Times Of Swaziland: HUMANS ‘ARE INERADICABLY SOCIAL BEINGS’

HUMANS ‘ARE INERADICABLY SOCIAL BEINGS’
================================================================================
Editor on 18/08/2022 08:44:00


Sir,
The first perpetrator, whom many might not agree with, becomes the person behind
the camera. Technology has made our lives way better as much as its misuse has
brought corpses and depression to some families. I vehemently believe whoever
captures a shameful act on another and post it on any social media platform has
the intention to make it go viral and to make a laughing stock of the captured
victim. However, I do not believe the intentions are to drive the victim to
suicide but he refuses to give himself a chance to think about the reactions of
the victim.
Limits
The poster limits his thoughts to only shame and embarrass the victim through
the post. Therefore, the victim becomes psychologically isolated and with
everything around mocking his dignity. Except suicide, the victim feels forced
to opt for the easy way out. Those who react and comment on the post negatively
and those who re-post, are the second accomplices to this crime of cyber
bullying. It is beyond reasonable doubt that as human beings we do not all the
time advance our thinking to the consequences of our actions.
Comments
One would say it is ‘merely a single, fun comment’, it is a joke. However,
the single-fun comments increase from many who react to the post and form 1 000
negative comments too overwhelming to handle. The criticisms, the judgements and
shaming comments literally expose the nakedness of the victim. Thus, the shame
becomes worse than the initial bullying that happened, and again drives one to a
negative solution of escaping the bullying. Finally, other perpetrators become
those who are so close but ignorant of the situation, by standing and watching
who will intervene and eventually intervene at their funerals. Emmanuel Kant
recognised that human beings ‘are ineradicably social beings’, which implies
that ‘no man is an island’, we are a community and obliged to care for a
fellow human. This means we are not to watch one being bullied.
From the first scene of the bullying to social media, where one should not
comment negatively but defend those being bullied. This is because the victim
does not take his life due to the bullying factor alone, but also the isolation
and lack of people who will defend publicly and empathise with the victim.
Therefore, the lack of people who will defend the victim also contributes
indirectly to the suicide at hand. Archbishop Desmond Tutu once said; “If you
are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the
oppressor.”