Bullying in Group Support
It has come to our attention that there is bullying going on in the support chat rooms. This is really sad to hear. 7 Cups is an emotional support network. We are all here to support you, and we expect you to behave supportively and with kindness towards others while youre here. Thats what were about.
⛔️ BULLYING NEEDS TO STOP IMMEDIATELY.
What is bullying?
Bullying is hurtful behaviour that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. It can happen online or offline. It can happen once, or it can be an ongoing behaviour.
Types of bullying:
☞ Making threats
☞ Ridiculing
☞ Gossiping
☞ Spreading rumours
☞ Attacking someone verbally
☞ Excluding someone from a group
How can I avoid bullying someone?
Treat everyone with respect. If youre about to say something that might be hurtful, put yourself in the other persons shoes and imagine how your words would feel. If you think you have been unkind to someone, you can apologise.
We have many vulnerable guests and members. Most of us on 7 Cups are struggling in some way. Thats why were here for support. Some have special needs and may not know how to behave appropriately. In cases like this, you need to be extra compassionate. Assume the best of others. Know that everyone is doing the best they can. If being kind doesnt help the situation, you can use your own personal mute button. Alternatively, you can take a break from the chat room.
How does bullying make you feel?
If youre involved in bullying, it might help you to feel cleverer, stronger or more superior than another person. You might find you quite enjoy bullying and forget to consider the harm that it causes to others. There is a danger, especially if part of a group, that youll begin to truly believe that the other person isnt worth as much as the rest of you. This is wrong.
What to do if youre bullying someone?
Stop immediately. Remind yourself that you can do better. Reach out to a listener and talk through why you might be behaving in this way and how you intend to put it right. If you dont feel comfortable talking about it, make a list of what you get out of bullying. Then make a list of how youd feel if you were that person. Be brave. Apologise to the person you were hurtful towards. You can also tell any friends engaging in this behaviour to stop. Remind them of the harm it causes. If they do not listen, it would be a good idea to find new, kinder friends that dont need to belittle others to feel better about themselves.
You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.
- Jim Rohn
How does being bullied make you feel?
Bullying can make you feel scared, upset, embarrassed or hopeless. Its important to know that nobody has the right to make you feel this way. There are people who will like, care about and support you. 7 Cups is full of them. If you are being bullied by anyone in the group support rooms, you can mute and report them. You can also reach out to me directly via PM.
Zero tolerance policy
Here on 7 Cups, we will not tolerate bullying. Let me say this again. We will not tolerate bullying. Anyone who is found to be engaging in hurtful behaviour will no longer be permitted to participate in group support chat. Those who continue to find ways to hurt others outside of group chat will be removed from the site completely.
Dont be that person.
Unfortunately, and sorry to be the horrible person to say this, but how do we define bullying? Sure, some things are obvious. Other things, not so much. For example, if someone asks for help and you tell the truth as you see it. They feel attacked. Are you a bully then? You say something. You personally wouldn't be upset by it, yet the person you're speaking to is. Is that bullying? What about those who don't realise their words and actions cause offence. Some people do have disorders where people often think we are manipulative or bullies or sometimes just struggle with empathy are people with those disorders (often, cluster b pds.) no longer welcome? What when you feel you're being bullied but no one else agrees with you? I remember my first time on this site, before I was a member someone was making comments and attacking me for being transgender. The chat sided with them, because they called bully first. Was I a bully for pointing out they were making me feel less than human? Apparently so, because that made them feel bad and they continued to give thinly covered attacks. But i was the bully.
It's not always easy to know if you're being a bully or not, especially if you have certain issues. Social issues, some pds, or just don't sugar coat things. Lots of times I've been made to feel worse for coming here. Yeah, I agree bullying is a huge problem everywhere but it's also really easy to get labelled a bully for stupid stuff such as having a differing opinion or poor social skills and other stuff like that, you know? Some are more sensitive than others, so what do we do there? Should we all just shut up?
@Wire, Personally , I sincerely believe when we are interacting with others, we must be sensitive to them and also to our own thoughts. We are all part of society, we just have to adjust and adopt to be part of it. Sometimes we get hurt by others but that doesn't mean we should withdraw or stop interacting with each other. We can choose to be silent , take time out for our own feelings and their feelings to settle down. Bullying can or may come in many forms and each form is a gross injustice to the victim and the bully itself. What a waste it is for us to be humans who are aware, civilized and most importantly with thinking skills yet we can't respect or value each other as fellow human beings. As a society, respecting each other's boundaries , giving and accepting respect and having compassion for ourselves and others should be a priority. When a bully interacts with you, you have a choice how you want to respond. You have the power to report to someone in charge, you can remove yourself from the scene for sometime for your own peace of mind, you can speak up by being assertive without being rude or you could allow the bully to goad you to be just like the bully.
