Advice to adult victims of cyberbullying

I'm not talking to people who have deliberately bullied others and are being bullied in turn, where bullying is defined by Christ in the Sermon on the Mount, and in other world religions (no I'm not a "christian": too many Christians are bullies: we don't need no son of G-d, we need a Teacher):

And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council. And whosoever shall say, Thou Fool, shall be in danger of hell fire

(Matt. 5.22). Note that Christ doesn't say you shouldn't criticise behavior or affections. He is saying that if you judge a person globally, you are playing G-d, and this is what constitutes bullying and stalking: the obsessive and addictive judging of a person globally.

Tu quoque, the logical fallacy of "you're another", linked as it is to psychological transference, makes most bullies reductionist. They typically claim, as did their role model Hitler, that their conduct is a riposte to being "called" something. The key is that when the victim's text is investigated, you find, usually, criticism of affections or behavior.

Language is assaulted by a constant reduction.

Here, then, is my advice to the victim of cyberbullying.

(1) Admit to yourself that you are a victim of wrongdoing, of bullying. This is hard for adults to do since the media encodes bullying as kid stuff. However, many cases of cyber-bullying are instigated by parents and teachers, and society as a whole is pervaded by bullying in the small as a sort of lubricant.

(2) The conduct of the cyberbully, insofar as he or she writes things that would not be said in public, is wrong, and despite what he or she may imply, you didn't cause it.

(3) Of course, there may be minor or even major flaws in what you posted. On a free Internet, your communication "style" is not the issue.

Shakespeare, in Julius Caesar, has the Roman mob tear the poet Cinna to pieces when they discover that he's not the assassin Cinna. They shout, "kill him for his bad verses". Note that very many campaigns of bullying start with amateur literary criticism, typically by strikingly incoherent, uncultured, and aliterate people, of the sort who, you'd think, would be the last people to become literary critics.

But, as Stalin may have sighed after a hard day at the office signing orders for execution, it's a dirty job, but someone's gotta do it. The appearance of the words is easier to "understand" than content, if you're a thug and bully.

Therefore, it's usually not the case that you will Win Friends and Influence People if you sign up for a course in Effective Communication at the community college, although you will benefit from reading Dale Carnegie's book of that name; it's chock full of good advice taken from Christ's Sermon on the Mount, in fact.

(4) You will usually be compared to a child by chronological adults: in the 1950s, had the Internet existed, you would have been compared to a woman or a black or brown person because racism is part of bullying, and vice-versa.

This is because as Adorno, the midcentury musicologist, philosopher and critic, said, "fascism is the return of the nightmare of childhood".

Take comfort in the innocence of children, an innocence which the bully is trying to destroy in himself, and realize that you might be a grave child after all, full of sincerity and truth, and with a wallet full of credit cards, something every kid wishes they had.

I hate getting so Biblical since Christianity and most organized religion is just bullying on steroids for the most part, but you do have to reconcile the serpent and the dove: Matt. 10:16:

Be ye therefore wise as serpents, and innocent as doves