Rosalind Wiseman

“Wouldn’t it be funny if we…”

For years, I have told teachers and students that nothing good ever follows this phrase.  Why? Because what is often amusing in this situation is publicly humiliating someone, and the target rarely thinks that’s funny.

Events like the recent Tyler Clementi suicide put this problem front and center.  From the information I have read, I don’t believe Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei’s actions qualify as a homophobic hate crime. In fact, it is an unfortunate reality that some high school and college students secretly record their roommates having sex, or in other potentially embarrassing, and supposedly private, situations. But this is nothing new:  It happened to one of my closest friends in college. The guys who did it thought it was hilarious, but when my friend found out she was devastated and felt horribly violated.  What is new is how easy it is to acquire and disseminate this type of information.

While not a hate crime, Ravi and Wei’s actions were most definitely bullying; the use of superior strength or influence to intimidate and/or demean someone.  This type of bullying, using powerful technology to spread humiliating information, is defining our age. And maybe one of the most disturbing questions is the possibility that it didn’t even occur to Ravi and Wei that what they were doing could be defined as bullying.

What I see are two people who don’t value privacy, believing instead that it is entertaining to humiliate and embarrass someone in a public forum, without thinking through the possible consequences. Further, their actions reflect a belief that degrading others is an acceptable way to complain about something you don’t like. In this case, it looks like a roommate who was annoyed that his bedroom was occupied for a hook-up—a common occurrence and source of conflict in college. The difference, of course, is that previously if you were locked out of your room you complained about it to the people in your hall. You couldn’t instantaneously throw common sense out the window and post it on-line for everyone to see for as long as the human race has electricity.

On the other side, it appears as if this young man also impulsively decided to take his life. Having talked to many young people whose sexual behavior went public, it probably felt like he would never be able to get beyond this video. He could easily have believed that it would follow him for the rest of his life. And while we can try to explain his decision to kill himself as a result of the brain chemistry of an 18 year old, we also have to understand that the reality of the endless lifespan of these videos fuels a desperation and misery that is completely independent of the rashness of youth.

In a world where our on-line and real lives merge fluidly, this trifecta – not respecting privacy, degradation as entertainment, and impulsive decision-making –is one of the biggest affronts to our society’s social contract. It is rocking the foundation of our agreed on rules for how we should treat other. That’s why stories like this one, in addition to being sad, are also frightening. It feels like there are no brakes on people’s behavior; especially in areas where our culture still all too often reinforces bigotry based on race, class, ethnicity, and sexual orientation.

How do we slow this down? How do we reflect on these changes and gain some wisdom that can positively impact our future actions?

I don’t have any quick answers for this but I am thinking hard about it. I believe that the first step is to stop and think very carefully about the following questions:

• How are these challenges impacting our own life and the lives of the people closest to us?
• What are our limits to our own behavior when we are angry at someone?
• Have we thought about our own internal brakes when we are frustrated and tempted to lash out?

For another blog on this topic, Sandip Roy’s essay in the Huffington Post is insightful and thoughtful, and the New York Post raises compelling questions on the legal consequences of these issues.