I've always wondered what's the difference between online bullying and offline bullying. Because it's a common thing which has been going on for a long time. I've not dealt with it personally but few of my friends has shared their story with me which was traumatizing. I have two friends one has faced bullying online and the other one offline.
Trust me none is less. After hearing their experience it became clear to me that bullying is bullying it can't be less worse no matter how it has happened, the consequences are the same. The victim who deals with the bullying goes through many mental health problems.
There's no scale which can decide which one is the worse. I personally feel we should take both seriously as the victim suffers a lot. People are unable to understand because they are not in victims situation, so it's difficult.
But if you really wanna find out how a victim feels then you should think like "What if this had happened to me?" and ask yourself "How would I feel?" If you have any empathy inside you then you will start to understand the feeling of getting bullied.
One of my friend attempted to end her life because of online bullying. She was a content creator she's a feminist, she made videos about empowering women. The comment section always had hateful comments often made by the opposite gender. it didn't stop there some fake accounts was created and they started posting her pictures without clothes which was ai generated. Few people believed her and few didn't, she also got life threats as some people found out her location.
Obviously it was one of her friends who gave out the address. She couldn't tell her parents as they are very conservative minded so she decided to end everything by trying to attempt suiside. Currently she's out of social media and out of anyone's reach.
She is still a good frind of mine but she's not normal anymore. Her mental health has completely drained. If I compare this to physical bullying then yeah both are the same. As always the victim suffers no matter what.
Bullies can destroy ones mental health even if it's online. People are built different and everyone has different kind of capability. If you're mentally strong then it gets a bit easier to handle bullies but that's not the main point.
The thing people should do is protest against the bullies. The one who does crime and the one who tolerates both are at fault. We should take stands whenever we see someone getting bullied but often we back off because it's not problematic for us. That's why bullies get encouraged to bully the victims.
I will always say that both acts should be treated equally. Physical bullying and online bullying are not any different. Legal actions should be taken against such bullies so that they can learn their lesson. I've often seen victims let go of their bullies just because they don't wanna go through any trouble which I don't support at all.
The reason I write blogs on Hive is the people over here are truly positive. But if it was any other platforms I'm sure I could have not continued this long. Becsuse I would have been bullied for expressing my opinions online. I wish every other platform becomes this safe so that no one is bullied, at least online. In real life, we have to do the same and create a safe place for everyone.
The thumbnail is taken from canva and created with canva
