Fort William First Nation raises awareness about cyberbullying and its lasting impacts
By Rick Garrick
FORT WILLIAM FIRST NATION— Fort William First Nation’s Mental Health and Addictions department held a Stop Cyberbullying presentation on October 5 at the Fort William First Nation Community Centre.
“Bullying is generally defined as repeated, intentional, harmful behaviour involving a real or perceived imbalance of power which can be physical, verbal, social, emotional, or online,” says Julianna Renzullo, Mental Health and Addictions Worker at Fort William First Nation. “The goal is often to hurt, intimidate, or humiliate the victim.”
Renzullo says physical bullying involves the hurting of someone’s body or damaging their things on purpose; verbal bullying involves using words to hurt, embarrass, or scare someone on purpose; social bullying involves trying to make someone feel left out, alone, or unwanted; and emotional bullying involves doing things that make someone feel scared, embarrassed, worthless, or bad about themselves.
“Some examples [of cyberbullying] are sending e-messages, posting embarrassing pictures, or making hurtful comments online,” Renzullo says. “Why might someone bully — they want control and power over others, they put others down to feel better about themselves, have difficulty managing emotions like anger and frustration, maybe they struggle to understand how their actions hurt others, maybe they give in to peer pressure or they want attention from others, or they have difficulty taking responsibility for their actions.”
Renzullo says it is important to remember that bullying is a behaviour, not an identity.
“People can learn to make better choices, change their behaviour, and treat others with kindness and respect,” Renzullo says.
Renzullo says bullying can have a significant and lasting impact on victims, physically, emotionally, and socially.
“Some short-term effects include how someone might feel right away, so they might feel sad, angry, scared, lonely, stressed, or have trouble sleeping,” Renzullo says. “Some long-term effects include how someone might feel over time, they may have low confidence, anxiety, trust issues, relationship difficulties, trouble at work or school.”
Renzullo adds that bullying doesn’t just hurt feelings, it leaves emotional scars.
“There are several ways that can be done to overcome bullying, including speak up, tell the person to stop if you feel safe or you walk away, you can tell someone and they can talk to their trusted adult, you can stay safe, stay near people you trust, don’t try to get revenge,” Renzullo says. “If you see someone being bullied, don’t join in, don’t laugh, and don’t ignore it.”
Shannon Crews, Director of Community Wellness at Fort William First Nation, says Renzullo and Shaylynn Dykeman, Mental Health and Addictions Worker at Fort William First Nation, did a wonderful job with their presentation.
“It was good and informative,” Crews says. “It’s nice to get the community out and be together, sharing a meal, and getting some information.”
Ashley Harju, Mental Health and Addictions Manager at Fort William First Nation, says bullying is “really prominent” in schools.
“Sometimes teachers are just not aware as well when it’s happening behind closed doors, especially when they’re going home with social media,” Harju says. “So, having the education for parents and kids [is important] on signs to recognize, that they can go to their trusted teacher or principal or family member or even the mental health and addiction team, just knowing the proper resources they can go to get support if they are experiencing bullying.”
Luanne Maki, a Fort William First Nation citizen, also stressed the importance of the presentation.
“These programs are really good for our kids and our families,” Maki says. “[It’s important] to get our families together, not just for the information that we’re gathering from whatever presentation is happening but from each other as parents and caregivers of our kids. It brings everybody together, it’s really good.”