@Wire
You make a good point and I think it helps us explore this topic more deeply.
I think it's undeniably true that someone can be called a bully just because another person takes offense at what they say. However, we all have times where we are misunderstood or our words are not appreciated by others.
I think one good sign that we may have slipped over the line into bullying someone is if we are not willing to stop doing something when someone else tells us we are hurting them.
It may be tempting to dig in or to escalate, or to feel personally insulted or hurt by the criticism, but if our response is to double-down and continue saying or doing something toward someone else after they have asked us not to, it's likely that we have started bullying them.
Does that make sense ?
@KrinkTheMellowUnicorn
Perfectly! I think, based on my previous experience of 7 cups I'm worried about getting in trouble for being a bully. It's happened before. Or the whole "I'm offended, you're a bully" thing. I spend my whole life walking on eggshells. I know what people think of people with my disorder, hell. The most famous writing about it is called walking on eggshells. Except, I find I'm the one walking on eggshells. The idea of being a bully or a manipulative person really is upsetting, and as it is I don't have friends. When I wrote the post, I was already feeling pretty unwelcome here, but hey, moods change like the breeze so I probably overreacted. Taking things personally is something to work at.
Thankyou sooo much for finally posting this ive been a victim of Bullying before and it really isnt nice this happened in the rooms so thanks for putting things in place @Heather
its sad but unfortunately has to happen
you got blatant group bullying going on in depression support yet you refuse to do anything whatsoever about it ,they attack hard in a group ,have been ages ,i have no chance against them ,who helped absolutely no one atall
@winterssunshine111
you can use the emergency mod request form
@Amelia can you provide a link to that form please?
@soulsings
Here you go: Emergency Mod Request Form. It can also be found by clicking on the chatroom rules and scrolling to the bottom of that list. Feel free to message me if you have any questions :)
@Amelia Thank you so much. It is good to keep this form handy when needed. Hopefully never, but having it handy helps. <3
@Amelia unfortunately usually no room replies or its 45 minutes later and to late. plus mods say i cant do anything unless i saw it when all they have to do is scroll up 2 lines
I get the thinking behind these sweeping posts. This is something that needs to stop so lets address it now. Here is the only issue.... I really truly believe MOST of the people on here are good, decent and well intentioned people. So this type of post is not needed for them. The small percentage (but always growing) who are bullies or find it fun and exciting to bully, well unfortunately this warning is not going to bother them and they won't care how often we remind or threaten them. You have met these people in life. What I would find more helpful is a well laid out plan of how I can help, step in, stop, protect etc someone I see being bullied on here. I mean I have done it in "real life" and I will do it here not because I was told to, but because I know it is the right thing to do. So what should we do? Please provide the emergency forms, the people to contact, how to report and how to help when no one else will. I am a realist and I know no post is going to magically stop bullies. It's just a sad fact of life. But I do know you can make me better informed and better prepared for when I see it.
Most bullying starts out as a misunderstanding and needs someone to step in and mediate
The following was posted by a 'member' in 'Depression Room 1' yesterday morning, it's self explanatory, it's very nasty, the 'member' should be ashamed.
'Winter, I hope you delete your account because I will END YOU if you mess with my sister again. I will haunt you all over 7cups'.
'I am not kidding'.
'I am phucking nuts'.
It breaks every Rule on this site. That should be a life-time ban, it would be on every other site.
@rebel11
I believe they would ban this person in a heart beat. Here is the issue I know of. You ban that account and well accounts are free and heck they are not even email verified. Meaning they make another lame name jump right back on and here they go again. I know they are working on it. FOr the life of me I don't know how you stop it. All I would know to do in this instance is make sure the person this was directed at be offered any support they need cause yes, this is sick and it would scare the heck out of me.
@AndyDufresne1994 - the primary thing is that people who witness it report it so that we are aware of problematic people and situations.
it's like they say about safety in the real world and looking out for each other:
if you see something,
say something
I know it's not that simple and it can be hard to know what to do in the moment. Bullies (as well as "internet tough guys" who say nasty things from behind the mask of the screen) are going for shock value and it's hard not to react and get upset.
