Actual English with Jennifer

Lesson 101 Cyber Bullying

引言：

Hello,welcome back everyone to actual English.

I'm Jennifer Clyde.

And let's start a brand new category with lesson 101.

Today's topic is Cyber Bullying.

We did talk about bullying a while back,but let's focus on cyber bullying.

There are many different ways of bullying

Bullies bully other kids for no special reason in many cases and that can happen in the cyber world as well,through the net on the internet.

Now,so what happens?

I think especially younger people tend to do this,not so much older generations although some adults do,but I think it happens more among younger people.

People may say mean things to others or mean things about other people,harassing them in the cyber world,for example,it's not just about physically abusing someone,but it's about abusing someone mentally.

That's right.

Really just playing with their minds and harassing people giving them a very very difficult time that sometimes cyber bullying can lead to suicides as well which is very very sad,now which should not happen.

Anyhow that is our topic for today.

Let's find out what we have ready for you in today's actual talk.

Let's listen.

ACTUAL TALK

M:Have you seen the number of cases of cyber bullying increasing on the news these days?

W:Yeah,it's alarmingly high.A lot of children,especially in high school and middle school,they are being targeted,as victims of cyber-bullying.

M:Sure.I think it's a lot easier for the bullies because you don't have to see your victim face to face.You don't quite realize the consequences as well.I'm sure if they knew how badly they were affecting their victims' lives,they would think twice about it.

W:Right,exactly.Like you said,the bully can't see the immediate reaction of the victim and you know when you're hiding behind a screen like that,it's so much easier for the bully to do things that they probably wouldn't do face to face.It's so much easier to build this character because no one's really going to know who did it.They can't really put a face to it.

M:Sure,and that's the thing.When you're like texting someone as opposed to calling them,you'll be more courageous as well,not necessarily in a bad way,but it's the same thing with cyber-bullying.When you typing something,it's' much easier to type things that are out of character.

W:Exactly.And the bully is kind of detached from the person that are bullying,the victim.

M:And in many cases I've seen as well.it starts off almost accidentally.People don't go out there with the purpose of bullying someone,but like in bullying in the flesh,you maybe start out just playfully teasing someone,then others join in,and when it's on a social network site or something like that,it can get out of control and snowball really quickly.

W:Exactly.And the hard thing about things on the Internet is that once it's on there,it's really hard to delete it or take it away. You've seen a lot of politicians fall because they impulsively wrote something online or sent pictures and things like that.But you know,I think there are mechanisms now to attack cyber bullying and make sure it's not going to happen anymore.

M:You've gotta hold the people accountable and then make an example of them so that people don't do it in the future.

W:And I think that parents should also pick up on warning signs or kind of monitor the younger children and their use of the Internet.

M:Yeah.

Actual Expressions(syn.近義詞)

• 單詞
• alarming : disturbing,frightening 令人驚恐的、令人擔(dān)憂的
• snowball : intensify,multiply,escalate,increase 滾雪球般快速增長(zhǎng)
• mechanism : means,method,system 機(jī)制
• pick up on : take notice of,learn 了解
• 詞組
• the number of something is ~
• face to face : in person 當(dāng)面
• can't put a name to 記不起...的名稱（名字）

ACTUAL STORY

Cyber bullying.

Well,for me,it's not really affected me because I was born in 1985 and my generation went from the analog age into the digital age of different social networkings,so I didn't really experience it.

I was in college when I first learned this idea of,like,a"troll" who goes on and says comments like"your mama's fat" or whatever.

But I was already too old to really get offended by it.

Unfortunately,nowadays when you're a lot younger and you didn't see this"older age",apparently kids are committing suicide over it and it's really really depressing.

For me,I don't know what I could personally do to change cyber bullying,but what it probably has to connect to is a cultural movement to eventually get to the point that it's not ok by law as a punishment,but also not ok in your mindset to want it to be better for the entire community basically.