Anti-Bullying Week.....What Would Percy Do?

This week is Anti Bullying Week, and I thought I'd do an entry about Cyber Bullying and what you can do to protect yourself.

If you are on Twitter you may have seen a character on there called @PercyThePigeon who tells a story which has an anti bullying message...the general theme is "What Would Percy Do?" and the answer to that is tell someone you can trust, so they can help you and not to suffer in silence.

As someone who was bullied a lot at school (and in a few workplaces as well) I thought I'd help by doing a blog entry that was about keeping safe in cyberspace...

• MOBILE PHONES

1. If you get a nasty text/video from someone, don't reply to it no matter how hurt or angry it makes you feel.  There are numbers you can contact for your sevice provider (ie Vodafone, O2, Orange etc.) in regards to this.  Check their websites for more details.
2. Be careful who you give your mobile phone number to, only give it out to people you know you can trust.
3. Don't leave your mobile phone lying about unattended around people you do not know or trust, they could get your number, or numbers of other people too.
4. If you do get abusive texts/messages, if you are able to save them to a folder on your phone as proof and tell someone you can trust and will be able to help you.

• INTERNET

1. DO NOT GIVE OUT PERSONAL DETAILS ONLINE!  Yeah, I know it sounds like something so obvious to say, but you would be surprised how many people do!  People can take your details and use them, pretending to be you, and get you in trouble.
2. If you are using an instant messenger, or sites like Facebook or Twitter and you get abuse messages from people, you can block them.
3. Don't reply to abusive messages, you could say something that you regret and that could make the situation much worse.
4. Bully is quite serious, but if it gets really bad try to print off the offensive messages, and if they are on a school network let the teacher who runs it know.

There is a general rule of thumb, and I know it's not easy, but try to ignore the comments.  Most times comments are made so a person will respond, but if the comments are ignored for the most part the people responsible will get bored and leave you alone.

The one thing though, even if you ignore the comments, let someone you cant trust know that someone is sending you horrible messages, it's not right, you don't deserve it and you should never suffer in silence.