Where is the line drawn between online bullying and brash opinionating?

I don’t really think there can be such a thing as online bullying. Opposed to real life where one might find it difficult to avoid a toxic person, bully.
Online one is free to disengage, ignore and stop participating at any time.
Sharp dialogue is not bullying, and calling an ass an ass is not bullying if the asshat fits wear it.

( Tell me it’s okay to molest children because they are sexual beings and I will tell you you are a sick fuck. lol ) As a line from a new movie states when one character tells another that their response to something is “cold”, they reply, “truth has no temperature.”
I love that!
The mods here do a good job of removing anything that could be misconstrued as, or IS, a blatant personal attack.

I am not a thin skinned, hypersensitive type, I don’t want to be called names, I don’t take abuse, I do not dish out abuse, not acceptable, but some people are very emotionally fragile and get their feeeeelings hurt at the drop of a hat.
One persons sharp debate is anothers “bullying”.

People have committed suicide over online bullying. One was a schoolgirl who had mean things posted all over the net about her and the people she was at school with were party to it.

I think online has given cowards a comfortable place that they can hide in and write anything they want to get all the frustration of being a weak asshole out of them. I have nothing but contempt for them.

Some can disengage but others get into your real life space and cause havoc. So it is not as innocuous as it first seems.

@LornaLove

Anyone that would commit suicide over online bullying is already a couple of ducks short of a flock. I am not disputing that hurtful words can happen online and young kids may be more prone to being subject to online bullying, but as far as adults go, and kids, you can’ t be bullied if you shut off your computer and refuse to engage.

@Coloma “I don’t really think there can be such a thing as online bullying..” and
“You can’ t be bullied if you shut off your computer and refuse to engage.”

That’s what I used to believe. I don’t anymore, because I’ve realized that, in theory, the same thing could be said about all bullying. You’re getting bullied on the internet? Turn off the computer. Getting bullied at your office? Quit. At school? There’s other schools.

Closing your front door is just as easy as going offline…so now, I’m not so sure. It’s hard for me to imagine someone on the internet making me commit suicide. I don’t think that could be the only reason. However, it can easily drive a sensitive, insecure and troubled person over the edge. That’s why I like pages such as Fluther, where bullying is less accepted.

As to the original question…it’s hard to define. I think this may be a time for the infamous “I know it when I see it.”

@Coloma, If I recall correctly, the case @LornaLove is referring to included lots of online posts about the young woman AND everyone at the school she was going to were reading these posts, treating her with derision, and even physically assaulting her. Fluther does have rules against personal attacks, and the fact they can leave deep wounds is part of the reason why.

To answer @pleiades’ question, in my opinion, Fluther’s rules have it about right. Feel free to be brashly opinionated. Right or wrong, it’s your prerogative to hold a strong opinion and to express is forcefully. The line is crossed when one steps away from explaining and defending their opinion and moves into personal attacks on others who do not share said personal opinion.

@ETpro I agree that is very sad.

@longgone Agree with ” I know it when I see it” but….being the internet we are not mystics and are not responsible if our opinions push someone over an already precarious edge.
Being an anonymous vehicle for communication that places far too big of a burden on innocent people. If I tell someone I think their thinking is skewed and they decide to stick a gun up their left nostril, well….their issues are far deeper than a few words typed across a an internet forum.

The schoolgirl situations are invariably situations in which the online bully translates directly into in-person bullying.

I think I might have been one of the early victims of online bullying. When I was in high school in the early aughts, the concept of the “slambook” came back, and for the first time, they were online – so the teachers couldn’t steal them away like they could a notebook being passed from snobby teenage girl to snobby teenage girl.

So, everyone saw what was being said about everyone else. Except me. The people posting against me obviously weren’t going to tell me about it, and my one or two friends shielded me. Finally, one person told me that, among many, many absolutely horrid things she wouldn’t go into, I had been voted “Person Most Likely to Blow Up the School”. This came back later on in the year when the yearbook looked for nominations for Senior Superlatives. It was a write-in category.

High school is hell if they want to make it hell for you.

I like the internet because here I can choose who to spend my time with. I spend my time on Fluther because we don’t allow bullying-like language and personal attacks. We like our conversations at least nominally on topic. And people are generally helpful and friendly. If these things weren’t true, I wouldn’t cry bullying, I’d just go somewhere else.

