

Four Difficult Questions Regarding Bullying and Youth Suicide - lkrubner
http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2011/12/12/questions-bullying-suicide.html

======
plasma
The school is at fault. Schools are spineless.

My brother dealt with bullying at school a few years ago.

Constant harassment, abuse, the usual. He would hate going to school, and come
home crying. On the weekends, he would disappear at times and we would have to
call the police to help us find him, as he told us he was going to jump into
oncoming traffic.

1) The privately paid school he went to had a "Zero tolerance" bullying
policy. They did not act on it.

2) The kid(s) who were part of the bullying were eventually pulled aside and
asked to stop the harassment, yet continued to do so.

3) After the problem was known about by teachers, students and staff, nothing
of value was ever done. The bullying continued, just more passively now.

So he changed schools. Now he's just graduated, and he's happy to be done.

\--

Why are schools so SPINELESS? Where is the expulsion of these kids who think
its all fun and games?

Why do schools seem to try everything in their power to keep the bad kids in,
and force the good kids out?

Where is the spine and values people should hold, especially at a school in
charge of children's welfare and education, at a time like this? It's
pathetic.

~~~
mlsuthe
The line between "fun and games" and "damaging" is very grey and differs
widely from administrator to administrator. I know a lot of people (and I'm
sure there are a lot of teachers/administrators) who harbor the "harden up and
get over it" viewpoint.

Legislating out bullying, while a productive first step, will not make it go
away. It's the conflation of factors that tell young kids that "gay =
wrong/weak/unmanly"--parents, media, peers, etc. Of course it should be our
mission to make schools a safe place for kids, but that's only a part of the
solution. Many kids live in homophobic home environments, engage in
extracurriculars (namely, sports) that are typically more homophobic, or have
role models that reinforce homophobia (some religions are this way).

In order to cultivate safe spaces, schools do need:

-to call out bigotry wherever it is (zero tolerance policies that are actually enforced)

-to give teachers and administrators sensitivity training

-counseling, resources, and positive role models

-specifically designated LGBT safe spaces

And keep in mind that things have gotten a lot better for LGBT kids in school.
Just ten years ago a lot of this stuff was simply shrugged off and pinned on
kids who "couldn't handle" a "normal" amount of bullying.

~~~
thret
"-specifically designated LGBT safe spaces"

That's hilariously bad. Every place should be equally safe. You want to herd
the LGBT kids into a corner?

~~~
mlsuthe
In an ideal world, every place would be equally safe, but that LGBT suicide
happens is evidence that we don't live in that world. A GSA or similar program
is important because it is the one place that is guaranteed to be safe. And,
if you're gay and you don't want to participate, you aren't required.

------
shaggyfrog
This is incredibly lazy writing for someone who is not only a researcher but a
PhD. Instead of a well-researched piece with citations and supporting
evidence, we get a half-assed questions-instead-of-answers style "reporting"
using several inflammatory "questions" which are fleshed out with anecdotal,
emotional and unsupported musings.

Especially link-baity by asking if the It Gets Better project is causing
_harm_ to children. I can see the religious right warming up their copy-paste
commands.

danah boyd, if you really want to do something constructive, do some damn
research. Which is your job title. This piece does nothing to advance our
actual knowledge of bullying and suicide.

~~~
wisty
So, asking questions (fleshed out with personal opinion and anecdotes) isn't
research?

OK, there's no study or links. It's not really her area. Her first point
(moral panic has stopped LGBT youths from seeking advice from strangers in the
LGBT community, especially online) is probably true. The second ("It Gets
Better" could have an unintended affect) is tricky. The third (media
harassment is bad) is obvious, and the forth (adults should also blame
themselves and society) is kind of broad and meaningless.

You're taking umbrage at the second point - that "It Gets Better" can make
things worse. Just because it's a well intentioned (and in some ways
effective) movement, does that mean that no-one can question it without
bullet-proof evidence? Well intentioned movements often make things worse (in
some way), and you can't rely on "real" research to uncover this if nobody is
asking questions.

