The rise of online spaces has helped many people express themselves.
People enjoy showing off their talents, hobbies and advice they wish to give others.
However, with creative liberty comes the freedom to be opinionated as well. Far too many users on the internet seem to have a big mouth they just can’t keep shut.
A disheartening, yet prevalent part of online culture is bullying random unsuspecting people for their lifestyle or the things they enjoy doing.
Look into any comment section on any video. Within a few minutes or even seconds of scrolling through comments and replies, you will find hateful comments, usually about the video creator’s looks, opinions or a potential traumatic experience the creator has had.
These comments threaten the well-being of the creator and can turn into self esteem issues and self-destructive thinking.
In these circumstances, confidence suffers dramatically.
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), bullying leads to the development of extreme insecurities and unhealthy defensive mechanisms like self-isolation.
Activities and hobbies you love are no longer the same because the things you happily did before become disturbed by intense anxiety and fears of judgment. Ultimately, the horrible consequence is that you become afraid of expressing yourself for who you are or aspire to be.
Coupled with behavioral changes, mental health is placed at risk of a downward spiral. The mindset cyberbullying fosters often manifest in self-harm.
A study by Boston Medical Center Public Health revealed that the risk of self-harm was six times higher for the ‘bully-victims’.
These awful things happen because being bullied usually makes people feel like they’re not worth spending time on. It’ll make you feel isolated from the community you once felt a part of and ashamed for being the way you are.
This often happens when a new artist posts their art. Instead of being encouraged by more experienced artists, their comment sections are usually full of hateful comments telling them to die or stop doing the activity they so deeply enjoy.
There are also many insensitive comments about people with disabilities that people feel are alright to make due to the anonymity of being online.
People online make videos on their illnesses to spread awareness for other people to understand and sympathize with them. There is nothing wrong with that, but the comment sections for these videos are almost always atrocious.
Comments saying these people are lying about their illness, their illness does not exist, its clout chasing etc can be very dehumanizing things to hear when you are born with something most other people do not have.
People online need to get it together. It is not at all hard to be a decent human being. You may think it’s cute or quirky to be a hater, but you are not being a hater. You are being a bad person.
Things people say will always stay in other people’s minds. Insults are incredibly difficult to forget and can alter the way you see yourself.
This is why the rise of social media has been so controversial among people. It has made bullying as easy as the click of a button with zero repercussions.
No matter how many people you block, people can make new accounts over and over again to harass people they happen to not agree with.
Social media apps need to start enforcing what they preach in their terms of service, they need to start banning bad users for the sake of people’s mental health.
