Cyberbullying follows your kid home now. You gave them the phone in grade five. Seemed fine that first year. Summer hits. They're scrolling. Someone filmed themselves committing suicide and posted it in a feed your kid follows. Your fifth grader sees it. Nightmares start. You find out weeks later. What else did they see that you don't know about?

Victoria Talwar's research documented that exact case. Not a kid seeking harmful content. Just scrolling. The nightmares lasted months. The bullying you experienced stopped when you got home from school. Your kid's doesn't. Group chats at midnight. Gaming voice channels during homework. Posted photos they can't delete. Comments they can't escape. One parent Talwar interviewed called it the guinea pig generation, the first to raise kids with social media when nobody knows the rules yet.

The weekend used to be the reprieve. That's gone. Your kid's identity forms while strangers post about them in spaces you can't see. But bystanders change outcomes. Research proves passive ignoring makes it worse, and intervention stops it. That's the part nobody's teaching yet.

Topics: cyberbullying, digital parenting, online safety for kids, bystander intervention, youth mental health

GUEST: Victoria Talwar | http://youthdigitalcompass.com

Originally aired on 2026-02-06