For years, I’ve seen posters slapped onto school walls, soliciting the ever-so golden rule, “Treat others the way you want to be treated.” Obviously, the message hasn’t hit home.

Currently, with trending sites like twitter, facebook and tumblr, it’s too easy to let “friends” in, and it shows when a new form of bullying, such as cyber bullying, has taken the main stage in the teen world. For instance, the creation of mock facebook pages has been dedicated to discriminate peers and post uncensored opinions such as comments about students who don’t fit in with their stereotype or into one that’s out-casted, is common. This situation mentioned above did happen at my school where a small circle of students created a twitter page labeled “here to talk about s***”. Obviously, there weren’t stars to cover up the word, and what they did was exactly what their name implied. They wrote disturbing comments about their peers, personal ones that weren’t meant for the twitter world to lay their eyes on. The cyber-bullied students reached out to our school counselors, even printing out the page as physical proof, but because the founders of the page remained anonymous, punishment was out of their reach, the counselors said.

Teens won’t stop and stare at a poster urging them to be kinder and wiser toward their peers; in fact, most of us will walk right on by. And although high schools are implementing bully-awareness sessions between classes, they won’t take it to heart. Cyber-bullying is permanent, once “enter” is pushed, the words can’t be erased from the internet and taking them back isn’t an option. From personal experience, one of the more effective ways to handle these situations is finding a way to let peers step into each others shoes and take a day to understand how their words and actions, even the most minute ones, can negatively affect others. Simple words can go a long way. Make them go the right way.