I'm all for supporting "It Gets Better" until it's proven to be a bad idea,
and supporting whatever it morphs into if a better idea is found. I also think
that questions should be asked; even stupid ones. Creating an "us and them"
mindset is the fastest path to groupthink.

~~~
shaggyfrog
My point with It Gets Better is that she is suggesting there may be unintended
negative consequences to the movement. First, this is sensationalism. Second,
her own words ironically have unintended consequences since people who
"oppose" LBGT groups will no doubt use this argument in the future. What would
danah boyd think about giving the latest talking point to the likes of, say,
the Westboro Baptist Church?

~~~
lkrubner
Your argument is irrational and incoherent.

You write "This is sensationalism" but you don't bother to say why. boyd is a
researcher who focuses on issues such as the effect online social services
have on teen social pressures. In what sense is her question invalid? Why is
this not a valid topic for further research?

I gather that you are mostly worried about the unintended consequences of her
words. To the extent that I can find a coherent line of reasoning in your
words, it amounts to fear, and a desire to shut boyd up. The gist of your fear
could be summed up as "boyd should shut up or her words might be used by the
enemies of the LBGT community". You don't seem to consider that perhaps she
has a loyalty to the truth that goes beyond her desire to give support to
policies endorsed by some LBGT non-profits, and also, and more importantly,
her research might ultimately do good for the LBGT community by pointing out
that some of those policies currently being pursued by various levels of
government and also NGOs (It Gets Better) might be doing harm.

In other words, you are criticizing her without ever considering the
possibility that what she writes might be true.

You then try to make a point using the Westboro Baptist Church as an example.
Your point amounts to "boyd should lie or otherwise the Westboro Baptist
Church might misuse her research."

Your argument is ridiculous.

------
nhashem
This article is mostly just lazy hypotheticals, but I was surprised that the
author thought, "the sexual predator moral panic kicked in in 2005." I'm not
LGBT, but I was pretty much 'not cool' for most of high school, and I spent a
lot of 9th and 10th grade hanging out in this sci-fi/fantasy collaborative
writing forum on AOL (yep, that's how 'not cool' I was), so this was like '97
and '98. Eventually I did end up meeting with two of them, a very nice couple
who went to a college near me at the time, and had a fun time.

And then I told my parents I had met them through the internet, and my mom
flipped her shit because all she reads about the internet is how everyone the
hangs out in an AOL chat room ends up getting raped and murdered, or
something.

So 'stranger danger' seems like it's been around since it became mainstream
for minors to use the internet, but I would have expected it to dissipate with
time, much like people used to be generally sketched out by online dating, but
I don't know a single person who hasn't tried it today. Then again, as other
commenters have indicated, there is pretty much no factual evidence presented
here one way or another.

~~~
dasil003
It was definitely around when I was a kid in the 80s. It certainly wasn't as
hysterical, but "don't talk to strangers" was definitely boilerplate
parenting. Of course it's impossible to really get in my own head as a
10-year-old, but I think I internalized the message more or less appropriately
as "not everyone is bad, but keep your wits about you".

Later when I got on BBSes and then usenet/irc there wasn't really an adult in
my life who had a clue what the Internet was (other than something that
annoyingly tied up the phone line and induced nerd rage when they picked it up
:), but I was talking to all kinds of strangers and rightly felt totally safe
because what I was doing was just _on the internet_. If someone had asked to
meet in person it would have been exceedingly weird and triggered all kinds of
red flags.

------
patrocles
How many people googled Jamey Rodemeyer?

It seems boyd's article revolves around our relationship with media. We look
back a century and the political papers and non-stop sensationalism seems
quite familiar. Humanity hasn't changed, online or offline, we still
rubberneck.

So boyd wants refuges built to replace the ones that once existed. I'm wish
her well. However over time, we see safe havens come and go. Why is that?

Maybe it's the same reason. Those safe havens either collapse or are destroyed
because our society is as shitty as ever was.

