Hello, my name is Logan Petoe, and my partner in this subject is Matthew Lee, and we will be addressing the issue of cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is the use of technology for harassment, bullying, embarrassing and etc (all negativity used to project at others.) Which after COVID-19, children usually allocate more of their time to technology over anything else, essentially addicted to it and because of this, a problem is created. Children have access to people who they do not know online. In which, strangers whom they do not really know (the child/victim) often lure them to do malicious things, common cases are cyberbullying. Cyberbullying could in fact cause children to develop mental disorders, eventually leading to dangerous thoughts, even suicide is common. And cyberbullying will be continuous unless it is regulated.

Nowadays, children allocate most of their time online, an article from LinkedIn called, “Online Bullying and Screen Time: Where Have We Gone Wrong With Technology as Parents?”, on paragraph 4 states that, “In an age where technology is advancing at a rapid rate, it's important to realize the pitfalls of too much screen time. Younger generations are being raised in a digital age, with many struggling to develop social skills because they spend so much time online.” This highlights that children nowadays are more exposed to technology, in which most of the time — they are essentially addicted to it — which is due to the advancement in technology. In addition to technology addiction, there is cyberbullying, a  case of cyberbullying happening is shown in an article from the NBC labelled, “Texas child died by suicide during online game following cyberbullying, authorities said”, from paragraph 1 and 2, the authorities stated, “A child in Texas died by suicide during an online game following alleged cyberbullying”, continuing on, authorities also stated that “A boy in Michigan was identified as the suspect and ‘pled true to a felony charge of aiding suicide and a misdemeanor charge of harassment causing death,’ the Montgomery County Precinct 3 Constable’s Office said in a statement on Friday.” The fact that children nowadays spend too much of their time online can result into suicide, or mental thoughts/disorders because of cyberbullying proves that technology is likely the reason why cyberbullying exists. On top of this, a study by Pew Research Center found that “Nearly half of U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 (46%) report ever experiencing at least one of six cyberbullying behaviors asked about in a Pew Research Center survey conducted April 14-May 4, 2022.” This study proves that there are many more people targeted by cyberbullying “half of U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 (46%) report ever experiencing at least one of six cyberbullying behaviors” , adding on to the fact that kids now spend more time online increasingly. If there are this much cyberbullying incidents, there would be a high risk of suicide.

If this issue isn't solved, children's lives will be at risk and cyber bullying would increase, and suicide would occur even more. To keep this issue from prolonging and reduce its impact on children we have to bring awareness towards parents that they should minimize their child’s screen time. In addition, we need to have parents acknowledge the negative effects of unsupervised screen time, such as suicidal thoughts. So, please sign this petition in order to bring awareness and reduce this issue, and if you are being cyber bullied, get help by reporting it right away.