In the year 2022, modern-day media and awareness programs have been working tirelessly to educate people and raise awareness about cyber bullying and related online cyber crimes. Even though the internet and online communities in the world have been around since the turn of the century, still the awareness about these issues is not as widespread as it should be. A major incident which prompted extensive campaigns about cyber crime awareness and cyber bullying education was the suicide of Canadian teenage girl Amanda Todd in the year 2012. Today, as we are about to complete a decade after her death, we again try to understand what drove her to take that decision.
The Incident
Amanda Todd was a Canadian national living with her parents in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada. When she was 12 years of age, she was lured into an online conversation by a man and was flattered into flashing her breasts to him on her webcam. The man took a picture of her breasts and followed her around on the internet for years. He demanded another show from her but when she refused, he dug up her classmates and friends from Facebook and circulated the picture online everywhere. Within days, the picture was all over the internet and Amanda’s world was shaken up. She was subject to extreme abuse in school, slut shaming and various other forms of bullying. She changed her school 4 times after the incident, but it was no different. Battling chronic depression, having regular anxiety attacks and dealing with an extreme case of stress took a toll on her. On 10th October 2012 she posted a video on YouTube holding flash cards and narrating how her life was ruined by someone who exploited her. It was on the same day that she hanged herself at her home.
The Reason: Cyber Bullying
As simple as the term might seem at first glance, cyber bullying is actually much wider in scope than it seems. From the simple act of clicking a picture of someone or writing a mean comment to threatening someone on an online platform publicly, cyber bullying is a deep-rooted crime in cyberspace.
When a cyberbully targets his or her victim, the abuse is done with the purpose of making the victim feel unhappy, ashamed, and worthless. Although studies have found a link involving traditional bullying and depression, it is only recently that people have addressed how cyber bullying may be linked to teen depression in this social media age.
According to research, females experienced more psychological suffering (35.3%) than males after encountering cyber bullying, according to one study (17.1%). Cyber victimization was substantially linked to depression in females, which was linked to suicide attempts.
According to a new study, children and individuals under the age of 25 who are cyber - bullied are more than twice as probable to self-harm and engage in suicidal conduct.
The Cause: Depression
It was not just the incident and the cyber bullying which followed that lead to Amanda taking her own life, it was rather the chronic depression and the extreme stress and anxiety which she was suffering from, that drove her towards this drastic step. Suicide is a major issue that many teenagers encounter. As of 2016, suicide was the second greatest cause of mortality among adolescents in the United States. While homicides among teenagers have declined from 10.4 to 6.6 per 100,000, suicide rates have climbed from 8.0 to 8.7 per 100,000. Furthermore, depression is linked to an increased risk of suicide ideation and actions.
Aside from looking at how depression and suicides are linked, a few research have looked into the link between excessive social media use as well as screen time and depression as suicide-related outcomes. Twenge and colleagues discovered in a 2018 study that adolescents who engage with social media applications, particularly on their phones, had higher rates of mental health problems like despair and suicide ideation than others who spent time on non-screen activities.
Conclusion
A fact that needs elucidation is that a reason and a cause is not the same in this situation. A reason for something is a physical act while the cause is something abstract. As in this case, it can be rightly established that the reason for Amanda’s unfortunate and untimely death was cyber bullying and the cause of her death was the depression and anxiety that followed. As we near almost a decade to her death which is also now recognized as the “World Mental Health Day”, the cyberspace is still filled with such bullies and such incidents. While efforts are made to increase awareness over such issues, Amanda’s contribution to this cause can and shall never be forgotten. Every day, every hour in some part of the world, someone is a victim of cyber abuse and cyber bullying and as much as it is important for people to know that such things happen and exist, it is also important for the victims to know that they are not alone in this, netizens if united, can surely reduce such incidents and make the internet, a safe place for everyone.
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