Danah Boyd's Cyberbullying Is A Serious Problem

799 Words2 Pages

In today’s world filled with computers, tablets, and phones; all capable of accessing the internet, the dangers of the cyber world are relevant to everyone. Andrew Schrock and Danah Boyd’s article, “Cyberbullying Is a Serious Problem”, highlights the full extent of cyberbullying and online harassment. The effects of cyberbullying haunts many people in America, specifically adolescents. These victims are threatened, embarrassed, and humiliated on a platform that everyone can see. The authors use of emotional and logical appeals works very well in making the reader fully grasp the seriousness of this topic. The article focuses in examining who the victims tend to be, the perpetrators and the overlap of victims and bullies. According to the …show more content…

They are connect to people’s Pathos and Logos appeals. Pathos connects to people by trying to convince people by emotional appeal, and Logos appeals to logic. The authors thesis, “These acts are designed to threaten, embarrass, or humiliate youth”(Schrock,1), pulls the reader’s emotions into the article right away by using strong language. Remarks such as these make the reader feel sorry for the victims, which happen to be youth the majority of the time. Depression is also discussed, which is a very serious topic, not taken lightly by the readers. Their use of logical appeals works very well to make people feel bad, and want change. One of the most shocking statistics in the article is that 4%-46% of youth between the ages of 10-17 have been a victim of cyberbullying. That means nearly half of all kids in America will be harassed online at some point in their life. This statistic works very well to appeal to those who need logic to be convinced of the seriousness of cyberbullying. Another good example of the authors Logos appeals is, “ In a recent study, 27% of teenaged girls were found to “cyberbully back” in retaliation for being bullied online”(Schrock,3). This particular figure does an excellent job of taking the topic of cyberbullying full circle, proving it needs to end before everyone becomes a

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