This is an excellent resource to learn about school bullying, bullying laws and cyber/online-bullying FOCUS AS (http://www.focusas.com/Bullying.html)
ANOTHER LINK (http://www.cbc.ca/news/national/news/http://www.cbc.ca/news/national/news/cyberbullying//)

LAWS AGAINST CYBER BULLYING (http://www.cyh.com/Archive/NewsDetail.aspx?p=216&id=1921)

Harrassment/Bullying (http://www.cyh.com/HealthTopics/HealthTopicDetails.aspx?p=240&np=300&id=2069#3)

very good links mama.
I especially thought this part was interesting

Bystanders also play a role in bullying:

* the assistant who joins the bully
* the re-enforcer who encourages the bully by observing and laughing
* outsiders who avoid the bullying by staying away and not getting involved for fear of losing social status or being bullied as well

thanks for posting

I hope laws have gotten better in the past few years. I was sooo harassed a few years ago by my dh ex wife. I even had death threats to me and to my kids and the police told me they couldn't do anything about it and that if it bothered me I didn't have to read my email.
He said just beware who had my phone number and address and not to post it online. But this was dh's ex so she had to have our phone number nad address since they have kids together.
Anyway nothing ever happened to her. She did get in trouble finally when she posted that me and my dd Katie, 4 at the time, were looking to get into a threesome. The FBI looked into that for me.
If you are getting harassed, I am sooo sorry, it really is the worst thing to have to go thru!
Mindi

My 12yo dd recently had this freaky thing happen. One night the mother of a boy at her school, who I had never met nor heard of either of them, came to my house with the mother of a friend of my dd. She said that my dd was saying really sick stuff to her son online. I had never met this woman and then there she is in my house accusing my dd of some horrible things. Things I absolutely know my dd would not do. The other woman I had only met in passing and had never been to our house, but her dd (my dd's friend - sorry this is confusing...) had been here. So basically it was like having 2 strangers in my home. weird. She also said my dd was spreading a picture of him online. (not a bad picture, just a snapshot from school) and that she wanted that to stop immediately.

So, after I got clear on just who these people were and what they were saying (which was very confusing as I never had even heard mention of this boy's name and now his mother was in my house.) I thanked them politely for bringing the situation to my attention, that I would discuss it with my daughter, get her side of the story and check some other information. I told them that I know kids do outrageous stuff we never dream they would, but that the sort of stuff that she was talking about, I would be shocked if my dd had done these things. I thought maybe she was posting a picture of the boy and didn't understand that this wasn't kosher. She just got a new camera and we had not completely covered digital photo protocols yet. I didn't tell them I didn't believe them, just held any outrage or reaction until I knew more. Very reasonalbe. They were *very* clear that in their house such behaviors would not be tolerated, blah blah, blah, and that my dd was jezebel to her angelic son. :rolleyes: They wanted me to proclaim her guilt and give sentence solely based on their testimony. um, no, I repsect my children. I will always give them the chance to speak on their behalf.

so... I talked to dd and as expected, got an *entirely* different story. It is complicated, but it basically boiled down to that this 'estranged friend' of my dd's from when we lived in Texas 3 YEARS AGO got this boy's IM name from my dd's buddy list. She contacted him and they started chatting on a regular basis. When this girl found out that this boy 'had a crush' on my dd (an unrequited one, I might add) she got really upset. So she made a screen name similar to one my dd had used at one time, but abandoned. It wasn't identical, but enough to fool this kid. And then she started saying really horrible stuff pretending to be my dd! :eek: The ultra twisted part is that the boy knew it was really this other girl but because he was upset that my dd did not 'like him back' he told his mother that it was my dd doing it!!!! And the picture in question - my dd took the picture for the kid and he asked her for it. She sent him the picture. HE sent it to this ex-friend girl and SHE was posting it all over the place online. All this while some someone was posting insane anonymous comments in this boys livejournal. The woman who came with this boy's mother to my house, her dd told her that the anonymous postings were my dd and that she was bragging about it at school. Turns out that it was MY DD' FRIEND (whose mother was in my kitchen accusing my dd of doing these things) who was doing the postings!!!!!!!! :vent:

It just took a few IP Address searches and it started to all fall into place. It was really weird. Pretty much everyone has 'confessed' to their role and the drama is over. Needless to say neither one of them has apologized even a little for accusing my dd of things. And even a week or so after it all got sorted out, my dd was online and this boy IM's her on her current screenname (not the tainted one from the whole incident). She did not know who it was. He kept saying "its me" and stuff. She finally got it out of him who it was and his mother got online and started "yelling" at my dd, telling her that she was watching her and she knows what she is doing !!!!! Dd is under strict orders that if anyone from that family contacts her again to notify me immediately. If they do, I will be paying a visit to HER house.

so - yes - it is VERY important to know about harassing stuff. It can get really crazy really fast.

:(

Originally posted by lakshmi_mama
My 12yo dd recently had this freaky thing happen.

:(

It scares me, kids having unlimited internet access like that girl must have!

Originally posted by Vanity Fair
It scares me, kids having unlimited internet access like that girl must have!

Yes. And I fully admit that I was not being as vigilant in monitoring my dd's online time as well as I should have. After this entire incident my dd's have *very* restricted time limits online. Not as a punishment, but to try and prevent garbage like this whole thing happening again. It is just too scary.

Kind of off topic...but how long has Amity World/Amity Mama's been around???

It seems like at least a little bit of drama has always been going on since I joined 3 years ago... :shake: