Cyber-bullying could lead to school expulsion

[manofphat]

Ontario announced today a proposal to change their education act to add both physical bullying and cyber-bullying to the list of behaviors that can get a student suspended or expelled. Posting comments, pictures, or videos attacking other students or teachers outside of school hours will carry the risk of school punishment, if the incident is believed to have an 'impact on school climate.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/ottawa/story/2007/04/17/safeschools.html

[WiseGuy]

this is complete bs!

...since when did anything outside of school ever result in school punishments? why should exceptions be made for the web...

like if me and mano go to the same school, and on the weekend i beat up mano and hang him from a tree by his tighty whities, since when do i get in trouble at school the next day for something i did on the weekend....

[The Killing Joke]

I disagree - and I'm gonna kick your ass later! (...hang on a sec - there's a knock on my door.)

What? I've been EXPELLED!!! I'm not even in SCHOOL anymore!!! :))

[Mike-KT]

well that's something that school boards struggle with, but if the government thinks that the schools would be better able to deal with these situations than a correctional facility, then things that happen to students of the school regardless of situation is a matter for the school to decide.

The government could have easily changed the burden of responsibility to the police or family and children's services. They obviously felt that the school was the best available option.

I don't see a problem with the law, or with the body legislated to enforce it.

[silence]

this is complete bs!

...since when did anything outside of school ever result in school punishments? why should exceptions be made for the web...

like if me and mano go to the same school, and on the weekend i beat up mano and hang him from a tree by his tighty whities, since when do i get in trouble at school the next day for something i did on the weekend....

actually, at my old high school if u got into fights outside of school (didn't matter if the other person attended the same school) when you went to class the next time you would get called down to the office and would be suspended for 3-20days or even expelled for the rest of the semester depending on how severe the beating was.

has always been that way at my old high school, always will be that way too.

nothing new there bro.

[TheGreenBastard]

Its a hard argument. People say shit that they wouldn't say to people in real life while they are online just because they think that they cant be caught. We call this phenomenon "Cyber Balls" its a close relative of "Liquid Courage". I believe that schools should be able to intervien depending on the degree of Cyber Balls being grown. ie. Calling your teacher a fag online should not be a problem, But when people make threats towards teachers or students online they should be taken as real threats and that person should be punished accordingly.

[AgentOrange]

My issue with this law is the fact that its been implemented AFTER THE FACT. If they truly believed in this law then it should have/would have been implemented before, since the internet, web forums, criticism of teachers online, etc is nothing new. However, it seems ironic that this law comes into place just as a kid is expelled for making fun of his principle (or whatever staff member it was) online. I believe the kids expulsion is unjust (you should have free rein to make fun of whomever you wish online and should not be subjected to school policy at home on your own time because it relates to someone at school... unless its a threat of attack, etc) and that this law is trying to be put in place to defend the actions of a pissed off principle whose punishment was WAY to stiff, over the top and unnecessary... I understand they are trying to promote peace and harmony within schools that now a days are way to violent BUT they have no way of knowing who truly posts what online, no direct evidence other than a posting itself (which could have been written by someone other than the person whos account it is) and if schools are going to be given the right to monitor/punish me outside of school (ie. take the place of my parents) they better start cooking me dinner and reading me a bed time story lol... and what makes expulsion or suspension the correct punishment? why not make the student take some courses/attend meetings on Respecting/Understanding of others... I'd rather see the kid taught to respect others rather than receive a vacation from school

[WiseGuy]

Calling your teacher a fag online should not be a problem, But when people make threats towards teachers or students online they should be taken as real threats and that person should be punished accordingly.

i agree with you there, but thats slightly a different story, a threat on someones life online is the same thing as sending mail to someone with a death note on it or w.e. A threat is a threat online or not and legal action is taken against it.

I dont have a problem with their being legal implications ... but i dont think that the school should have the rights to cut in here... if its that bad, call the police or 'gtfo' as they say.

[aftersh0ck]

At my school I was part of a Facebook group about a teacher, nothing offensive really, we just poked fun at her mannerisms and stuff, there were about 20-25 of us and we got called down to the office one time, they said they couldn't do anything about it but they told us it had been brought to them by an "anonymous member of the community" and that we should get rid of it basically.

[Crayola]

how the fuck do you get cyber bullied? i mean, you have complete control of what you look at and who you talk to

[WiseGuy]

i get cyber bullied by u guys all the time :( *cries*

[TheGreenBastard]

i get cyber bullied by u guys all the time :( *cries*


stfu, imma kill you

[silence]

LOL TGB that was priceless

[ORION]

Some people seem incapable of using this handy feature available in many web-apps called 'ignore' and I've made a few facebook posts in various groups about how I genuinely believe that these things should be settled outside of the school, so long as the students can maintain a reasonable level of professionalism around the persons in question. e.g. I hate this guy who works at Macdonald's, but I love MacDonald's, so I beat the crap outa the guy and call him a fag on the internet. He should take it up with me online, in person, or in court but not while I'm trying to have my fucking chicken nuggets. With a teacher, if they wanna take it up with me in class, that's fine, but don't drag the school into something that's between you and me. capeesh? (but I do agree that an eyebrow should definately be raised to """threats""")

[gremwood]

Oversensitive people.

That is all.

