Internet bullying hurting community
The need for a defined internet protocol on networking site Gaydar has been highlighted by a plea made to the community in Newcastle.
Novocastrian Paul Eilich has circulated a letter calling on the Newcastle community to put an end to bullying in chat rooms. This follows incidents where personal details including HIV status, addresses and phone numbers were disclosed.
There appears to be a major misuse of the internet chat room on Gaydar, Eilich wrote in the letter circulated to hundreds in the Newcastle and Hunter region.
The room is used by a group of small-minded individuals to demoralise other people in the community. The behaviour is creating a huge divide in the community, not to mention the discrimination which is happening at huge levels, he told Sydney Star Observer.
I’m sure it’s happening everywhere, but what it’s doing up here because it’s such a small community, is that you just don’t know if the person you talk to at the pub is then going online and stabbing you in the back anonymously.
It’s wearing people down. Every time I talk to people they will say -˜oh such and such happened on the internet’. It’s dominating the community.
The simple solution would be to have the chat room for paid members only so people couldn’t create fake profiles to rip people off. Eilich also called on the community to make a vocal objection to instances of bullying.
Gaydar has rejected Eilich’s suggestion but claims to have extensive safety procedures.
Our five million members have the right to use Gaydar without any prejudice or bullying, a spokesman for Gaydar’s parent company, QSoft, said.
We would strongly advise anybody who feels they are being bullied to block the profile to stop messages being received from that particular profile.
If a member would like to make a complaint, our customer service team can look into specific cases and advise on next steps. We have also teamed up with a number of LGBT Police Liaison Officers who have profiles on Gaydar and can be contacted if an individual feels they are being victimised.
ACON’s Hunter branch has responded to Eilich’s concerns and will start a campaign to raise awareness of internet bullying.
The real issue Paul has brought out is the need to promote a culture of care, Hunter manager Chris Clemenson said.
While Gaydar probably does play a particular role, we would see that peer pressure is also a really important thing that people in Newcastle can exert by saying that abusive behaviour is just not on.
ACON has posted an article on netiquette on its website and is investigating further education possibilities, including workshops.
Have your say: Have you been the victim of internet bullying?
info: For more information head to http://www.acon.org.au/community/index.cfm?cat_id=73&subcat=105#address or email [email protected].
ATO
White jumbuck ute
The problems will always remain and people just have to realize gaydar doesn’t care about their websites members and rhyce maybe just maybe you have possibly been the cause of some of the problems
The abuse is still happening in the Newcastle chat room yet gaydar refuses to do anything about it.
Maybe the only way to stop the abuse is to close the newcastle room.
Until gaydar does something about all the fake profiles there will always be trouble in the Newcastle room.
The fake profiles run rampant in the room, the room becomes a shit hole, and main person who causes problems always has insulting remarks in his bio line and if you email gaydar support they ask for evidence of the abuse and then they email you back saying sorry.
When will gaydar support do something ?
The Newcastle room is now a pathetic chat room and the abuse is getting worse and gaydar still does nothing about it.
There is no use sending gaydar a complaint as all they will do is say sorry, saying sorry does nothing to help or solve the problems.
Gaydar needs to take responsibility for their website and put a moderator in the room so 24hrs a day so the abuse can be dealt with in real time
Somethings needs to be done asap.
What I find that really bugs me is, where I live in essex gay ageism and racial abuse tend to dominat the room, so many fake profiles where peole can quiet frankly make others feel alone, I use the net all the time and gaydar in particular, I live in essex and it seem the whole site is dominated by shalow people, passing judgements about age weight, etc etc, gaydar needs to address this issue now as it will find during this “credit crunch” that fewer paid members will want to join the site for fear of online bullying, I have been the victim of such bullying it leave one feeling alone fed up and almost suicidal, I have ben the subject of one guys hate and anger because he can be the way he is with no comeback you report this to gaydar and yet they do nothing my life is very insular as I have three major health problems so I do not go out much and it seesm that thse issues of gay bullying are forcing people to rethink their aproach to gay life, this needs action now and for gaydar to take a stance instead of sitting there doing nothing
I used to be a gaydar member.Raced home every day to see if I had any “New” messages,and yes it was very exciting in the first few weeks.
I then started to realize that Gaydar was taking up alot of my time as I was always on it,looking for something that I could never find.
I also realized that I could go on it at a time and hours would just melt away.I also realized its the same people on it all the time (At the weirdest hours),some nice & geniune,some just on it to play games and yes other types that are mentioned above.I also worked out that alot of gay men who gaydar their lives and another group meet up in the clubs and bitch bitch bitch as they talk about their daily victims.
I also worked out that if theres an argument on gaydar and you have no pic,the guy you argued with gets his friend to sweet talk you and send him a pic to send again to the guy you argued with,then the nice one dissapears,very sleazy.
Years ago a drag queen at the Albury stated that everyones has fucked each other anyway,I suppose thats like gaydar.
The best thing is that I got rid of it.It was such a relief to get rid of it,you feel mentally healthier and imagine your physical health as well (Sitting there like a couch potato hour after hour).
Get rid of it,and enjoy the great sunny weather that you have missed outside,visit your family and catch up on doing the things that you loved doing before Gaydar took it all away,as theres more to life then Gaydar,thanks
The security advice to chat site user’s should not be taken lightly. Never give your true name or location on your profile. Never advertise your phone number, web address or email address. Never give a pornographic image of yourself that shows your face or location.
