The Power of The Internet

[MidnightCowboy]

Although this is a worst case scenario, this type of affect on peoples lives is sadly increasing.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12844673

[wdhpr]

It appears the main motivation that caused this person to snap was the bullying he received on the Internet's chat boards. Sadly the bullying defense has been used by high school students to justify killing as many innocent students as possible.

There are two frames of thought in my country on how to deal with bullying.

Prohibit all types of bullying period.

Allow people to grow up learning how to deal with bullying.

In my opinion they both have merit. Although I hate bullies and stopped it when ever I seen it occurring there is something about enabling a person especially young school children to learn how to deal with it. Real life experience can not be underestimated. A skill that can not be learned from a book or over the Internet.

I know people that have replaced real life socializing with FaceBook, My Space or irc chat channels.
Sadly I believe they lose important social skills in the process.

I didn't know Japan had the death penalty

Wdhpr

[MidnightCowboy]

Originally Posted by wdhpr

I didn't know Japan had the death penalty

Me neither

Although I'm no longer practicing, as a psychologist I was already picking up the pieces of internet addiction along with drugs and everything else before I left the UK. What is most difficult to comprehend is the rage coming back from parents when you suggest that allowing kids to sit 24/7 in front of a PC is contributing to the problem.

Before this, kids, well most kids anyway, inhabited three distinct environments with school, home (family) and friends (social). Now, for many, constructive family interaction is reducing all the time and their social environment is mostly virtual. The frightening thing is that kids don't comprehend the hurt they cause in a virtual world because they cannot physically see (or feel) the effects. In the real world bullies can only get so far before they make a wrong choice and end up on the floor themselves. In a virtual world however they can continue to provoke pain and fear with impunity.

[wdhpr]

Before this, kids, well most kids anyway, inhabited three distinct environments with school, home (family) and friends (social). Now, for many, constructive family interaction is reducing all the time and their social environment is mostly virtual. The frightening thing is that kids don't comprehend the hurt they cause in a virtual world because they cannot physically see (or feel) the effects. In the real world bullies can only get so far before they make a wrong choice and end up on the floor themselves. In a virtual world however they can continue to provoke pain and fear with impunity.

Sometime I think I'm turning into my grandfather as he used to talk about them long haired hooligans.

Modern technology causes modern problems and we have to learn from scratch how to deal with it. I could write a book on how I think the modern approach of child rearing is causing more harm than good (something grandfather also railed about). But as hard as society tries to prevent bruised feelings the worse things seem to get.

IMHO

If you get a F in math you FAIL

If your team didn't win, sorry but you LOST

Although the effort needs to be praised. Failure is the flip side of success and should be the motivation to do better. Its now gotten so bad some teachers no longer use red because they don't want hurt the students feelings. To put things in perspective, The USA ranks low on student performance while ranking high on money spent per student.
Student performance by country.
Money spent.

I'm sorry what was we talking about again

Cheers
Wdhpr

[MidnightCowboy]

Thanks for the links - interesting read