{"id":1905,"date":"2015-06-10T09:14:45","date_gmt":"2015-06-10T09:14:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.surveycrest.com\/blog\/?p=1905"},"modified":"2018-12-27T06:23:42","modified_gmt":"2018-12-27T06:23:42","slug":"online-harrasment-vs-real-life-discrimination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.surveycrest.com\/blog\/online-harrasment-vs-real-life-discrimination\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Online Harassment Worse than Real-life Discrimination?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Online gaming was supposed to be about knowing your friends and opponents and besting them through sheer tenacity and skills. Online social networks were supposed to be about uniting people all over the world and promoting tolerance. Instead, we need to look at the facts – It is said that about 20% of the youth are cyberbullied during the course of their lives. And as to how your garden-variety bullying is doing in the USA alone, picture this \u2013 there’s 2.7 million schoolyard bullies in a population of 320 million people. When the conversation shifts to racial discrimination<\/strong><\/a>, the level of human depravity and cruelty hits a stratospheric high, reinforcing the view that technological progress and more opportunities have not translated into a more tolerant polity at home and abroad.<\/p>\n

\"Children<\/a>
Source: <\/strong>National Education Association.<\/p>\n

These shocking statistics reinforce that age-old observation about human nature, that it rarely lets everyone live and let live. Egoes, power balance, dictatorial tendencies, and overall aggressiveness are bound to rear their ugly head sooner or later. That dark aspect of human nature gives rise to harassment, mocking, bullying and stereotyping, with subjugation or sadistic pleasure a common goal amongst the abusers.<\/p>\n

Mean behavior is a fact of life. Despite all the awareness and measures that are taken to curb it, it seems that man’s inhumanity to man goes on unabated. And its there, affecting home, schools, workplace, streets, online channels, and refuses to go away.<\/p>\n

Whether the form of harassment is face to face or over the internet, this is an issue that continues to fester and needs to be addressed.<\/p>\n

Real-life Discrimination<\/h2>\n

There are people who call in sick on a workday or a school day, just to avoid a particularly noxious person in their daily life. There are people who are under severe stress, because they know they will be unfairly singled out and ostracized. These are the effects of someone facing real-life discrimination.<\/p>\n

Examples of real-life discrimination can be usually classified into these categories:<\/p>\n

Physical \u2013 <\/strong>any sort of physical attack such as hitting, punching, kicking, spitting, etc. Taking someone’s belongings away also falls into this category.<\/p>\n

Verbal \u2013 <\/strong>making racist, homophobic, sexist jokes, calling names, and abusing someone with offensive remarks are all signs of verbal discrimination.<\/p>\n

Indirect \u2013 <\/strong>Ever heard the term ‘taking behind someone’s back?’ Backbiting, spreading stories and malicious rumors about someone, all these fall into indirect bias.<\/p>\n

Online Harassment \u2013 Digital or Cyber Bullying<\/h2>\n

With the influx of modern-day communication tools and social networks in our everyday lives, people are bound to face strangers that get high on making others miserable over the internet. Even though cyberbullying might not involve face-to-face communication, it is no less harrowing and cringe-worthy than the former.<\/p>\n

\"Online<\/a><\/p>\n

Surveys reveal that the most common forms of cyber bullying are:<\/p>\n