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Never been the target as far as I can recall. I've certainly been flamed in my early days - some of it quite warranted for being a newbie and I learned from that. But some of it quite unnecessary and I (or others) stood up against it. That doesn't mean I wasn't shocked or hurt - I take things quite personally. I may have lashed out angrily or withdrew completely depending on what happened. As my ability to process and respond matured, I would internalize that more in the physical reality and my "virtual-world" responses would be a little more "thought out" and emotionally composed often backed with citation and fact to bolster whatever argument I was oft defending.
I have run across a few people over the years in my direct social circle who have been cyberstalked/cyberbullied and having the experience of building large-scale publicity campaigns and doing online image consulting at one time or another throughout my career has give me some skills to help combat these psychological attacks. The challenge is when they then bleed over to the physical environment when I am not present to help or defend the person and only my advice works. In that case, I usually recommend building a cadre of allies first online and then hopefully that too will bolster into the physical environment where any such "attacks" on character (mentally/physically/emotionally) are occurring. The key there is to be careful in responding, giving further ammo for the bullies to hurl back and work on building up defenses based on fact. Never hurts to do your research and see if their own background provides insight into the bullying - especially "dirt" that might show them to be hypocritical in their arguments.
Never been the target as far as I can recall. I've certainly been flamed in my early days - some of it quite warranted for being a newbie and I learned from that. But some of it quite unnecessary and I (or others) stood up against it. That doesn't mean I wasn't shocked or hurt - I take things quite personally. I may have lashed out angrily or withdrew completely depending on what happened. As my ability to process and respond matured, I would internalize that more in the physical reality and my "virtual-world" responses would be a little more "thought out" and emotionally composed often backed with citation and fact to bolster whatever argument I was oft defending.
I have run across a few people over the years in my direct social circle who have been cyberstalked/cyberbullied and having the experience of building large-scale publicity campaigns and doing online image consulting at one time or another throughout my career has give me some skills to help combat these psychological attacks. The challenge is when they then bleed over to the physical environment when I am not present to help or defend the person and only my advice works. In that case, I usually recommend building a cadre of allies first online and then hopefully that too will bolster into the physical environment where any such "attacks" on character (mentally/physically/emotionally) are occurring. The key there is to be careful in responding, giving further ammo for the bullies to hurl back and work on building up defenses based on fact. Never hurts to do your research and see if their own background provides insight into the bullying - especially "dirt" that might show them to be hypocritical in their arguments.