Try a nic name. Try an approximate location e.g city east. Keep your face pics decent and completely separate from nude pics. Give a secondary email address that is completely separate from your banking, business, professional, work related or family access. Eventually provide a phone number via email and talk 1 on 1 . The first meeting should be held in a safe location e.g cafe where nothing should go wrong and even if it did you could get help easily. Consider taking a buddy with you to your first meet up. Don’t be too quick to go home with your new ”friend”.
Always provide yourself with the security measure that you require. Sometimes people are so impressed by pics and text that they overlook their welfare.
If the person you are so impressed by really is so great they wont mind your security precautions.
Please be reminded that the bad guys are few. . . . .but you will not be their next victim !!!
Happy and safe chatting .
Michael. Inner West.
Substaniated reports of abuse should also result in members being barred entry. Depending on the severity of abuse the penalty could range from barred entry for 1 day , 1 week, 1 month or permanently with no chance of a refund !!!
Also the management may well find themselves liable to legal prosecution and compensation payouts due to negligence in their care to protect members from harassment.
Gaydar management is legally obliged to look after its membership.
Whether the abuse is petty or significant, always report it to Gaydar and insist that the matter be dealt with asap. Dont tolerate abuse, report it always and demand that your rights to your peace of mind be upheld. In this way with many thousands of regular Gaydar users keeping vigil on this website service im sure we can get rid of many trouble makers and prick the conscience of , ”would be offenders ” by showing them that they will be held accountable for their abuse.
Michael. Inner West.
There are many fake identities on Gaydar. People can upload a pic of any one and pretend that is their pic . With this level of decieving occuring some misguided men can bully others with apparent ease with no fear that their own stupid behaviour could be traced directly to their face pic . Some other chat services providers reduce this problem by sending you a code that you must write down on paper and hold it up in your face pic. All other pics must be approved by comparing them to your original encoded face pic. Gaydar can enhance its security by upgrading its scrutiny in this way and by including more ‘report abuse buttons’ . Substantiated abuse alerts by its members could result in problem makers being prohibited from re-entering Gaydar. Also providing members with a guarantee that any genuine abuse will be reported to the police.
Michael. Inner West
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What happened to nofliesonme?
The internet harassments in the Newcastle room are INCREDIBLE! I have never experienced it before in my life until moving here.
Last year I had to take court action against a regular chatter in the Newcastle room for the stalking he enacted against me. Most of you know who he is. Me and the writer Mark share something in common.
I have seen this man move into our community and create a atmosphere of hatred and enemies between the members of the local gay community who previously lived side-by-side without malice angst them.
Online chat sites are a perfect tool for perpetrating these offenses with little room for retort of defending yourself.
I personally am proud to say that I have lobbied for the removal of a couple of profiles of Newcastle chatroom participants for publicly vilifying persons with HIV – and we as a group have been successful in our efforts. The problem is that these men have created duplicate profiles to sit in the room “anonymously” and enact their filthy vilifications.
But this is a small town…and we know who they are.
My advice? TALK ABOUT IT! and beware of Wolves in sheeps clothing.
Rhyce
Be careful not to give any details of yourself! In chatrooms you just dont know who or what is sending you messages back and forth.
I have been harrassed in this room,while there are lots of genuine friends in the room, there is the element of bullies, and they are nameless guys. One even brought up a subject which contributed to the end of my career, and all the people in the chatroom did not need to know the nitty gritty details of what happened to me in my job. Wickham Rooter was the person who made these allegations, and what was said, need not have even been mentioned in open chat. he has no pic on his profile, preferring to hide behind a camera with a line thru it.
With the amount of bitchiness that goes on in the newcastle room, its a wonder nothing has been said about this room before now.
There appears to be several groups causing the problems in question, rather than two individuals. Shame on grown men who should know better! Why carry on with such banter?
Having said that, I felt that gaydar’s response to the article was a hint on the weak side. It implied all care and no responsibility.
And, for future reference, how does one go about conacting the LGBT Liaiason Officers who are prepared to assist with this problem?
The vast majority of the problems in the Newcastle chat room can be attributed to just 2 individuals.
Gaydar has banned these 2 individuals and deleted their profiles, but as we know email addresses are easy to get and they are back online continuing their campaign of bullying now is a more clandestine manner.
Chat websites like these need to be really careful as one small group of anti-social users may make others turn off the site altogether. And that’s bad for business.
People know which sites have more friendly atmospheres and which ones are just plain bitchy (just like we know about certain bars).
Personally, I’ve found it remarkable how the same wording and pictures on two different sites can have such different responses from other users. It certainly says alot about a chatsite when people consistently interact in the same way (be it in a positive or negative manner).
Neil, some people just get their kicks out of it! Simple as that.
Ive been on gaydar for 8 years,,,
I am appalled at a small group on .the Newcastle chatroom.
There is a secret code on where they bully and intimidate people to the point where i rarely go on there,,,,
These people are responsible for my car windows being smashed and tyres being let down
They are giving out names and numbers of people….
Why must we fight amongst ourselves,,its hard enough being a minority group with out the internal bitching and fighting