I think a big aspect of bullying is the inability to escape.

During the last decade, we have grown into a society where millions of adolescents constantly carry and monitor ‘smart’ devices which allow many of the “not so smart” kids to post almost anything they want about someone without fear of being held accountable for it.

The mother of the young girl who swan-dived off the cement tower in Lakeland was fully aware of how much torment her 12-year-old daughter was enduring because of this, and her solution was to keep moving and changing schools.

Reports say that the girl was in her bedroom exchanging texts like mad on the night before she killed herself.

Was there a ‘smarter’ solution than moving around while allowing this young girl continue using her ‘smart’ phone ??

It’s really not that complicated….

With friends and acquaintances, the harsh dialogue isn’t all you get. There are other elements in the interactions that buffer harsh opinions, like friendship, caring, camaraderie, sharing of experiences creating a past, sharing of common interests, and the energetic interchange that can only happen in person.

When you’re on line, the question or dialogue you share on that issue is IT a great deal of the time. There is no buffering, no innate caring, no endearment born of sharing life. The other person is embodied within your imagination and the words that stream across a virtual canvas. The exception is when you develop a friendship with the person on line.

On line, in a forum of strangers who also have strong opinions, there is no buffering factor. A person could express a harsh opinion to a friend, then smile and give them a slap on the back. This injects caring and buffers words.

Plus, the reason that, for many people, it has always been easier to write something than just try and speak it to another, is that the distance, and being alone with yourself allows for an objectivity. This objectivity lends courage to speak one’s truth. It can also desensitize a person, if they are not aware of the power of words and are caught up in the passion of their own convictions.

Our society has been gifted by technology with the ability to become partially robotic, virtual if you will. I say ‘gifted’ with a great deal of sarcasm. The furry to write words off the top of one’s head ls like a surfer riding a wave. There are more waves to ride, but when does one go down into the immense beauty and mystery of the ocean? Technology is weening the ability to dive into the depth of the moment, and replacing it with the slippery, shifting floor of I’m here, doing this and right now I think this and blah blah blah. This keeps thought and communication on a very superficial level, unless of course, one uses the tools of technology to express deep thought.

Deep thinkers luxuriate in the silence.

The line, in my opinion between bullying and a strong opinion is when it becomes personal. Bullying draws attention to the person, rather than remaining on the points of the issue. I am of course speaking about communicating over issues on line with a stranger. When you watch a debate, you can see the difference I am talking about. There is not bleeding over into personal attack.

Bullying that goes on in our culture is born of the insecurity and self devaluation bullies themselves feel. Bullying is an echo of either a conviction of superiority or self devaluation. Either way, it speaks to the atmosphere in which these kids grow up. They aren’t born bullies.

The solution is to teach kids from a very early age about how the mind works, and the innate beauty and value of unique expression in the world. Sadly, there aren’t enough enlightened adults out there to do that.

The kid who do have this advantage, are loving, caring, creative and accepting. They grow up to be adults who know how to guide and nurture a young child, and, who do not themselves bully others anywhere, at anytime.

Interesting question; interesting answers.

(Opinionate and therefore opinionating are not existing verb forms. You must use opine or opining.)

Well, that’s just your opinionation, Gail….

^^ Don’t forget that I am the opinionator-in-chief here, and I also have a big cat with sharp claws.

Yes, ma’am

(skulks away…..)

See PM.

I keep getting lucky in this minefield of a place. One of these days, you will see little pieces of me all over that submarine at the top….

^^ What a waste. If you are bent on self-destruction, better in freshly-pressed cider or pie.

I wouldn’t exactly say ‘bent on it’. It’s more like…..resigned to it. Besides, I could use the rest….

( mmmm…....pie…..)

^ cannibal

What was it, Clarice ?.....What was it ??........Was it a dream….?

Yesssss…

Things migrate from brash or harsh opinions, to bullying when the reason for the comment is to demean the person who made it, while getting a slap on the back from supporters to further legitimize the ”cyber slap”; as if to say ”I owned you”. If you can make a hard point, even if it was blunt, if it was to further the conversation but had no personal animosity behind it, I don’t think it crosses that line…too bad that is not understood often here.