The most resilient thing we can do together is to mute, block, and ban people in realtime as they misbehave. The less rise they get out of us, the less incentive there is for them to continue.
None of this is adequate to protect an individual being harassed and we will continue to look for better ways to safeguard members and listeners here in good faith against those who come for more negative reasons.
@KrinkTheMellowUnicorn
Krink, please see my prior post. I asked for someone to please post HOW, TO WHO, WHAT FORM to use. I am 100% for saying/doing/stepping in/fighting for/speaking up... I will do it every time. All I ask is the how be better explained.
@AndyDufresne1994 - good request... @Amelia? @heather @laura @iara?
Hi there, sweet @AndyDufresne1994
Thank you so much for taking the initiative to help make a change when there's a disruptive member in the chatroom. If in this circumstance, use the Group Support Chatroom Emergency Form to request a moderator's help. It can also be found by clicking on the chatroom rules and scrolling to the bottom of that list.
Thank you so much for being here!
CCing @KrinkTheMellowUnicorn
@ZaraSmiles Are there any statistics on it's effectiveness?
I don't know how many times I have utilized that, along with mod/listener reports and nothing seems to happen.
Heya, lovely @AffyAvo
I'll tag in the lovely @Heather, @Sarah, @Jake and @Amelia here who may be able to answer this question better than me.
From what I have observed, listener/mod reports are responded to and addressed by the mod leaders and said listener is talked to on how to use this as an area of growth.
Regarding the Group Support Emergency Form, any moderator linked to the responses is able to respond to the request and assist, however this may not always be the case. I do see where you're coming from regarding the effectiveness of these forms and I hope that Heather can address your concerns better.
You're wonderful!
@ZaraSmiles
Thanks!
It's frustrating to hear that there's zero tolerance for certain things, but then nothing seems to be done when it's reported.
@AffyAvo agreed
@ZaraSmiles thanks
@AndyDufresne1994 I do not know the way to people stopping being the kind of person they are even if they are rude or offensive. But we are not helpless. We can learn to be present and not react to taunts or misinformation. We can press the mute button (ignore the member) or leave the room. We have options, but I am very empathetic to this plight. If it were easy to solve it would have been solved by now. If I knew a way I would use it.
@rebel11 wont do anything unless they personally witness it
@mutter3 Mods don't need to witness the actual violation of site Rules. Mods should have access to chat records from chat rooms that can easily be searched for evidence / the event. If the reported event has happened, then they should take swift action, 30 minutes max. The Mod has a report from a user, the Mod should be able to check chat records quickly, if the User has violated Site Rules, the Mod bans the individual for a lengthy period to reflect on their actions and moderate their future behaviour. If the User believes they have been banned wrongly or all the facts haven't been taken into consideration, then they can appeal. The site Rules need to be reviewed and changed.
@rebel11 sorry but this isn't happening
@mutter3 From experience, it is possible to do it, the technology is there to do it, it does work!!
@rebel11, @mutter3 is correct though that the system is not set up to work that way today.
@rebel11 - there are no chat records. We don't keep chat logs or transcripts... In chat rooms I think only hte last 20 messages are in the database, and in 1-on-1s I believe it's 10.
@KrinkTheMellowUnicorn
Off-Topic: Having history of the chats in 1-1 would be really great tho. I mean ALL messages. It's horrible to see you cannot go back to your conversation from yesterday because you refreshed/closed the page... It would be super useful to have it all there.
@cristiana33 - it's a policy decision for us not to save them, as a matter of preserving anonymity, privacy, and confidentiality.
If your member or guest is OK with it, you can always copy and save transcripts in your notebook.
Good to see so many listeners and members making a stand against bullying. I am sure everyone specifically the mods , and administrators of 7 cups , are doing their best to keep out the bullies. Give them your feedbacks and support . Most importantly ,also give them some time to look through the feedbacks and information they have. They need to go over and verify things. Let's be patient and meanwhile, be their eyes and ears.
@faithlove1111 I have not seen much bullying but recently witnessed repeated use of degrading terms about women and reported it to a mod who took action to stop that.
If you see unacceptable behavior find a mod and let them know which room and what is happening in a few words without mentioning names of participants or specific words they are saying that may be triggering.
I haven't seen this happening much but if it still continues to happen, the 7 cups listeners should take a stand against this.
It makes me sad to see that such a thread has to be created 
I was in one of the group support rooms and unfortunately had to witness a bullying incident and it pains me so much how a support room ends up like this... I hope things will get better.
Important to ask yourself,am I being bullied or just overly sensitive.