UK Government to tackle Cyber-bullying

Author: Joe Martin
Published: 10th April 2007
Comments (9) Stumble
UK Government to tackle Cyber-bullying

Online bullying affects teachers as well as students and may be responsible for staff shortages...

The BBC reported news this morning that the education secretary, Alan Johnson, was determined to tackle online bullying in schools -- whether targeted at students or teachers.

Mr Johnson believes that the way to tackle this 'cyber-bullying' is to force websites like YouTube and Rate My Teachers to take a moral responsibility for the content posted by their users, who may post videos or other content of their victims.

Mr Johnson believes cyber-bullying is a major problem for schools and is causing many teachers to seek new jobs.

"The online harassment of teachers is causing some to consider leaving the profession because of the defamation and humiliation they are forced to suffer."

Cyber-bullies will often video their victims using mobile phones or digital cameras and then upload the video for others to view. As such, Mr Johnson has also highlighted the new powers teachers have to confiscate phones and MP3 players from students.

This is obviously a step forward in tackling cyber-bullying, though websites like YouTube are already struggling to monitor their content to ensure it conforms to the site's terms and conditions. It will also be interesting to see where the line is finally drawn between the personal responsibility of the bullies and the wider responsibilities of websites.

If you're a teacher, a student, or just have an opinion to share then we'd love to hear from you in the usual place.
Quote DougEdey 10th April 2007, 10:17
Personal responsibility should be taught from birth, you cannot blame someone else for your own mistakes.
Quote CardJoe 10th April 2007, 10:47
I personally don't see the point of this. Youtube has a set of terms and conditions and polices itself as best it can to try and stop things like pornography and bullying getting on the site. It is the fault of the bullys who post such videos and not that of the website, unless the website actively encourages such behaviour. Youtube doesn't, it's a blank canvas for others to use.

What would be helpful would be to make sites like Youtube more readily available to the staff that tackle bullying so that the videos can be used as proof to help stop bullying. This would discourage people from posting such content and allow bullies to be caught more easily, without always causing embaressment to the victim.
Quote specofdust 10th April 2007, 11:30
Problem is, if you walk around with a blank white(or any colour) t-shirt and someone writes die n*****s on that t-shirt, you have to take it off. Especially if you've been inviting people to write on your t-shirt.

I do think we just need way tougher dicipline against bad kids in schools. I have a nasty feeling that Mr. Johnson belongs to the "if it moves, ban it" brigade.
Quote CardJoe 10th April 2007, 11:37
True, but if you ask people to write on your t-shirt but say they can't draw rude pictures or put anything too nasty on it but you end up being flocked by twenty people with pens wanting to write on your t-shirt, one of whom scrawls the word f**k on the back of your collar then it's not entirely your fault is it? Not if you try to stop that person and pledge to wash off that word as soon as you can.
Quote specofdust 10th April 2007, 11:42
Well I'd think that it very crucially depends upon how seriously you take action. Youtube could allocate anywhere from a single person to 10% of their entire workforce just to the job of taking down videos that aren't supposed to be up there. Depending how much effort they put into it, it wouldn't surprise me if groups or governments take action against them.

I'm not saying it's right, just saying I think it's the case. Total freedom only works with responsible adults, and we live in a world of children(old and young).
Quote DXR_13KE 10th April 2007, 13:12
Parents should be more responsible with their children and teach them right from wrong.
Quote Aankhen 10th April 2007, 23:22
Quote:
Originally Posted by CardJoe
True, but if you ask people to write on your t-shirt but say they can't draw rude pictures or put anything too nasty on it but you end up being flocked by twenty people with pens wanting to write on your t-shirt, one of whom scrawls the word f**k on the back of your collar then it's not entirely your fault is it? Not if you try to stop that person and pledge to wash off that word as soon as you can.
Yeah, it is your fault. If you can't make sure people stay within the boundaries you set for them, then don't make the implicit promise that you can by allowing them to do what they like in the first place.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DXR_13KE
Parents should be more responsible with their children and teach them right from wrong.
That's easy to say, not very easy to enforce, unfortunately. :(
Quote CardJoe 11th April 2007, 08:49
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aankhen
Yeah, it is your fault. If you can't make sure people stay within the boundaries you set for them, then don't make the implicit promise that you can by allowing them to do what they like in the first place.

That's easy to say, not very easy to enforce, unfortunately. :(

Surely then everything is everyones fault. Nobody can completely ensure that people stay within the laws of a country for example, which is why we have a police force, though even they act as much to clean up the mess after the event has occurred.

Laws and rules operate on the basis that people pledge to stand by them or suffer consequences afterwards, not on the basis that others make it impossible to break the rules. If that was the case then countries wouldn't need laws and Youtube wouldn't have/need terms and conditions.
Quote Aankhen 12th April 2007, 21:20
Quote:
Originally Posted by CardJoe
Surely then everything is everyones fault.
In fact, it is. :) And "everyone" there really means "everyone" equally.
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