Ryan Patrick Halligan. Megan Meier and now, Phoebe Prince; all three were victims of bullying, both online and in person, and all three subsequently committed suicide.
Bullying isn’t something new, it’s something that kids have had to face for decades, maybe even centuries. Kids taunt others for things like the way someone dressed or their glasses. Schoolyards are littered with this sort of activity, but since the Internet and new technologies have permeated into our everyday lives, it seems as though bullying has progressed with it.
Now, bullies stand behind the protective shield of a social medium, be it a computer through instant message or a cell phone through texting. They are invincible with the protection of some form of technology between them, and they’re ruthless.
Ryan was initially teased for having a learning disorder. His bullies decided to befriend him to get personal information out of him. They then turned and made assumptions about him and accused him of being gay. He started talking to a popular girl from his school online to try and douse the rumors, but she had only pretended to like him. In front of a group of people at school, she called him a loser. The bullying continued, and on Oct. 7, 2003, Ryan went into his bathroom and hanged himself. He was 13. A few weeks later, Ryan’s family found the archived IM conversations on his computer.
Megan met a 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans on MySpace in 2006. She thought he was cute from looking at his picture, and they started exchanging messages. Her family even began to notice that she was happier. But Josh Evans was not a 16-year-old boy. Josh Evans was actually Lori Drew, the mother of one of Megan’s classmates. Drew, her daughter and her 18-year-old employee Ashley Grills, created the account to get private information out of Megan to retaliate because Megan allegedly spread gossip about Drew’s daughter. How adult of her.
“Josh” began sending Megan mean messages on Oct. 15, 2006. The last message he sent to her read: “Everybody in O’Fallon knows how you are. You are a bad person and everybody hates you. Have a shitty rest of your life. The world would be a better place without you.” Megan hanged herself on Oct. 17, 2006; she was three weeks shy of 14.
Phoebe is one of the latest victims of cyber bullying. She was bullied by a group of popular mean girls at her high school over a senior boy she was dating. She moved to the United States from Ireland just a few weeks before the school year started. She had been relentlessly teased and harassed by these girls in person and through text messages. They posted messages online about her as well, and on Jan. 14, Phoebe went home and hanged herself. Her 12-year-old sister found her in a closet. She was just 15.
When will it end? And what will it take for lawmakers to realize that this is a huge epidemic in our society? The viciousness of these teens was unrelenting and, in the plainest word, cruel. And it’s probably still happening as we speak. This behavior, though largely online, also happened in the school halls. Something could have been done to prevent these tragedies.
Legislation in Massachusetts, Phoebe’s home state, is currently being pushed to create anti-bullying laws. But it’s not enough. Tolerance needs to be enforced and instilled in children. What parent would stand aside and allow their child to behave like that toward another? It’s simply unacceptable. For years from elementary school to middle school, I was teased for silly things from my appearance to my intelligence. And there were others around me who dealt with the same things. It hurt, but I know it didn’t hurt as much as it does for others.
Blame cannot be placed on one individual in any of these instances, and I know there’s nothing that could have been done to change the outcome of these stories. But something can change for the future. We can begin to be more tolerant in ourselves, and hopefully teach that to the coming generations. It’s small, but it’s something.
