Authors:
Hermawati, Amidah Tsaliswati, Tatu Zakiyatun Nufus
Psychology faculty of UIN Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta, Indonesia
Introduction
Social media is a platform that smartphone users widely use. If it is used properly, social media will be very useful, but on the contrary, if not used properly, it will cause crimes such as Cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is a series of acts of intimidation and harassment through technological devices, with the hope of hurting the victim's feelings, through messages, and images that are widely disseminated so that the victim becomes depressed and embarrassed. This paper analyzes the impact of cyberbullying in real life because there are still many people who are not aware of the impact of this phenomenon. In fact, cyberbullying has claimed many victims such as Sulli, Megan Meier, and VM. Unicef has explained that the impact on victims is psychological, social, and school life. The purpose of the author using this topic is to make people aware that social media activities that are not used properly will harm victims. This paper also contains invitations and solutions so that we can minimize and even stop the incidence of cyberbullying so that there are no more victims.
Today's technology is increasingly sophisticated, social media has become a familiar thing for people, especially in Indonesia. Social media algorithms are indeed very tempting for their users. However, behind it all, there are negative impacts caused by social media. One of the most common occurrences on social media is cyberbullying, either against famous influencers or even ordinary users. Cyberbullying is a situation that can happen to anyone.
Cyberbullying can take the form of negative or indecent comments, cornering one party and then demeaning them, spreading profiles or social media account posts, and then making fun of them. Of course, this can have a serious impact on social media users who experience it. The impact tends to be psychological. There have been many cases that have occurred due to cyberbullying and the most severe is suicide.
The purpose of the author taking the title of the topic "The impact of cyberbullying on life in the real world" is because this problem cannot be ignored, Indonesian people, especially those who use social media, need to realize that this problem is not trivial. This paper will discuss the impact that will occur if someone experiences Cyberbullying and find out how the sentences uttered on social media greatly affect a person's life. The author hopes that this paper can be useful for anyone who reads and gives new insight into cyberbullying.
Cyberbullying is a socially deviant behavior that has many negative impacts on its victims, such as emotional disturbances (Patti and Hidayanto, 2020), mental damage and the creation of psychological conditions that lead to depression, sadness, disappointment, anxiety, and even suicide (Rahayu, 2012 in Malihah and Alfiasari, 2018). Victims of cyberbullying are almost twice as likely to commit suicide as adolescents who have never experienced cyberbullying (Hinduja and Patchin, 2011; Rahayu, 2013). Weismann's (2016) research shows that the motives for doing this vary widely. Although the largest percentage said it was just for fun, the victims of bullying felt that the impact was real and not fake. However, the lowest proportion said their motivation was just to follow the crowd. This suggests that the external environment has a great influence on people's behavior, especially teenagers. The external environment can also influence bullying to be more widespread or less frequent.
Discussion
Social media is a digital platform that provides facilities for social activities through the internet, social media activities such as uploading and sharing photos and videos, expressing opinions through tweets, exchanging information, communicating, and others. With the existence of social media, the way humans interact with each other has changed. Previously, humans only interacted directly in the real world, now interactions between humans can be done only through a technology called smartphones and using applications developed such as Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and so on.
According to data released by the Asosiasi Penyelenggara Jasa Internet Indonesia (APJII), the number of Internet users in Indonesia is increasing significantly every year. More specifically, the latest national survey results in 2019 reached 196,714,070.8 million (73.7%) of Indonesia's population.
Along with the development of technology, the Internet can provide information that is widespread, diverse, and easy to collect. As a means of online communication, the Internet can also be used as a means of intelligent communication through social media. Therefore, it is very useful in various aspects of life, both in the economic, social, and cultural fields, thanks to the internet virtual communication can be easily carried out effectively. This media is very interesting because it can categorize and present various types of entertainment today such as games, movies, and music, and can be used at any time without having to refer to a broadcast schedule like a TV show. (Annisa Rahmania et al. 2010)
With so many internet users who certainly play social media, it will have a positive impact if utilized properly. However, along with the positive impact, social media also has a negative impact caused by bad activities including judging, shaming, hurting, and threatening. This can be said to fall into the category of cyberbullying.
The crime of bullying can be defined in similar terms, cyberbullying is a series of acts of intimidation and harassment through technological devices, with the hope of hurting the feelings of the victim, through messages, and images that are widely disseminated to cause the victim depression and embarrassment. (Terry Brequet, 2010).
Internet offenders are influenced by several factors that motivate a person to commit such acts, such as revenge, piracy, theft, or just for fun. As a motivated offender, that is just a prank called bullying (Kartini Kartono, 2013).
