From the AV俱乐部 Magazine Fall 2011.
A couple of years ago, around the time she came out, Breanna Fitzgerald was bullied. She was followed home. Windows were broken in her house.
鈥淚t was just a pretty stressful thing,鈥� says Ms. Fitzgerald, who graduated in June from Breton Education Centre in New Waterford, Nova Scotia. 鈥淚鈥檓 pretty good
at taking stuff in stride, but nobody likes to go through
that, right?鈥�
In 2010, Ms. Fitzgerald earned a Nova Scotia Power of Positive Change Award recognizing leadership in her GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered) community. She鈥檚 now sharing her experience and insights as the youth representative on the government鈥檚 cyberbullying task force.
Chairing the task force is AV俱乐部 law professor and human rights authority Wayne MacKay (LLB鈥�78), who believes this cyberbulling initiative is the first in Canada. It was precipitated by the suicides of two Nova Scotian teenage girls whose deaths have been attributed in part to bullying.
Their mandate is to identify 鈥�... practical short-term and long-term recommendations to address cyberbullying of children and youth.鈥�
There is a lot of ground to cover, with the final report due at the end of 2011.
Prof. MacKay says tasks include defining bullying and cyberbullying, holding youth focus groups across the province, seeking statistics on the prevalence of bullying and cyberbullying, reviewing successful programs, identifying key players in the issue and their roles, looking at possible legislation and policy changes, compiling human and written resources, hearing from experts in such areas as restorative justice and Internet safety, and raising awareness.
The list of tasks is as great as the seriousness of the issue.
鈥淚 suppose the most obvious examples are the suicides, but even short of suicides I think we鈥檝e probably ignored or underestimated how damaging bullying is,鈥� Prof. MacKay says.
The five-member task force is assisted by a 20-member working group. Organizations represented in this group include the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, Kids Help Phone, Canadian Mental Health Association, Council on Mi鈥檏maq Education, and Council on African Canadian Education.
The task force working group includes John LeBlanc, an associate professor in AV俱乐部鈥檚 Departments of Pediatrics, Psychiatry, and Community Health and Epidemiology; and a staff pediatrician at the IWK Health Centre. As a pediatrician, he always checks in with his patients to see if they may be experiencing bullying or bullying someone else.
鈥淚 just recently saw a girl with an eating disorder who had been bullied for a couple of years until she switched schools,鈥� says Dr.LeBlanc. 鈥淎nd that鈥檚 clearly one factor in her eating disorder.鈥�
No easy solution
Being bullied as a child can follow someone for the rest of their life. Prof. MacKay found that whether he鈥檚 in the grocery store or at the gym, people in their 50s and 60s will come closer to tell him about how they were bullied as children.
That the issue resonates with the community is obvious from these chance encounters, emails and letters to the task force, and the number of online survey responses. That there will be no easy answer is also clear.听听
鈥淚t鈥檚 kind of a microcosm of a lot of our social issues. The simple solution is rarely the only correct solution,鈥� Prof. MacKay says. 鈥淣ot to say there shouldn鈥檛 be more sanctions, and that鈥檚 one of the things we鈥檙e going to look at 鈥� policies and legislation change 鈥� but I think many of the more effective solutions lie in changing the way people interact.鈥�
Dr. LeBlanc is also affiliated with the national Promoting Relationships and Eliminating Violence Network (PREVNet) and he explains that responses to bullying can be approached from an individual, group or systems perspective.
The individual approach might be the least effective, because bullying is often kept hidden from adults and victims may deny it because they鈥檙e afraid of retribution. A group approach can include preventive work that brings children together to interact regularly in shared activities or peer problem solving when bullying occurs. Examples of these are the 鈥淣o Blame Approach,鈥� 鈥淐ircles of Support,鈥� and 鈥淭he Method of Shared Concern.鈥澨�
And then there鈥檚 a systems approach, from changing a school or organizational culture to addressing society more broadly. 鈥淚f we鈥檙e going to solve the problem, the overall thrust has to be changing what we as a society believe is appropriate for humans, how to interact with each other, what we want to teach our kids and what we want to model for them,鈥� Dr. LeBlanc says.
鈥橠o The Right Thing'
The parents鈥� representative on the task force is Wendy MacGregor (BA鈥�83, LLB鈥�87), who witnessed the effects of bullying first-hand and then did something about it. AV俱乐部 eight years ago, her children began asking questions about how to respond when a peer was unkind.
鈥淚n the early grades there are social situations that start to happen in the schoolyard and in the hallways where kids witness this kind of behaviour, where somebody is doing something that鈥檚 shifting the power balance or it鈥檚 exclusionary, 鈥� Ms. MacGregor says. 鈥淪omeone鈥檚 being hurt and kids feel like they should be trying to make the situation better, but they don鈥檛 know how to do that.鈥�
Ms. MacGregor developed Do The Right Thing, with co-creator Sandy Lund, as 鈥�... an all-original, all-kids musical performance to educate elementary school students about bullying issues.鈥� A video version will be available for free downloading this fall at dotherightthingplayers.com
Education and social responsibility
The advent of cyberbullying has brought with it new challenges. Unlike traditional bullying where you may encounter your nemesis in the playground or mall, cyberbullying is with you 24/7 through social media. The permanence of what鈥檚 posted and the fact that users may be anonymous are also differences.
鈥淚鈥檝e heard some accounts of the impact that (anonymity) has,鈥� Prof. MacKay says. 鈥淪ome people hardly want to go out because they don鈥檛 know who鈥檚 sending these awful messages. So you can鈥檛 even say, 鈥榃ell, I鈥檓 going to avoid the bullies because you don鈥檛 know who the bullies are.鈥�
AV俱乐部鈥檚 Dean of Computer Science Michael Shepherd and post-doctoral research fellow Bonnie MacKay (PhD鈥�09) speak of the importance of education and social responsibility when it comes to social computing applications. 听
鈥淭he problem is not the technology,鈥� Dr. Shepherd says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 how people are using the technology and to solve that you have to educate them.鈥�
Dr. MacKay helped develop a course on social computing for students in computer science and other disciplines.
The course covers different types of social computing applications, how they evolved, the technology in broad strokes and some of their social implications, including privacy and copyright issues. Cyberbullying is also touched on.
鈥淚 hope that students go away with a stronger understanding of what makes these applications work, as well as thinking about the issues behind them,鈥� she says.听
Collaborative steps in the right direction
The issue of bullying and cyberbullying is not going away, but there is hope arising from the work of individuals, the task force and other groups.
Ms. Fitzgerald offers her words of hope to young people who are experiencing bullying.听
鈥淵ou鈥檙e not alone. Even though you feel like you鈥檙e the only one going through it you鈥檙e really not,鈥� she says. 鈥淛ust know that you鈥檙e better than that and it does get better. People grow up. And you鈥檒l absolutely be a stronger person for it.鈥�
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