You agree, right? So do you want to help curb down the recurring instances of online bullying and harassment? Let us start by checking if you take care of the following parameters when you logon to your devices.
Here are 8 ways to avoid being an online bully:
1) If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say it
We understand. It’s a free world and you can say whatever you want to. But how about just being nice to someone who is not necessarily being mean to you? How about not fat-shaming, slut-shaming, race-shaming people and not explicitly calling someone ugly just because you don’t find them attractive? Not don’t know the impact of your words on other people, so it shouldn’t be too hard to
be avoid saying things which are not ‘nice’.
2) Be a good listener
If you’re in an online discussion, just try to hear the perceptions of other people and the points they try to make. Constantly repeating your own set of beliefs in capital letters would not automatically make you right.
3) Stop cussing people out
You do not necessarily have to give a showcase of verbal diarrhea while in an online discussion with someone. You don’t have to cuss celebrities just because they are rich and famous. You don’t have to call someone personal names, because their views on governmental policies is different than that of yours.
4) Accept the fact that people have different opinions
Oh! Thank god, we live in a world full of people with different opinions and takes on things – that way we can always strive to improve on where we might be lacking, while looking at things from just one side. Isn’t that a beautiful thing? Let’s not try to fight that notion.
5) Stop imposing your ideologies on other people
You can believe in whatever religion, culture, ideology you believe in (as long as it’s harmless to other people), but that doesn’t mean every one else has to live by your standards too?! Every individual is allowed to create his own set of principles and rules in life so let us please stop the moral policing.
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6) Stop stalking women (or men)
Not every site is a dating site. Even the dating sites should not have people stalking someone who’s clearly not interested from the first go. You see a beautiful picture, you send a compliment – fine! But can we stop the multiple ‘fraaaaandship’ or ‘sexual’ messages, please? Thank you.
7) Stop calling people names
So easy to get away from a point you might be losing in an argument by calling someone a name (a mean one, particularly). Let us now see if you can do the same without calling someone a ‘snowflake’ or a ‘fag’ or a ‘sissy’ or an ‘anti-national’ – you may actually be right, and you’d realize you never really had to use any of these.
8) Stop labeling people (Stop generalizations)
Not all men are sexual-predators, not all women are after your money, not all people of a certain religion would bomb you, not all people of a certain race would sell you drugs, not all gay men want to sleep with you – so can you please just STOP?
Putting a group of people in a bracket and defining them based on one common aspect is just a narrow way of dealing with reality. We are sure human brains are more capable of that.
As you go through these points you would realize, so many of them also happen to fit the real world. Don’t we wish everyday if the world was filled with more tolerant and loving people?
It would be easier if we start with ourselves.
Sharing is caring. So pass this on.
All Images sourced from: Wikimedia Commons