Unicef explained that 3 impacts occur to victims of cyberbullying. The first impact occurs in the psychological impact, this causes the victim to be easily angry, feelings of anxiety, easy depression to suicide attempts. The second impact occurs in the social environment, the victim will withdraw from the environment, lose confidence and be more aggressive to friends or family. The third impact occurs in school life, declining academic performance, low attendance rates and causing problematic behavior at school.
Nowadays, crime does not only occur in the real world, but in the world of social media as well. The crimes that occur are not trivial and cannot be ignored, considering that the impact of cyberbullying can be so fatal in real life. It is unfortunate if social media should be used for useful things such as interacting and exchanging information, but must go hand in hand with the phenomenon of bullying that can hurt others, even to the point of causing fatal impacts such as suicide. Some examples of cases that occurred due to cyberbullying are as follows:
An example of a case of cyberbullying that was widely discussed among netizens was the Sulli case in South Korea. At that time, Sulli was found lifeless by her manager. According to Yonhap News Agency, the woman whose real name is Choi Jin-ri was saved late by the medical team. The former groupmates of Amber Liu and Krystal Jung often receive bullying from netizens. She was attacked by malicious comments and rumors online and this was the cause of her departure from the group that raised her.
"She's really on drugs, she eats her own shit", "You ruined F(x)'s image with your behavior, "What a spoiled idol and so selfish."
The hatred towards Sulli for leaving F(x) returned when Sulli was reportedly unable to attend a music event in Korea due to her declining health condition. From the news, netizens blasphemed and created absurd rumors surrounding Sulli's absence from attending Korean music events. Previously, Sulli also admitted that she had a psychiatric illness in the form of panic disorder and social phobia. In fact, she had received intensive treatment for her mental disorders. The mental burden she has experienced coupled with the cyberbullying that constantly intimidates her, can be a trigger for suicide.
Then there is the case of Megan Meier. One day, Megan received a message on MySpace from a 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans. Megan, who was often the victim of bullies at school, became increasingly familiar with Evans even though the two had never met in person. From her cyber-friendship with Evans, Megan felt like she was 'alive' again.
But things changed when Evans inexplicably sent a message, which triggered Megan to end her life. "I don't know if I want to be friends with you anymore, because I heard your bad attitude with your friends," Evans' message read. Just 20 minutes after receiving the message, her parents found Megan hanging herself with a belt in her room. She died the next day after experiencing breathing problems.
Last, there is the case of A man with the initials VM (26) decided to commit suicide. The victim was found by his parents when he entered the house after traveling. This happened in ciledug, Tangerang city. Before VM committed suicide, he had admitted on social media Twitter that he had committed sexual harassment. The confession was uploaded on March 11, 2022 at 23:39 WIB. Then there were other accounts that revealed VM's personal information so that VM was bullied. This is thought to have influenced VM to feel depressed.
The cases exposed are just a few examples of the impact of cyberbullying. In fact, the fingers that we use, which God has bestowed upon us can mentally 'kill' many people if we misuse them. In essence, cyberbullying should not be done because it can cause psychological and emotional damage to a person. In addition, it violates ethics and social norms, and damages relationships between individuals, creating division and hatred. Social media is used as a medium or intermediary for voicing opinions. Each individual's self-awareness in listening to opinions from various points of view, and not bullying or judging others can minimize this cyberbullying. Besides that, Education is one of the right tools to influence the younger generation and prevent and overcome cyberbullying. Character education based on moral intelligence needs to be further developed. This is because the formation of good attitudes and behaviors is not enough to achieve academic competence, but most importantly through the cultivation of morals and the achievement of personal character (Setiawan, 2013).
Conclusion
Cyberbullying is one of the crimes that occur in the era of technological development. Although it occurs on social media, the impact experienced by victims is very influential in real life. The impact affects psychology and the social environment and if the victim is still in the world of education, this is very influential on his school life. This phenomenon does not look at certain people, everyone can be affected by cyberbullying.
Many of these cyberbullying actions are based on jokes and pranks, but without realizing it, these actions can become a form of cyberbullying. Furthermore, the research findings regarding people's attitudes when facing the phenomenon of cyberbullying show that people still have little awareness to take decisive action to stop such acts or report such acts. In addition, our lack of knowledge about the phenomenon of cyberbullying is also one of the reasons why this behavior is still so prevalent.
Seeing the many cases of cyberbullying, including the cases that befell Sulli, Megan Meier, and VM, should be able to make social media users realize that social media activities used inappropriately can result in mental death and damage one's life. Therefore, self-awareness when using social media is very important to prevent cyberbullying. Social media users need to think clearly, listen to different points of view, and refrain from judging.
References
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