After seeing a video of a young girl being mercilessly bullied by another, reportedly slightly older girl do the rounds on Facebook, I resigned in the knowledge that I was about to once again witness the Internet responding to a video of heinous bullying by becoming bullies themselves. I wasn’t wrong.
The video, taken in the Scottish county of Fife, sees a 13-year-old girl being repeatedly slapped in the face by another girl, while an assembled crowd of youths encourage her and film her actions on smartphones. Someone spectating the assault can be heard jovially saying: “She’s shaking like a leaf!” It’s difficult to watch, and it’s impossible not to find yourself becoming unreasonably angry at the teenagers’ behaviour.
You can watch the video below, though viewer discretion is advised:
The video was inevitably circulated on Facebook, and Police Scotland have since released a statement saying that a 15-year-old girl has been charged with assault, though for the Internet vigilantes that was not enough. In a Facebook post that has been shared over 100,000 times, the girl’s alleged name has been revealed along with a link to her Facebook page and a photograph of her.
The post reads:
“Everyone share fuck out this so that she will be recognised in the street and battered every time she crosses someone. Nasty cow deserves it battering a 12/13 year old lassie when she’s 16 for something the lassies dad may or may not have done. Thanks.”
This post, and the plethora of comments written beneath it encouraging this violent attitude, is essentially those involved stating their disdain for bullying before engaging in bullying behaviour themselves. It’s them saying: “Bullying isn’t okay, we must show this bully how not okay it is by going ahead and bullying her.” It is nonsensical, short-sighted and, considering that the majority of those commenting appear to be adults, grossly unacceptable when you take into account that the girl involved is 15 years of age.
It is understandable that the behaviour of the 15-year-old would incite anger, but just because the actions of those involved in naming and shaming her aren’t as immediately jarring as the video of her physically assaulting and intimidating someone, doesn’t mean that it’s any more acceptable. Being hounded and cyber bullied by over 100,000 people is hardly the most sensible solution when it comes to dealing with bullying, with it instead showing how bullying can be effective. Just because these individuals are ostensibly on the “right” side of the argument by siding with the 13-year-old victim doesn’t give them the authority to deal out some justice themselves, and it certainly doesn’t warrant a call-to-arms that hopes it will encourage others to “batter” her “every time she crosses someone.”
This is the second time in the past month that a video depicting bullying has attracted the same response, with footage of a 16-year-old girl in Northfield, Birmingham bullying two teenagers having gone viral back in July. After the video was widely circulated on Facebook, the 16-year-old girl’s identity was revealed and she was hounded across various social networks, with further posts of hers in which she claimed that her home had been attacked and her parents had been harassed having been jubilantly shared by others online. There were even Facebook pages set up dedicated to mocking her physical appearance,with them also posting PhotoShopped images that depicted the teenager engaging in sex acts.
It is easier to sympathise with those left so infuriated by the actions of these bullies that they seek to deal out their own version of justice, than it is to sympathise with the bullies themselves. But that isn’t the point. While these teenagers may be thoroughly loathsome individuals who we should hope will see the error of their ways in the future, it isn’t the place of the Internet hivemind to involve itself in a job best left to the proper authorities. Not only that, but seeing grown adults respond to the actions of a bully by rallying up their Facebook friends, before hunting the bullies down online and then issuing them with threats of violence, isn’t exactly the best message to send victims of bullying; it’s essentially telling them that bullying works, and the best method of retaliation against a bully is to become the bully yourself.
