Prime Time Bullying Programme

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liaconn

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Did anyone see this last night? It was scary stuff. I knew bullying in schools had increased but didn't realise it was so vicious, sadistic and sustained. The really worrying thing is how helpless schools and parents are in dealing with the perpetrators. The law seems to be completely on their side.
 
Same thing happened 20 years ago when I was in school; it just wasn't recorded on phones.

What did bother me about the programme was that schools were blamed and not the parents of the bullies. The school can only inform the parents, if it does more than that then it will get sued. I see no problem with just expelling the bullies. If they don’t get an education that’s completely their own fault (and that of their parents) but they should not be allowed to be inflict misery and suffering on other children. Their right to an education should not take precedence over the right of other students (or teachers) to a safe educational environment.
 
Part of the problem seemed to be the total reluctance of some parents to face up to their children's behaviour and deal with it. I know everybody wants to think the best of their kids, but this head in the sand attitude is doing nobody any favours, including the bullies who will just carry this behaviour forward into their adult lives if it goes unchecked and find themselves disliked and isolated in the workplace.
 

Well thats the nub of the issue isnt it? The parents are raising children to think that bullying is ok.
There should be zero tolerance for bullying in schools, the parents should be made to take responsibility - I bet if parents were fined and threatened with a custodial sentence for not dealing with their childrens behaviour theyd take it more seriously!
 
Purple said:
Same thing happened 20 years ago when I was in school; it just wasn't recorded on phones.
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Indeed but one of the points they were making on Prime Time was that because of phones and social networking sites the bullying can continue 24 hours a day and not just at school which means that the kids have no refuge from it.
 
efm said:
Indeed but one of the points they were making on Prime Time was that because of phones and social networking sites the bullying can continue 24 hours a day and not just at school which means that the kids have no refuge from it.
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I didnt see the program - how are the bullies getting the victims phone numbers and/or social networking profiles?
 
+1
I was absolutely horrified by the show. The level of violence, viciousness...worse than any horror movie I've ever seen
 
The scary thing for me from all of this was the glorification of violence using mobile phones to record fights and publishing these on the likes of YouTube. How do you stop this? You can't blame the parents of the kids fighting for some of this - for example the two girls who were basically pushed into a ring to fight each other (alright they weren't forced but I'm sure there was plenty of goading and stirring leading up to this), purely for the entertainment of the masses with their mobile phones. Where do you start - for me the culprits here are those recording the fight and glorifying it. Bullying has always been around and fights have always happened but this new level of glorification and the resulting humiliation of the kids involved is a really frightening thing for me.
 
truthseeker said:
I didnt see the program - how are the bullies getting the victims phone numbers and/or social networking profiles?
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I'm not sure, but I think the victims usually start off as one of the gang and then the others join up and turn on them. I'd imagine there's one or two ringleaders and the others go along with it for fear of being the next target if they don't. This is another reason why parents should take allegations against their child seriously. A lot of them are probably joining in under duress and realise its fundamentally wrong. They might secretly be relieved by a bit of adult intervention.
 
I’m amazed that nobody has sued YouTube about this sort of thing yet.
They are very good at removing pornography from their site, why can’t they do the same thing with these sorts of clips?
 
Purple said:
I’m amazed that nobody has sued YouTube about this sort of thing yet.
They are very good at removing pornography from their site, why can’t they do the same thing with these sorts of clips?
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There is nothing actually illegal about those videos, so there is nothing to sue youtube or bebo about.

I've had the misfortune to attend schools that makes last night show look tame and here is my take on it:

1) A child's behaviour and character is merely a reflection of their parents
2) It is not the fault of Bebo or Youtube, they are merely a new conduit for the bullying.
3) A school lead by a strong principle and good staff can help create an atmosphere that does not tolerate bullying, however, this will only work if parents are willing to also take ultimate responsibility for the behaviour of their children.
 
I'm constantly surprised at how adults (not to talk about children)give out so much personal information, mobile numbers, e-mail address etc and are then shocked by some of the reactions they receive
 
Purple said:
I’m amazed that nobody has sued YouTube about this sort of thing yet.
They are very good at removing pornography from their site, why can’t they do the same thing with these sorts of clips?
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I totally agree with this, there should be far more policing of websites and service providers, it is not good enough to say the internet cannot be policed, china polices it fairly effectively, if we cant control sites from other countries surely we can change our own laws to allow us to police the media and internet sites to block any of this stuff in this country, the same argument was used for child pornography, all the effort was used to try and go after the buyers of this, surely we should also be going after the internet service providers and mobile phone networks for facilitating this material. If Ireland was successful at policing this other countries would follow, maybe it is an area we could move into, developing technology to police this stuff,
 
joe sod said:
china polices it fairly effectively
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lol! China police a lot of things 'effectively' - though I don't know if I'd fancy living under their regime!
Blaming the technology is a red herring, just like blaming the drink or blaming the gun - unless we tackle the people then we are on a roundabout.
 

Absolutely agree with this - the technology is only a conduit - the behaviour needs to be tackled.
 
truthseeker said:
Absolutely agree with this - the technology is only a conduit - the behaviour needs to be tackled.
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television is a conduit, newspapers are a conduit, yet this material is not allowed on these, indeed they would be sued and prosecuted if they allowed it, we have reached the stage now where the internet must be viewed in the same light, it must be policed,

however i agree that behaviour is also as important but the internet is also encouraging this behaviour, it is also a result of the free and easy liberal society which has been dominant for the last 50 years, i think we are now at the end of this period, i think society will become more conservative again simply because it cannot continue much further on its current route as it will collapse
 

I fear you may be right here, and that in accordance with human behaviour there will be an equally radical shift to the right - particularly if economic conditions continue to decline. Shame we can't seem to ever get the balance right.
 
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