More than two million children and young people in this country are affected by cyberbullying. The crime scene is usually the school, as a recent study shows. But the response there is often hesitant.
“Last year a mother came up to me and said: Have you seen a video of our children going around in the class WhatsApp group?” Anja Rößler (name changed by the editors) knows nothing. You will be forwarded the video. In it she sees five girls, including her daughter, all fifth graders, doing a silly dance in front of school. “They were dancing around, doing nonsense, making a bit of a fool of themselves,” said Rößler.
But what she immediately notices: The girls’ faces have been given stickers. A goat. A clown. A pig. And there are derogatory comments under the video. “”You’re too stupid to dance,’ it said. ‘You’re totally ugly’ or ‘Look how the fat woman moves’. It was very insulting,” says Rößler.
A gauntlet for those affected
The following day she confronts the girl who made the video. “She then told me that she had already uploaded it to TikTok and YouTube. And it had already gotten a lot of likes and been shared,” said Rößler. This is the beginning of her daughter’s first experience as a victim of cyberbullying. And a real gauntlet.
Because the video quickly spreads throughout the school. The then ten-year-old was the talk of the school hallways for several days – and she suffered because of it.
School crime scene
Many thousands of children and young people feel the same way as Anja Rößler’s daughter the study “Cyberlife V – tension between fascination and danger” suggested, which was presented by the Karlsruhe Alliance against Cyberbullying.
According to the study, at least two million students in Germany have fallen victim to cyberbullying. The frightening thing is that in most cases the crime scene is the school. “Unfortunately, the problem at school has increased compared to 2022,” reports Uwe Leest from the Alliance Against Cyberbullying. “Almost 70 percent of teachers now say that they are no longer able to deal with this issue at school. In 2022, only 42 percent said that.”
“The key is the parents”
In fact, even in elementary school, twelve percent of the children surveyed said that they had been bullied online at some point. A development that is hardly surprising, as more and more children and young people have their own smartphone or other internet-capable cell phone at a young age.
According to the study, students spend 3.4 hours on the Internet every day. And only a few parents (14%) say they have a lot or very much control over their children’s use of this device. But that is exactly the core of the problem, says Uwe Leest:
“The key is the parents. If you give a child a cell phone with internet, you have to teach them how to use it. It’s like learning to swim. You don’t throw a child into the water and say ‘take a swim’. You take it by the hand, give it a swimming ring, empower it.”
One in four young people has suicidal thoughts
And above all, empowerment includes pointing out the dangers – and the emotional injuries that careless use of cell phones can cause. One in four young people surveyed in the cyberbullying study stated that they had even had suicidal thoughts due to bullying. That’s 500,000 students who have considered whether they should take their own lives – because they can no longer stand the pressure from social networks.
The main way hate and malice are spread appears to be WhatsApp (77%), followed by TikTok (57%), Snapchat (50%) and Instagram (45%). All social media, which creates the opportunity to attack someone without having to look them in the eye. “If you are physically bullied and cry, then the perpetrators will probably leave you. But you can’t see the tears that are cried online,” says Uwe Leest.
In most cases, the victims know the perpetrators
The paradox: The majority of cyberbullying does not happen anonymously. In most cases, the victims know their attackers. Anja Rößler’s daughter also knew who was agitating against her online. It didn’t help much. The parents weren’t available and the school didn’t want to help at first. “They were overwhelmed, didn’t know what to do with it, and dismissed it,” says Anja Rößler. “They had no guidelines on what to do in such a case.”
It was only thanks to Anja Rößler’s persistence that a round table finally took place with affected parents, the school management and the police. This makes it clear what criminal consequences cyberbullying can have if it is reported.
Overall, Uwe Leest complains, the issue is still being neglected politically in Germany. He would like to have his own law against cyberbullying: “We are primarily concerned with the deterrent character that such a law can have. A separate law gives the perpetrators a clear signal that what you are doing is not fun, it is punishable .”
Mobile phone bans in schools – a way out?
Anja Rößler has now found a way to protect her daughter at least at school: “As of this school year, we have two schools here where cell phones are banned. The cell phones are locked in cell phone safes in the morning before school starts and the students only get them afterwards End of school again.”
In fact, more and more schools in Germany are discussing making schools a cell phone-free space. A move that Uwe Leest also supports: “We have to make the school room what it actually is: a room for learning and not a room for sending messages from the fifth row to the first row. If we can do it, “We would help many people by making schools a space of mutual respect again.”
