„Jocurile morţii”, între sinucidere şi cyberbullying. O analiză asupra riscurilor la care sunt expuşi copiii în mediul virtual [“Death games” between suicide and cyberbullying. An analysis of the risks to which children are exposed in the virtual environment]

In the past years, particularly in the United States, cases of suicide among child victims of cyberbullying have been reported in the media. The media reported the seriousness of the fact that some children were cyber-bullied “to death”. Rebecca Sedwick, Kristina Arielle Calco, Amanda Todd, etc. are some of the victims, adolescents who ended their life because of cyberbullying. From February to March 2017, the Romanian press presented a “wave” of suicide cases among children and adolescents, which seemed to be moving from Russia to our country, since from November 2015 until April 2016 only in Russia there were 130 suicide cases among Russian adolescents who had chosen to play a “game of death”. Parents were worried, the subject was debated with panic around the world, and teachers were sometimes interrupted in their teaching activity by the pupils who “wanted to play the Blue Whale”, often as a joke or in an attempt to attract the attention of adults. This morbid “game” appeared and seemed to shade the Romanian celebration at the beginning of spring (Mărţişor). “Was it a real danger or a false alarm?” “Did the media coverage have a preventative role or generated unwanted effects among children?” These are questions that we would like to answer, along several others, such as: “What were actually these «games of death»?” Have there really been victims among children?” “What component of these games was cyberbullying?”, “How real are the risks of cyberbullying and how far can they go?”

Keywords: suicide, “death games”, cyberbullying, “Blue Whale"