Parenting Foundation makes cyberbullying noticeable for the first time

Cyberbullying is one of the most current everyday problems faced by children and young people. According to the 2016 James Study, one in four children in Switzerland is bullied, threatened or exposed on social networks.

What is part of a beautiful childhood? Certainly not sadness, despair and loneliness. Yet it is precisely these emotions that characterize the everyday lives of many children and young people. While juvenile crime has fallen in recent years, cases of cyberbullying are on the rise. Online harassment culminates in verbal attacks such as: "Do us a favor and kill yourself!" Those who are bullied feel pain, anger and shame. For those affected, this often leads to insomnia, depression, social isolation and self-doubt, and in extreme cases, suicide.

What does it feel like to be a victim of cyberbullying? With the new campaign "When words hurt", the Elternsein Foundation and Jung von Matt/Limmat are drawing attention to the growing problem of digital psychological terror. Using a specially created cell phone installation, the pain of seven real victims of bullying can be felt. While passers-by hold the smartphone in their hands, real chat histories arrive. Depending on the level of aggression of the messages, the phone sends mild to strong electrical impulses to the "victim":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/8nemGvhGU-0

In the accompanying print campaign, the causes and consequences of cyberbullying merge in a dramatic way: The painful messages are shown as wounds on the skin of young people. These wounds were not created on a computer, but modeled by make-up artist Marc Hollenstein. Hollenstein is otherwise responsible for the film bodies in the series "The Undertaker".

The print subjects and the cell phone installation are flanked by banners in order to address the target group as broadly as possible.

"With our campaign, we want to make children and young people aware of how much harm they can cause with a derogatory comment, an insulting line or a quickly typed threat," says Thomas Schlickenrieder, Managing Director of Stiftung Elternsein. In order to combat cyberbullying effectively, the media skills of children and young people need to be further strengthened. "Responsible use of the internet is one of many issues that the Stiftung Elternsein is committed to."

Responsible at the Stiftung Elternsein: Ellen Ringier (President of the Board of Trustees), Thomas Schlickenrieder (Managing Director), Katja Schaffner (Head of Fundraising), Nik Niethammer (Editor-in-Chief of Swiss parents' magazine Fritz+Fränzi). Responsible at Jung von Matt/Limmat: Dennis Lück (Chief Creative Director), Samuel Wicki, Lorenz Clormann (Creative Director), Christina Wellnhofer (Art Director), Jan Kempter, Sarah Ming (Copywriter/Concept Designer), Jacqueline Willimann (Marketing Communications Planner), Kathrin Gautschi, Andrea Braschler (Consultant), Julia Fischhaber (Junior PR Consultant). External partners: Jung von Matt/play: Michael Kindermann, Sandeep Abraham, Marc Schulz (Casefilm); Jung von Matt/services (production) ; Claude Gasser (photographer) ; Marc Hollenstein (make-up artist); Fantastic Machines: Heinz Sonderegger (development of bullying simulator).