Case Study 2: Bullying: The Amanda Todd Story

Case Study 2: Bullying: The Amanda Todd Story

CRJ 180: Juvenile Delinquency and Justice

Bullying: The Amanda Todd Story

In a society of information, an epidemic has taken over our country. Those who are most effected are those who are still searching to find out who they are. This disease is called bullying, a bully can be defined as a person that seeks to harm, intimidate or one that oppress ones they perceive as weak. This has led an increased amount of teen suicides. According to an article posted on the organic agency nearly 43 percent of kids have been bullied online, and 1 and 4 of these children have had it happen more than once. This trend seems to worsen more and more each year. Especially with technology be unmonitored in the hands of teenagers. This same article reports that only a staggering 1 and 10 teens report it to their parents.

It seems every day on social media a news outlet is reporting suicide death of juveniles as a result of bullying. Amanda Todd is a great example of how a choice that seems harmless at the time can destroy the psyche of a person. Like most girls in middle school she enjoyed chatting online with friends as well as meeting new people, nothing can be more innocent. In a webcam chat group, she begins talking with some other kids, after they begin calling her beautiful and stunning asked her to show her breast on camera. After a year of them asking her to she finally decided to show her breast on camera. This would lead to a series of negative events to begin to unfold in the life of 7th grade Amanda Todd.

One day she received a message from a boy attempting to black mail her into sending more nudes. She states in her story that she had no clue who he was or how he found her. He explained to her that if she doesn’t put on a show for him online that he would send her boob pictures around online. After some time, she got a knock on her door from the police stating that her nude picture had surfaced online, this caused her to lose the respect of her peers and lose all her friends. This led her into a deep depression, as a result of the bullying and she began cutting herself to deal with the pan she had experienced. In this story alone she encountered three types of bullying. Cyber bullying, emotional bullying as well as sexual bullying. There is a lot that can be learned from this story aside from what she learned on a personal level. One of the first issues with this story I had was parent presence, it seemed to me that her parents had no idea of her social media activities or took the time find out. I came to this conclusion in the first part of the story, she was in chat rooms with guys taking her clothes off. It is a parent’s job to protect and watch over the activity of their youth. As a 7th grader I was baffled by the fact that she had this type of online unregulated freedom. Maybe if Amanda’s parents took the time to monitor her this whole thing could have been avoided. Parental supervision would be my strategy one.

Even after the first incident they continued to allow her to have this freedom, which led to her hooking up with a guy, and getting embarrassed again at a different school. The whole purpose of her changing schools was for a fresh start to deal with the previous issues she was having. I also think there could have been a level of counselling to help her get through her emotional issues that she had, Counseling is a great way to allow a person to cope as well as properly channel emotions, lack thereof caused Amanda to fall victim a second time but on a much grander scale. It also led to her attempted suicide and her not wanting to live anymore. She even drank bleach to try and numb her pain. In her mind death was a better choice, consequences she faced from two bad choices that led to bullying.

Children need the protection of loved ones, to get them through life. It is the responsibility of everyone close to them to ensure the have not only the guidance they need, but protection an environment that they feel safe in. As well as an open-door policy in the home. Amanda had so much bottled emotion that she almost died. As a child she was just doing what teens do, they act they often don’t consider or understand the consequences of actions they take. This story represents what millions of school children face every day, they need all the tools thy can to combat bullies, teachers and administration alike. The federal website for bullying had this to say,“When adults respond quickly and consistently to bullying behavior, they send the message that it is not acceptable. Research shows this can stop bullying behavior over time.” 

Source

ChisVideos. (2012, October 11). Amanda Todd’s Story: Struggling, Bullying, Suicidal, Self-harm [Video file].http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej7afkypUsc. ;

Source

ChisVideos. (2012, October 11). Amanda Todd’s Story: Struggling, Bullying, Suicidal, Self-harm [Video file].http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej7afkypUsc. ;

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
https://www.stopbullying.gov/