From the NY Daily News.
Excerpt:
Guadalupe Shaw, 14, and another girl were charged with felony aggravated stalking in the suicide death of 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick, who jumped off a tower last month. Sedwick’s tormentors were relentless in their bullying, police said, and Shaw even wrote a heartless message on Facebook after the girl died.
[…]Sedwick was bullied relentlessly for several months before she jumped to her death from a tower at a nearby abandoned concrete plant in Lakeland, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office said.
The 14-year-old, identified as Guadalupe Shaw, reportedly posted a coldhearted message on Facebook after Sedwick’s suicide — prompting cops to arrest her.
The implicating post said, “Yes ik [I know] I bullied Rebecca nd she killed her self but IDGAF [I don’t give a (expletive)].”
As many as 15 girls “terrorized” Sedwick for several months with messages such as “You should die” and “Why don’t you go kill yourself,” but Shaw and a 12-year-old girl are the only ones that have been charged so far. The sheriff’s office released the name of the 12-year-old, but it is the Daily News’ policy not to identify minors.
“Detectives have determined that on Sept. 10, 2013, Rebecca Sedwick committed suicide by jumping from a concrete silo tower to her death, and that the malicious harassment by (the 12-year-old girl) and Shaw was likely a contributing factor in Rebecca’s decision to commit suicide,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
Witnesses told investigators that Shaw harassed Sedwick by calling her ugly, told her to “drink bleach and die,” and suggested that she should kill herself. Shaw’s animosity may have stemmed from the fact that a boyfriend of hers had previously dated Sedwick.
I always thought that only boys could be bullies, and not girls, so I find this story surprising. However, it does sort of make sense since studies have shown that women commit domestic violence at almost the same rates as men do. Let’s take a look at those studies.
Studies on domestic violence
Let’s see what’s happening with domestic violence rates in the UK.
Excerpt:
Data from Home Office statistical bulletins and the British Crime Survey show that men made up about 40% of domestic violence victims each year between 2004-05 and 2008-09, the last year for which figures are available. In 2006-07 men made up 43.4% of all those who had suffered partner abuse in the previous year, which rose to 45.5% in 2007-08 but fell to 37.7% in 2008-09.
Similar or slightly larger numbers of men were subjected to severe force in an incident with their partner, according to the same documents. The figure stood at 48.6% in 2006-07, 48.3% the next year and 37.5% in 2008-09, Home Office statistics show.
The 2008-09 bulletin states: “More than one in four women (28%) and around one in six men (16%) had experienced domestic abuse since the age of 16. These figures are equivalent to an estimated 4.5 million female victims of domestic abuse and 2.6 million male victims.”
In addition, “6% of women and 4% of men reported having experienced domestic abuse in the past year, equivalent to an estimated one million female victims of domestic abuse and 600,000 male victims”.
And the numbers from the government of Canada are the same.
Canada numbers:
An estimated 7% of women and 6% of men in a current or previous spousal relationship encountered spousal violence during the five years up to and including 2004, according to a comprehensive new report on family violence.
So it’s pretty even. Women are about as likely to commit violence as men are. And in lesbian relationships, the rate of domestic violence is extremely high, from 17% to 45%, depending on the study. I think in general, women are more violent when there is no man present, because they have more difficulty restraining their emotions and resolving disagreements with rational arguments instead of fist, feet and weapons. It would be interesting to know more about which of the girls in the Florida stalking story – predators and prey – had fathers in the home. I think that the presence of fathers would have helped everyone concerned. Fathers are a stabilizing influence in the home.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
Oh, yes, girls do bully. It’s a social play for them. And the ages are right, it starts at about 11-12 and loses its intensity at about 16.
There are girl cliques in every school, and lotsa bullying.
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I found it starts right from toddlerhood. And it’s gotten more vicious over the years. It’s also learned. I’m pleased to say my daughters never bullied, but then, I home schooled them.
Not that that prevented bullying from happening among girls in the home school groups, but at least is was less of an issue.
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“I always thought that only boys could be bullies, and not girls, …”
Oh, my… I’m surprised by your surprise!
Girls have always been bullies. The worst sort of bullies, in my experience. Guys tend to be straightforward in their bullying – physical assault and threats of physical assault. Girls tend to play mind games more. It’s psychological warfare, to a vicious degree. The internet is perfect for that sort of bullying.
It’s part of the reason I never got along with girls while I was growing up. Boys made more sense to me, and I found them more trustworthy. Girls were horrible. That didn’t change until my last year of high school, though I did manage to have female friends before them – all, like myself, among the “rejects.”
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Part of the reason bullying is such a problem these days is that kids are so much more peer-oriented. They learn to care about what their peers think of them more than anything else. So it becomes a huge issue if they aren’t liked. Considering the number of broken families, children these days are less likely to have a close relationship with their parents – particularly their dads. Considering the typical education where they are separated out into cohort groups, they often have little understanding of how to relate and communicate with adults. They become isolated in a world where their same-age peers are their only real peers and this allows them to become even more peer-dependent. These things make it harder for them to tell their parents of what is happening and separate them from the help they need from the adults in their lives. Throw in their immature thinking where they don’t fully understand the results of their actions and can’t see the big picture (e.g. that junior high problems of being picked on are quite temporary) and you have a perfect storm for bullying to become a major issue for many kids.
The number of bullies is also greater these days because fewer parents are teaching their children to be kind and considerate of others. If the problem is brought to their attention, they take their own child’s side, even when their child is at fault, and won’t correct their behavior. Schools, meanwhile, have their hands tied since they can’t use corporal punishment any more. So bullies aren’t punished for their behavior and simply continue.
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Three cases I recall are Rehtaeh Parsons this year. Amanda Todd last year. As well as, Reena Virk in 1997 which was actual murder.
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“I always thought that only boys could be bullies, and not girls, so I find this story surprising.” Oh, my. Girls are absolutely VICIOUS, bloodthirsty, and brutal, and the abuse of others begins in early grade school. It’s all about superiority and one-upping the other girls. (Having been on the receiving end of bullying much like this as a kid myself, I know, believe me. Being bookish has its downsides.) This is where an ability to forge true and even deep friendships, even at this early age, is extremely important—thus teaching kids the ability to see beyond the surface and make good character judgments is important as well. I had two very, very good friends I met in 2nd grade and having them around made life immeasurably easier for me, because we stuck together and defended each other—not being from a wealthy/spendaholic family and not being naturally pretty very much worked against me (none of my trio was wealthy), but friends made up for that a gazillionfold.
I do think one reason bullying in general has become more pervasive and ending with things like this is all of the emphasis on anti-bullying. That probably sounds counterintuitive, but we all know how kids, especially, are—tell them not to do something, and guess what? Moreover, a lot—a LOT of parents—will still go to the teacher and/or principal and whine that their kid is being bullied, even when it’s not situations like this, but situations with very mild teasing and goofing around. Again, this only makes it worse, and also creates a victim mindset in the child in question. Thus by trying to ‘help’, the parent perpetuates the trouble, and sometimes we DO end up with sad things like this happening.
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