My, how far we've come

There are so many moments in my life that I wonder about the state of the world. I could wax nostalgic about better days in the past when people weren't cruel, when people didn't encourage bad behaviour, when people didn't do miserable, awful things to each other. But I know I'd look the fool. The "good old days" weren't necessarily better. It's easy to say, "That didn't happen when I was that age." Reality check: it did.

The difference now is about how widespread the misery can be made. Today, we're wired. Andriods, wifi, laptops, apps, data, continual and constant feedback and information being sent around our Twitter-verse. Google+, Facebook, blogs (guilty as charged), micro-blogs, newsreels, rss feeds, and a whole host of other jargon-filled technological indulgence allows endless access to an audience for bullies, predators, criminals, and miscreants of all colours, shapes, and sizes. Small, ridiculous vendettas can become the stuff of personal ruin and cause enough damage to warrant a psychological breakdown. 

The story of Amanda Todd goes far past that of bullying. When I read the article on the CBC the other day, I was sad about how cruel kids could be to each other. I thought a great deal about this last year during "the incident" and how helpless I felt to stop it. Bullying can be many things, but the story of this poor girl is so much more brutal and despicable. Sure, bullying was a part of it, but that's only one facet.YouTube took down the video she posted around the time of her suicide. However, this isn't something that should be hidden, and the video is back online. You'll see by some of the comments that there are a tonne of despicable vermin on the internet who think it's funny/helpful/righteous to continue to show ignorance and hatred toward this girl, even now that she's dead. They put blame on her and express the belief that she was responsible for this herself. But this isn't simply bullying... it's victimization, continual and widespread. Watch the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej7afkypUsc  It began with an event of sexual coercion and predation which turned into blackmail and a snowballing course of emotional and psychological abuse over months and years. A foolish decision made by a seventh-grade girl turned Amanda Todd into a pariah who was victimized, blackmailed, and emotionally/psychologically assaulted by someone who decided that, since she wouldn't give up more of what he wanted, he was going to do his best to ruin her. From there, it was all downhill. And in today's day and age, it's impossibly easy. After this episode of villainy, Amanda Todd began victimizing herself and never found her way out of a very dark place. The post-assault bullying that took place at school after school was beyond cruel and impossible to imagine. Beaten, shunned, ostracized. I regret every moment where I was a beast by making fun of those who I deemed "below" me. And please read THIS ARTICLE.

I'm not so pessimistic to say that only bad things come from our wired world. Fundraising, peace campaigns, education and so many other facets of the modern age are helping to fight against ignorance, racism, bigotry, and connect people in ways that were never possible before. But within the walls of this glossy new world, the dark reality is too hard to ignore. We have become not only an impatient people seeking immediate satisfaction and immediate feedback, but we've also created a beast that can exponentially enhance both good and evil in ways that are hard to fathom. Does the good outweigh the misery? Not when a young girl turns to suicide as her only hope.

T