I stepped on the school bus today and I was transported back in time to being a teenager and remembered everything I hated about being at school ( fortunately I lived locally and did not have to travel by bus ), but some things, though now have mellowed, have not changed at all since my school days.
On the rare occasions I share the bus with a bunch of children, always many shopping bags arranged around the fold down seat, ( done deliberately so no one sits next to me, and I always wonder how I am going to actually get off the bus one handed, but I always manage. ) On such journeys, I wander into reverie, watch the fields, observe what is occupying them, look at the hedgerows, just about anything but the noise on the bus; yet, they don't bother me and I don't bother them, I remember being that age. However, certain little things have never changed. I am an observer of patterns, patterns that have never changed. I try to shut off but you hear the "loudmouths", the same language that always existed, "you sit there", or, " you are not one of the cool kids", it now seems cooler to be on the bottom half of the bus than the top, in my day it was the opposite.
I was a nanny for years and I understand children's and teenager's behaviour but it isn't always very nice, and probably very diluted in the case of other circumstances, yet it still exists and you can see the people who are controlling and the ones who obey a mile off. This is early on, probably most is banter, but there is a rather subtle element there.
This may seem unrelated to my previous comment, and to some extent it is entirely, and to some extent it is not at all. but you can see subtle behaviour which in some cases grows into something more bitter. Anything fore mentioned is not my point here, but there are elements in people's personalities which make you think, and I think we should all think and open our eyes, because we don't.
People on the internet can be extremely vicious, beyond measure, and it is becoming a free world for many. Bullying takes many forms and it often begins where you least expect it. For me it was school.
In all fairness, my local school bus has nice kids, and I always sit opposite a nice young man who is very polite and helped me with my seat. There is nobody who is not nice, but I'm not going to retract that certain people are bossier than others and it doesn't always feel right.
I grew used to being controversial and not always liked ages ago, so I am not being directly critical of anyone, I just can't stand bullies.
Everything starts on a small level. Never let them do it to you.
Cyberstalked – (Unedited)
A Jewish term “eating your guts,” is what I have been feeling the last week. I refuse to call myself a victim for I am anything but helpless. The words annoyed, angry, and confused better describe my emotions. Dealing with an on-line cyberstalker insulted my reasoning until I realized I was attempting to find logic from the illogical, and possibly mentally ill individual who became obsessed with me after a single conflict in Writers’ Group.
When one assumes they are dealing with a Troll, the best advice is to ignore them. After two weeks, that did not work and escalated the female’s activity. Unlike anyone else who uses Goggle to search my name, she was only able to come up with two posts claiming I made them myself, write no books, sold no books, and could help no one with editing. She posted these blatant lies, and tagged me up to 18 times in a half hour. Her defamation was intentional and it was clear she intended to damage me personally and my business of editing and book sales. Many wondered why I didn’t block her. Blocking gives people free hand to defame you.
Her posts, as many as four and five in a few hours continued to be for the intent of getting me banned from the group for “lying to people” about who I was and what I could do for them. She assured all my potential customers her expert opinion was that I could do nothing to help anyone. When she posted this same diatribe in comments after I offered writing help to someone, I did reply and comment that I had never told anyone “I could take them to bestselling” or “I am a big star.” I asked her to copy and paste any post I made saying either of those things. She was unable to find a single post, but continued to make post and tag me in several posts to others she had written about me.
Facebook gave her a few suspensions, but before the lengthy one, she crossed a line with me, and I contacted an attorney in her city. This may seem over-the-top for a “group troll,” but it went a lot further than trolling to defamation and attacking me on a very personal level. A Google search shows many of her lies about to be lies, and her insisting I know no one outside the group was comical for three reasons. First, many of friends-in-real-life are members of this group. Second, many members have become Facebook friends having access to my wall and photos. My real life is theirs for the reading. Third, she made the same claims to the many who disagreed with her. When she searched my Facebook posts and found one open to friends and friends of friends, sent a friend request to one of my friends, then she attacked on that post on my wall and used a ridiculous ID she created with her name scrambled as her “friend” to tag team me. This is the only post I ever made asking for people to buy my books, and I would autograph and send them personalized. This is what eats my guts about the level she would stoop. MY HUSBAND WAS DIAGNOSED WITH LUNG CANCER, and I offered signed books to raise funds for medication and doctor co-pays – and that sub-human not only responded to my comment on my personal wall, but when her 60 day suspension was over, came to Writers’ Group and falsely accused me of making up my husband’s illness to sell books. How low can a cyberstalker go?
