When a potentially threatening situation occurs, seek assistance from an adult, friend, or classmate. Be tactful (not aggressive, battle or tease back).
To deflect a potentially threatening situation, use humour.
Before a potential cyberbullying incident happens, avoid unsafe places or leave immediately.
Avoid to walk alone, walk with friends or a small group of peers who are friendly.
To preserve positive self-esteem during an incident, use positive self-statements.
When cyberbullying happens, avoid getting emotionally upset, as this may embolden the bullying person.
“Hater” is a label used to refer to people who use negative and critical comments and behaviour to bring another person down by making them look or feel bad.
These offensive comments can happen not only on public social media but also in one-on-one text messages. Typically, this content will spread more and more widely over time. Haters are usually anonymous (especially online) but take off the mask and they could just as easily be someone close to you. For example, classmates, acquaintances, neighbours, exes, and even good friends you once had. Typically, haters seek out people who are different from them and use that difference as an entry point for slander or personal attacks. These negative, critical comments can upset people and trigger feelings of anger, hurt, and confusion. Such negative news is often spread by one hater but eventually spread by many people. At this point, the hater will get out of control of the situation. This situation may cause some teens to become overwhelmed, cancel their social media accounts, become distrustful of people around them and gradually developing psychological problems.
How to Deal with Haters
Ignore it. Walk away and don’t respond to their verbal attacks or negative comments. If it rises to the level of a threat, you can talk to your teacher, your parent, or a trusted adult. In more serious cases, you can also choose to call the police.
Take screenshots and Block online haters. If someone makes abusive or defamatory comments on your social media platform, you can take screenshots at first to preserve the evidence, and then block them. If they make threatening words against you, you can ask teachers and parents for help, and report the screenshots to the platform.
Be kind and respectful, even to haters. It shows that you’re in control of your emotions and that you aren’t letting negativity bring you down.
Stick with supporters. Keep in touch with friends and keep in mind that they are your supporters. With their support, you will be less likely to fall into self-doubt or be in negative emotion.
Remind yourself that comments from a hater are not the real you. What they say is not true. Don’t put yourself down because of that.
Understand criticism can be a sign of pain. People sometimes lash out because they have other life struggles. Negative comments may have nothing to do with you.
Acknowledge your feelings. Talk to a trusted adult or friend and get some encouragement and support.
Keep being you. Keep moving forward, pursuing your interests, and being who you are.
If you ever come across any content on social media or in a text message that makes you feel inappropriate and uncomfortable, no matter where it is, please report it immediately.
If someone spreads rumours about you
If someone posts false and damaging information about you on the Internet or social networking sites, it may be considered harassment. According to the law, it is a crime to engage in harassment both online and offline. Anything that is publicly posted about you will be seen by a lot of people very quickly because the Web is so open.
A growing number of people complain that the former best friend is spreading malicious rumours and vicious gossip. Therefore, please be careful to make friends. Choose carefully who you want to share your secrets with. Only share secrets with friends that you wouldn’t be embarrassed if other people found out about it.
If you are being threatened
It’s against the law in the UK to use the phone system – which includes the internet – to cause alarm or distress. It could even be against the 1997 Harassment Act. If threats are made against you then it’s essential that you alert someone you trust, or call a helpline or contact the Police. If someone is threatening you on the internet, or threatening someone you know, they could be committing a criminal offence.
Try to get documentary evidence if you can. By pressing the ‘print screen’ button, you should be able to print of a hard copy of the threatening text or images. Place it in a safe place, both on and off line.
If someone posts inappropriate pictures of you
If someone posts an inappropriate picture of you In a world where almost everyone has a smartphone, it’s common to take photos and videos, and it’s also easy to spread those photos and videos on social media.
For this reason, I recommend not letting anyone take pictures of you that might embarrass you, and try not to take photos with someone else’s phone or device. If someone posts inappropriate pictures about you, please contact them to remove them immediately. If you are going to post someone else’s photo, make sure you have their permission. Because once you post this picture, millions of people will see it online. Even if your friend later contacts you to delete the photo, her loss is irreparable.
Do not change or make fun of other people’s photos, as what you may think is funny may offend others.
