Beatbullying is training hundreds and hundreds of
CyberMentors across the UK, and young people from every part of the country are
accessing the site to get help.Here are
just a few of the cases that CyberMentors have seen so far:
Jane, 14, used MySpace to keep in touch with her mates. However, she started to receive nasty messages
posted on to her profile from some other girls in her school, commenting about
her size and hair colour, making fun of her because of the way she looked.So went online and contacted one of her
school’s CyberMentors, Kathy. Kathy
looked at the postings on MySpace and printed off the details, encouraging Jane
to do the same. She also clicked through
to the user, called Emily, who had sent the message and discovered that Jane
was not the only person Emily was bullying. Through her research Kathy was able
to identify four separate bullying posts and nasty comments made to different
pupils by Emily. Kathy reported the collection of incidents to the appointed
school staff member. The incidents were taken up with Emily and the matter
resolved.
Danielle was on Bebo when she discovered that someone
else had set up a profile in her name, and had posted pictures of her, with
rude comments about her. Other people
at her school had been on the site and added nasty comments too.Danielle contacted the CyberMentors website
and was emailed some safety information.She reported the site to Bebo, and got email support from a CyberMentor
counsellor, who also contacted Bebo to remove the page.
Chris was getting hate texts on a weekly basis from anonymous
numbers, and then found out that someone from his school had taken a photo of
him on is mobile and posted it online, where people had made comments and
laughed at him.He got in touch with a
CyberMentor, but didn’t want it to be reported and didn’t think it was worth
the hassle.The CyberMentor kept an eye
on it and is still in touch with Chris in case he changes his mind.