The attorney took a look at the screen-shots, the tags in activity log, and advised me that what she was doing was illegal and my first course of action was to file a police complaint. I don’t care what anyone thinks about me doing just that – I did. Thus, when the sub-human got off suspension, she came right back to the group and demanded that I tell her why. No, the Detective did not find her cyberstalking funny or a waste of time: cyberstalking is a felony and includes social media. The “no-action-yet” is the result of me being unable to make the six hour trip to her town because my husband was very ill while going through cancer treatment, and now has stage four. I really have more important things to deal with then this monster who has done all she could to make my life miserable for months. The line she crossed eats my guts, and I needed to put it on paper. I’m a writer and this is how I release emotions.
When one assumes they are dealing with a Troll, the best advice is to ignore them. After two weeks, that did not work and escalated the female’s activity. Unlike anyone else who uses Goggle to search my name, she was only able to come up with two posts claiming I made them myself, write no books, sold no books, and could help no one with editing. She posted these blatant lies, and tagged me up to 18 times in a half hour. Her defamation was intentional and it was clear she intended to damage me personally and my business of editing and book sales. Many wondered why I didn’t block her. Blocking gives people free hand to defame you.
Her posts, as many as four and five in a few hours continued to be for the intent of getting me banned from the group for “lying to people” about who I was and what I could do for them. She assured all my potential customers her expert opinion was that I could do nothing to help anyone. When she posted this same diatribe in comments after I offered writing help to someone, I did reply and comment that I had never told anyone “I could take them to bestselling” or “I am a big star.” I asked her to copy and paste any post I made saying either of those things. She was unable to find a single post, but continued to make post and tag me in several posts to others she had written about me.
Facebook gave her a few suspensions, but before the lengthy one, she crossed a line with me, and I contacted an attorney in her city. This may seem over-the-top for a “group troll,” but it went a lot further than trolling to defamation and attacking me on a very personal level. A Google search shows many of her lies about to be lies, and her insisting I know no one outside the group was comical for three reasons. First, many of friends-in-real-life are members of this group. Second, many members have become Facebook friends having access to my wall and photos. My real life is theirs for the reading. Third, she made the same claims to the many who disagreed with her. When she searched my Facebook posts and found one open to friends and friends of friends, sent a friend request to one of my friends, then she attacked on that post on my wall and used a ridiculous ID she created with her name scrambled as her “friend” to tag team me. This is the only post I ever made asking for people to buy my books, and I would autograph and send them personalized. This is what eats my guts about the level she would stoop. MY HUSBAND WAS DIAGNOSED WITH LUNG CANCER, and I offered signed books to raise funds for medication and doctor co-pays – and that sub-human not only responded to my comment on my personal wall, but when her 60 day suspension was over, came to Writers’ Group and falsely accused me of making up my husband’s illness to sell books. How low can a cyberstalker go?
The attorney took a look at the screen-shots, the tags in activity log, and advised me that what she was doing was illegal and my first course of action was to file a police complaint. I don’t care what anyone thinks about me doing just that – I did. Thus, when the sub-human got off suspension, she came right back to the group and demanded that I tell her why. No, the Detective did not find her cyberstalking funny or a waste of time: cyberstalking is a felony and includes social media. The “no-action-yet” is the result of me being unable to make the six hour trip to her town because my husband was very ill while going through cancer treatment, and now has stage four. I really have more important things to deal with then this monster who has done all she could to make my life miserable for months. The line she crossed eats my guts, and I needed to put it on paper. I’m a writer and this is how I release emotions.
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