Cyberbullying

We went to http://www.netsmartz.com and had to watch one of four videos that was posted on the website. I watched the video "Cyberbullying:You can't take it back part 2". It was about a boy who went on a website with his friend to rate the girls in his school. He thought it was a joke between him and his friend but the next day, the list was all over his school. There were girls who were upset over the list. His sister was also rated without his knowing and she stopped looking at him. The friend got suspended, and he might also get kicked out of school.

The boy shouldn't have gone on the website because his friend encouraged him. Now he is in a lot of trouble and he wishes he had never went there. If he knew his sister was rated he probably would have stopped this from happening. He should have realized what this would do to everyone before doing it.

What would you do?

In health class we heard a story about a girl who knew another girl that got pregnant with a man who wasn't her boyfriend. The girl's friend asked her what was wrong, then after hearing it decided to tell the boyfriend. The girl stopped him from doing that and decided to have someone else tell him. Then our teacher asked us what we would do if we were in that situation and I said I would probably try to tell someone.

Project Rehab

There is a program called Project Rehab that helps people get over addictions to drugs. It was founded in 1968 by Dr. Bill Kooistra and Dr. Chet Maternowski. Dr. Kooistra was inspired to found the program after a minister called to ask him to help someone get over their addiction to heroin. The two doctors decided to help other people who had addictions. In 2008, their website, http://www.projectrehab.org, posted forty of their success stories to celebrate 40 years of improving lives. One of their workers came to our school and we had to ask him two questions. I asked him how long he has been working there and does he like it there. You can learn mare about them by calling 776-0891 or going to their website that I mentioned.

Warning Signs

There are ways you can tell if a child you know is being bullied. Some of those signs are if they are afraid of going to sch00l, has unexplained injuries that they didn't have before school, has bad dreams frequently, and many other signs. If the bullying gets really bad then they might try to get out of going to school, may start thinking about suicide, and get depressed all the time. You can find out if your child is being bullied by talking to either them or their teachers.

Resources

We had to find three different resources in Michigan that help protect you from sexual violence and other abuses. One place you can go to is R.A.I.N.N. which stands for Rape Abuse & Incest National Network. They tell people what to do in case they are being sexually assaulted. You can get to them by going to their website at http://www.rainn.org.

R.A.I.N.N. also has a hotline called the National Sexual Assault Hotline. When someone is being assaulted, the victim can call their number to get help. You can call them at 1-800-656-HOPE. There is information about the hotline on the R.A.I.N.N. website mentioned above.

There is an organization called Springtide Resources that helps raise awareness against abuse to women. They help find ways to have people stop harassing women and protect them from abusers. You can call them at (416)968-3422. You can also go to their website at http://www.settlement.org.

Michigan laws about sexual harassment

In Michigan, there are laws that deal with sexual harassment. We found out what they are and what the penalties are on http://www.legislature.mi.gov. There are four degrees of harassment and the worst one is the first degree. The first three degrees are considered felonies and the fourth is a misdemeanor.

The first degree is when the abuse happens to someone under the age of 13, helped by someone, and had a weapon. The punishment is 25 years to life in jail without parole, or electronic monitoring. The second degree is like the first degree, only the punishment is up to 15 years, or electronic monitoring. The third degree is abuse between ages 13 and 16. The punishment is 15 years in prison. The fourth degree is when it happens to a relative and the punishment is prison for 2 years and a $500 fine.

These laws seem fair to me. People should realize that harassment is bad, and maybe these laws will help them realize that.

An Example of Bullying

There is an article about a boy who gets bullied a lot on nytimes.com. The boy from the article has been bullied since age 12. The bullies beat him up, say mean things about him on the Internet, and write insults about him in his school books. He tells his parents and they try to stop these from happening. The school doesn't usually help keep him safe. His parents once sued one of the bullies.
This could happen to any kid that is different from everyone else. Schools should make sure this doesn't happen to anyone.

Three Definitions

There are three things we had to define in Health class. We had to define bullying, sexual violence, and sexual harassment. Bullying is when one kid picks on another kid doing things such as hitting, scratching and saying bad things about them. When a boy bullies someone, they usually tease, trip them, name call, steal lunch money, and do other mean things. Girls usually ignore someone or exclude someone from a group of friends.

Sexual violence is when someone acts inappropriately toward someone from the opposite sex. This is done through threats, intimidation, and inappropriate behavior toward them. The victims are usually female. People are usually this way because they saw violence as a kid or having friends that act this way.

Sexual harassment is someone who does something inappropriate to another person, usually of the opposite sex. People are encouraged to get help to stop the harassers if this is happening. If if the harasser is someone who works with the victim, then the victim could tell the boss. If not, then the victim should call the police.

Video Game Violence

It is probably true that violent video games get people used to violence. If video games were less violent, people would probably get less violent, and maybe there would be less fighting in real life. There was a test done with 257 college students. One group of students played a violent video game for 20 minutes and another played a nonviolent game for the same amount of time. After 20 minutes were up, their heart rates were tested. Both groups had the same heart rate. Then the students had to see a video of violence in real life. The students who played the violent games had the same heart rate as before, but the ones who played nonviolent games had a faster heart rate. You can read this article at http://www.webmd.com/parenting/news/20060728/video-games-numb-players-to-violence.