Cyberbashing

CYBERBASHING is the most frequent form of cyberbullying and is evidenced when a target is assaulted, hit or harassed while a group of bystanders film the scene with a phone camera and then disseminate the images and footage on the web. 

Digital prevarications are the order of the day and are used by youth in order to humiliate, attack and denigrate others, many of which are unknown to most adults.

These are forms of violence, often acted out in group, in which physical force is used with the intent to hurt: children punching and kicking each other, girls beating each other and pulling each other's hair while others stand by and watch what happens, without intervening, except to comment and to incite them to continue, while they record it all behind a smartphone screen. The videos are then posted on groups and pages with the hashtag WorldStar, spread all over the world in order to be visible and popular, to receive likes, comments and shares on an attention-grabbing video.

The most alarming aspect is the sharing, appreciation and incitement to hatred on the net: in no time, in fact, the videos reach thousands of views and likes. No one intervenes; on the contrary, most of those who view these videos are as if they were watching a film, laughing, enjoying themselves, commenting with insults and sharing, fuelling the phenomenon.

The pages where these videos are collected have been flagged and closed several times but then reopened under other names, so that most of the videos can still be found on the web, triggering a very powerful contagion effect.

There is a risk of encouraging a normalisation, a greater acceptance of such behaviors by those who are already prone to this type of violence. There is also a deep deresponsibility in those who watch and do nothing because they do not feel personally involved, because they cover themselves behind the fact that 'it is not them who are fighting'. The screen also dehumanises, strips away feelings and emotions in those who do not put themselves in the victim's shoes and show no solidarity with them.

There is a total lack of awareness of what they are doing both to themselves and to others, failing to understand the limit between play, fun, prevarication and violence. There is a lack of education on all fronts, which must also involve all those spectators who, if they intervened immediately and if they did not share, could at least stem this type of violent phenomenon.