TEXARKANA, Texas. (KTAL/KMSS) – A Texas teen is sharing her experience with bullying in hopes of helping other students who have had to deal with the physical, mental, and emotional damage it causes.
Presley Minton is a student at Texas Middle School, who faced cyberbullying.
Instead of being afraid, she spoke up and said she sees it as a growing issue. Presley said when she was bullied online she reported it to people she trusted, her parents, teacher, and her counselor.
“Basically me personally I have gotten bullied before, a lot of times, and other people that I see around my school get bullied on social media,” Minton said.
Anti-bullying campaigns teach students that there are three R’s to follow when the child is subjected to or witnesses bullying – recognize, respond, and report. Minton’s mother, Kristy Minton said her daughter took the third “R” very seriously and did just that.
“She really wanted to emphasize the ‘report’ side.” Kristy Minton said.
Minton’s confidence to speak up came after talking with her older sibling who was also bullied.
Kristy Minton said Texas Middle School is doing a good job of addressing and cracking down on cyberbullying.
Stopbullying.gov provides tips for parents and students to help them recognize bullying and empowers them to understand appropriate actions to take to end it.
Cyberbullying similar to what Presley Minton suffered often takes place where children believe they have anonymity.
Online bullying can include sending, posting, or sharing negative, harmful, false, or mean content about someone else. It can include sharing personal or private information about someone else causing embarrassment or humiliation. Some cyberbullying crosses the line into unlawful or criminal behavior.
- Social Media, such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Tik Tok
- Text messaging and messaging apps on mobile or tablet devices
- Instant messaging, direct messaging, and online chatting over the internet
- Online forums, chat rooms, and message boards, such as Reddit
- Online gaming communities
Because of the very personal and permanent nature of cyberbullying, stopbullying.org indicates three unique concerns when dealing with online bullying.
It can be persistent since social media and smart devices have no cut-off time a bully can harass their victim 24 hours if they choose to. The speed at which information travels online is mind-boggling. Whether it is true or false once information is spread online it is very difficult to delete or correct.
Lastly, online bullying is hard to notice. Unless a parent or guardian picks up their child’s phone and monitors it every minute; knowing that your child is suffering without them sharing that information makes it almost impossible to know.
Anyone who believes a child they know is a victim of bullying in any form should ask questions, be supportive, and encourage the young person to block the bullies on all platforms and report the activity.
For more information or resources visit stopbullying.gov.
