Cyberbullying Download
Parent Guide (PDF)
Cyberbullying can mean sending derogatory insults
or threats in messages, often many of them. Sometimes it entails circulating humiliating
information or pictures of a youngster among peers. Sometimes it involves demeaning
postings on Web sites. Now that video games often involve online play and social
networking, cyberbullying can become an unwelcome part of gaming. In many ways,
this is the same problem kids have had to put up with for years.
But
in other ways, cyberbullying is a new kind of problem. Unlike the bullies of yesteryear,
cyberbullies can get to their prey right in their own bedrooms. For the victims
of cyberbullies, this access to the most private spaces and moments can be quite
traumatizing. They can feel that there is no escape from their torturous social
lives, or worse yet, that they are never safe from threatened harm. Make sure
you talk with your kids about cyberbullying. Let them know they can tell you if
they’re being bullied through a video game.
Aggression and Disrespect
Whoever tells the stories defines the culture. That isn’t new.
It’s been true for thousands of years. What is new is that during the 20th
century and at the beginning of the 21st, we have delegated more and more of the
story telling function to mass media like video games. Some video games stories
inform, educate and even inspire our youth. Too many, however, don’t. Too
many specialize in dishing out heaping servings of violence, disrespect and degradation.
The research linking violent media with attitudes and behavior is so
overwhelming that few researchers even bother to dispute that screen violence
has an effect on the kids watching it. Does this mean that children directly mimic
what they see on screens? Not necessarily. But an even more pervasive effect of
violent media is not so much violent behavior, but rather the culture of disrespect
it creates and nourishes. What stories are we telling? Make sure you talk with
your kids about the values and stories they see in video games. Make sure they
realize these stories and values aren’t necessarily appropriate in the real
world. More importantly, make sure your kids aren’t playing games with age-inappropriate
stories.
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