Bullying forum a success!

Bullying is consistently one of the top issues of concern for young people visiting headspace’s website.  That’s why on Thursday 21st of August 2008, we facilitated our first ‘Ask an Expert’ online forum on bullying. Panelists, Andrew Fuller and Tom Wood were kept busy answering questions from young people, parents, friends and teachers.

Some of the great tips that were provided by our 'experts' included:

Tom:
‘If someone is cyber-bullying you, first you should make sure they're aware that you feel bullied - and ask them to stop. If they don't, you should not respond to them, but instead save all the evidence for future reference, block and delete them as much as possible from the website/service, and report the abuse to the administrator. Most websites and services, such as mobile companies, have reporting abuse functions - to make the bully face consequences. Finally, you should tell someone you trust, like a teacher or parent.’

Andrew:
‘…social exclusion is the worst, most hurtful form of bullying and it always feels that the world is leaving you out. I generally ask people to list the names of people who like them, those who actively bully and those who are neutral. Then we devise strategies to befriend the neutral ones - building up allies. It is a sad fact of life that not every one is going to like us so we have to be adaptable in friendships and learn to make more than just a few good friends if we can. By widening your social circle you make yourself less of a target and you may also meet a few great people too.’

If you missed the forum you can still view our 'experts' responses to your questions on bullying and cyber bullying by clicking here.

headspace is also developing a ‘Bullying’ Fact Sheet which will be available on www.headspace.org.au shortly – so stay tuned!