Bullying. Everyone has been through it at least once. Being made fun of. Hands laid on you. Being attacked. Pushed or shoved. Name-calling. They think its harmless fun. But it’s a more serious matter. Bullying and cyber-bullying damage people. Mentally, and in some cases, physically. At times, they go to the point that people transfer schools, or move to different cities. It even goes so far, that many people decide that the only way to escape the torment is to end their life. Bullying needs to stop, or else many innocent people will be forced take their own lives.

Phoebe Prince, a 15 year old girl from County Clare, Ireland, moved to South Hadley, Massachusetts after being bullied in Villiers Secondary School. She hoped to have a better time at South Hadley High School than she did at her old school. She was wrong. DEAD wrong. She started dating a football player in the school, where she got the attention of six girls. Quickly, her life at school became a living hell. She was bullied, taunted by her classmates, and by students in the school that she didn’t even know. Her books were always knocked out of her hands, items were thrown at her, her face was scribbled out of pictures on the school walls, and tormenting texts were sent to her cell phone. On Jan. 14, Phoebe was oppressed in the school library and in a hallway. As she walked home, one of the six girls, dubbed the “Mean Girls” by the Massachusetts papers, threw an empty can of Red Bull at Phoebe. Finally, she had enough. Phoebe walked inside her house and hung herself in the stairwell. I was horrified when I heard about this incident. How could a group of students do such a horrible thing to a new girl from Ireland?

Cyber-bullying is just as bad as regular bullying. It hurts many people, but the difference is that it’s more public. That means more people can see this. An example of this is the story of Rutgers student, Tyler Clementi. Tyler was a freshman at Rutgers University. He lived in a dorm with Dharun Ravi. Tyler was very talented on the violin, apparently. Most of the students claimed that he was really skilled. Clementi was openly gay. On the night of September 19, 2010; Tyler asked Dharun if he could borrow the room so that he could be with his partner. Dharun opened his laptop, with his webcam, opened iChat, and used it so that he could record Tyler. He claimed it was because he was scared of theft. He went to his friend, Molly Wei, and streamed the video. The next day, Tyler found out about the video, and felt that he no longer had any privacy. He requested that he wanted another roommate because he felt violated. The day after that, Tyler asked Dharun if he could use the room again. Dharun recorded the encounter again, and Tyler had enough. On September 22, 2010, Tyler went on the George Washington Bridge, posted on Facebook on his phone, “Jumping off the gw bridge sorry”, and jumped off, drowning himself at the Hudson River. How could someone do a horrible thing to a homosexual? People these days have no privacy at all, these days.

Bullying is a problem that needs to be solved. Many people are taking their own lives because they are being threatened and harassed by people that just think that it’s just fun and games. If you were Phoebe Prince or Tyler Clementi, would you want that problem happening to you?