[Zimba]

i get cyber bullied all the time :))

[Mike-KT]

Terry, how many laws exist that pre-empt the first ever incident of it? Every law I can think of is a reaction.

To those who say that stuff outside of school should stay outside of school, it's what I said earlier. The government could have followed that thinking, but they reasoned that actually dealing with cyber-bullying is best left to the schools, who have a comparative advantage in dealing with children and youth.

This isn't something the schools have decided to do, this is a law made by the government telling the schools what to do. I think it is more effective for schools to deal with that type of abuse than the legal system. Who's got a better history with, and more experience with an individual offender, the school or some judge? It doesn't matter if it's cyber bullying or normal bullying, the schools IMO are in a way better position to deal effectively with the situation.

[jefftheworld]

To be honest, I think it really depends on the age of the students in question. Sure, a high school student should be smart enough to 'press the ignore button', but a kid in grade six may not be.

Cyber-bullying DOES affect in-school relationships, though. You rarely get cases where someone is bullied online and then comes to school and is totally friendly with their online 'enemies'. I think an all encapsulating rule won't work, you really have to take it case by case.

[Cleavage Monkey]

I received a message on facebook from my ex bf's gf the other night. Fine I didn't have to read it but I did and she was harassing me about not talking to him anymore. I don't know her and I don't care to and really, would she have confronted me in person to make these statements...I seriously doubt it.

[Normandiee]

sorry for the kinda bump, but this is funny cause some friend of mine did a website with his other friends where they posted random mean comments about teachers and some random students, kinda funny but they actually got caught by some geek at our school who traced out the computer ip mostly used to update the website and they found where it was located and then they got one of the kids and he told about the others so they all got expelled for like 2 days or sumthing.

[ORION]

...traced out the computer ip mostly used to update the website and they found where it was located...
Um, you mean down to the nearest city? cause that's about as close as you can get without (I'm pretty sure) a warrant to retrieve the IP address lists from the ISP and then find the account containing that users personal information, like I said pretty sure that requires a warrant.

[Fabulous D]

OUTSIDE of school i took a teachers "for sale" sign and moved it 3 doors down... INSIDE school i found out that teacher was watching me from his window so he stood me up infront of the class and told everyone what i did .... everyone laughed, i was embarasssed, that was that lol...

i hear they were more concerned about student slandering other students... like girls n stuff... meh i dunno cyber bullying or whatever is wrong and someone has to teach the kids to respect ppl... god knows parents dont these days!!!

> hear about that fire bombing??? jesus thats fucking brutal...

[ORION]

student slandering other students... like girls n stuff...
> hear about that fire bombing??? jesus thats fucking brutal...
You bring up a good point because, pardon my french, but this kind of backstabbing is far more common in women and queers. A guy may take a cheap shot at a teacher, but with regards to each other, correct me if I'm wrong, but their's a tendency to take things up physically. I know before I started working out and trying to make myself less of an easy target (ie. Grade 9) I got pushed around a fair bit, but women tend to be really big on trying to fuck people up emotionally and psychologically which quite frankly is alot harder to recover from.

As for the fire bombings, I heard they happened but I'd love a link cause I missed the report.

[RANDOM H3RO]

I remember being in school, getting into a fight, going down to the office and the V.P looking at me and saying "You got into a fight with two other kids....at the same time.....and you don't even look like they hit you." Suspended for 3 days, came back and was friends with them later.

Another thing, in highschool my friends and I use to be pretty lippy to eachother throwing insults around like crazy, so if some teach saw a blog or something with two guys throwing insults back and forth they have the right to suspend them? Fuck outa here with that bullshit, cyber bullying is a complete farce. These are idiotic parents and teachers choking thier sons and daughters expierences right out of them.

Lemme tell you something, in life to know how to handle a situation you gotta expierence, no ifs, ands, or buts. When you start protecting these kids from everything and monitoring everything they do, they break out in bad ways, I never had a reason to act out, I knew what would happen cause when I acted out I got punished.....but the punishment wasn't retarded.

Kids fight, they bully, some get caught and punished then shape up, others don't and learn the hard way that's life. When you pussify the nation, hell the world with these stupid ideas....you end up the cause of bigger problems.

[gremwood]

I remember being in school, getting into a fight, going down to the office and the V.P looking at me and saying "You got into a fight with two other kids....at the same time.....and you don't even look like they hit you." Suspended for 3 days, came back and was friends with them later.

Another thing, in highschool my friends and I use to be pretty lippy to eachother throwing insults around like crazy, so if some teach saw a blog or something with two guys throwing insults back and forth they have the right to suspend them? Fuck outa here with that bullshit, cyber bullying is a complete farce. These are idiotic parents and teachers choking thier sons and daughters expierences right out of them.

Lemme tell you something, in life to know how to handle a situation you gotta expierence, no ifs, ands, or buts. When you start protecting these kids from everything and monitoring everything they do, they break out in bad ways, I never had a reason to act out, I knew what would happen cause when I acted out I got punished.....but the punishment wasn't retarded.

Kids fight, they bully, some get caught and punished then shape up, others don't and learn the hard way that's life. When you pussify the nation, hell the world with these stupid ideas....you end up the cause of bigger problems.

If I didn't have a "thanks" button limit, the rest of the page would be spammed with "Thanked". That's exactly what I intended to type, and I just didn't bother.