removing this fear of consequence paints a more honest picture of who you're talking to, if an often far less favorable one. It's probably better to know that people are treating others based on their more direct principles of how they feel others should be treated, but the end result is definitely much less pleasant.
 
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Exophase, I agree with you. Another important thing to consider is the pack behaviour of a certain group. People adopt to the structures they find and want to be accepted by the group. So some people might even act contrary to their own basic attitude.
 
mali said:
Exophase, I agree with you. Another important thing to consider is the pack behaviour of a certain group. People adopt to the structures they find and want to be accepted by the group. So some people might even act contrary to their own basic attitude.
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Yeah, I think so too. And the funny thing about this is that some of the people who talk about interactions on the internet not mattering are following herd mentality to an extreme. I wonder if they're really seeking to be liked online too, or maybe they're seeking to induce fear and control. The only explanation people usually give for internet trolling at the explicit expense of others is "it's fun", followed by a string of justifications (ie, anyone who makes themselves vulnerable only has themselves to blame). Sometimes they'll follow it up with the weak rationalization of helping to make them stronger, when I doubt anyone really cares about that. If people delved deeper into their motivations beyond "I like it" I wonder what they'd find. This applies to all things though, not just internet harassment.
 
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Exophase said:
Some of my best friends are people I've met online, and while I've met a majority of them in person there are also some I haven't.
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Sadly no one has heard or saw of these "online" people again.
 
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DisgruntleElf said:
Sadly no one has heard or saw of these "online" people again.
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I don't know if you're trying to make a point or be funny or what you're trying to say at all really...

Friends are friends, and sometimes they stop being friends. When you're used to talking to that person online or on the phone it's easier to maintain communication because it's not dependent on maintaining physical proximity.
 
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Exophase said:
Some of my best friends are people I've met online, and while I've met a majority of them in person there are also some I haven't. The idea that someone is a stranger and that your interaction with them is inconsequential until you see them face to face is subjective and a little arbitrary. You could argue that the approval of other people in general isn't something you should strive for, but that isn't what you're arguing. What you imply is that we should react differently to insults online than we would insults over other media.
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If they're your friends, then you've presumably already gained their approval and respect, and they (hopefully) won't be bullying or insulting you, or if they do, because you're friends you realize they are only joking around. The are not strangers, even if you've never met them in person.
My sarcastic comment was for those that are not friends, those that do get offended by comments made by random people on the internet, and no, I don't believe we should react differently online or off. If you come to a group of people, and they start insulting you, I would expect the average person to walk away, and not try to defend their self against what amounts to a bunch of random strangers. If it is instead the stranger that has come into your circle of friends and started insulting you, ignoring them usually works quite well.
When the same situation happens online, you get a different response; the insulted party often stays, attempting to counter the insult. Even when the person doing the insulting is the new person who has stumbled into the group or a person well known for their pointless insults, there's still the urge by some to argue themselves. Just ignore the insulter, or walk away from the group you were not invited to, or if the insult is the result of a mistake you made, learn from it.
 
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^Good points, WizardStan :) My theory is that it _should_ be possible to achieve a similar behaviour in the anonymity of the web, like it is in "real live"(web is real life too, I know). Our community has the big advantage of being relatively heterogeneous with many older folks rooted in life.

To go back to Red Baron, that thread in lol-files, where jb0yx says that he has unmasked Red Baron is actually quite funny the other way around. Red Baron locked in with his real account to respond to his 'joker' alter ego, which is actually a great irony on Red Baron's side. I wanted to write a reply, but the thread was moved. The one who was fooled in that thread was actually jb0yx ;)
What has this todo with this discussion? Well, that poor guy on the school yard, who is plagued all the time just needs to place one sure attack back on the folks who attack, and he's free, if some people applaud ;)
 
WizardStan said:
If they're your friends, then you've presumably already gained their approval and respect, and they (hopefully) won't be bullying or insulting you, or if they do, because you're friends you realize they are only joking around. The are not strangers, even if you've never met them in person.
My sarcastic comment was for those that are not friends, those that do get offended by comments made by random people on the internet, and no, I don't believe we should react differently online or off. If you come to a group of people, and they start insulting you, I would expect the average person to walk away, and not try to defend their self against what amounts to a bunch of random strangers. If it is instead the stranger that has come into your circle of friends and started insulting you, ignoring them usually works quite well.
When the same situation happens online, you get a different response; the insulted party often stays, attempting to counter the insult. Even when the person doing the insulting is the new person who has stumbled into the group or a person well known for their pointless insults, there's still the urge by some to argue themselves. Just ignore the insulter, or walk away from the group you were not invited to, or if the insult is the result of a mistake you made, learn from it.
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But how often do you really spend time around "random strangers" on the internet? Usually you spend time in communities you feel you're a part of. If people there are giving you a hard time then it'll probably be a recurring thing you have to keep putting up with. If you don't care either way then that's fine, but it's not wrong to be bothered by being mistreated and to insist others treat you better. If you let people treat you badly then it's probably just going to get worse. Of course, if you react poorly it'll probably get worse too.

People don't generally stumble upon internet communities randomly with no intention of staying. There's more to interpersonal relationships than "friend" or "stranger." Sometimes you have to learn to best interact within a group of people who are going to be around but aren't necessarily all going to be people you'll like. Maybe it's hard for people to do this on the internet because this is not a skill that needs to be strongly carried into adulthood. People generally pick their own small groups based on others they like and aren't part of large groups that are purely social in nature. Sure, they have to get along with others in official contexts like work, but there's a greater motivation behind it that makes it easier for everyone to detach themselves and behave professionally. Being a part of an online community means interacting with potentially hundreds or more people. Despite this, sometimes a core group encounters others they don't like, and try to force them out. Internet trolling can be a manifestation of this.

I've compared it to a schoolyard before (and that's probably why the term "bullying" was used). You're not going to be friends with everyone at school - most will probably not even be friends with most - but you're still forced to interact with each other and by and large not towards accomplishing a common goal (yes, you're all there to learn, but you don't really help each other learn). These people aren't strangers, they aren't friends, but you're forced to at least be around them, and those who aren't happy with others who disrupt the perceived status quo - either intentionally or not - may try to alienate or oppress those people.
 
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Exophase said:
But how often do you really spend time around "random strangers" on the internet? Usually you spend time in communities you feel you're a part of. If people there are giving you a hard time then it'll probably be a recurring thing you have to keep putting up with. If you don't care either way then that's fine, but it's not wrong to be bothered by being mistreated and to insist others treat you better. If you let people treat you badly then it's probably just going to get worse. Of course, if you react poorly it'll probably get worse too.
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Ah, but there is a difference between not caring and not responding. You can be bothered by something someone said and also realize they're probably just a jerk that gets off on seeing other people get flustered. There is also a difference between insisting that you be treated better and retorting in a flustered way against the insult.
 
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For some people, not responding when someone bothers them makes them feel much worse. So what benefit necessarily makes it worthwhile?
 
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