Definition

Bullies and mean girls have been around forever, living the 21st century, technology now gives them a whole new platform for their actions.

By hiding behind a pseudonymous user name, they can hide their true identity and do whatever they please. "Cyberbullying" is when a child, preteen or teen is tormented, threatened, harassed, humiliated, embarrassed or otherwise targeted by another child, preteen or teen using the Internet, interactive and digital technologies or mobile phones. Cyberbullying can include such acts as making threats, sending provocative insults or racial or ethnic slurs, gay bashing, attempting to infect the victim's computer with a virus and flooding an e-mail inbox with messages.

Cyberbullying is often done by children, who have increasingly early access to these technologies. (If adults are involved it is called cyber-harassment.) This secrecy of their identity makes it difficult to trace the source. It can also encourage bullies to behave more aggressively than they might in a situation where they were identified. Children have killed each other and committed suicide after having been involved in a cyberbullying incident.

According to Freud's Psychoanalytic theory there are 3 portions in the human mind the conscious, pre conscious and the unconscious. The conscious mind includes everything that we are aware of. This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can think and talk about rationally.The preconscious mind is the part of the mind that represents ordinary memory. It can be retrieved and brought back to consciousness. The unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and memories that outside of our conscious awareness. According to Freud this part of the mind controls our behavior even if we are not aware of the underlying effects it may have on us.It is the driving force of our actions, behavior, attitude, decisions etc.

With this it is possible that cyber bullies must have had experiences that led them to do certain things. Since it is the unconscious mind that leads them to do certain things it is also possible that cyber bullies don't know why they do suck things.

House Bill 5718 or better known as the Anti-Cyber-Bullying Act of 2015 aims to encourage the netizens to be more responsible on the net. If found guilty of commiting cyberbullying a fined penalty of 50000-100000 will be issued and imprisonment of not less than 6 months but not more than 6 years depending on the severity of the act.

Cyberbullying is a real issue and it's time we start acting on it and stop being simple bystanders.