suicide by taunting in Massachusetts.

The recent suicide by a young girl in Massachusetts as a result of emotional, physical and verbal taunting is partially caused by the continued coarsening of the culture. In my clinical social work training regarding child abuse or spousal abuse, one of the first lessons I learned is that the calling of a woman by an animal or body part (bitch,cunt,etc) is a precursor to physical abuse. What I have noticed over the last few years is the calling of girls by other girls "a bitch". Look how often you hear this term on television, in movies. The acceptance of this blurs the boundaries of acceptable behavior.(The blurring is made worse by the technology that is so readily available and so intrusive and minimizes as well the sense of personal responsibility for behaviors. The attempts to keep connected with others actually has the opposite effect. Having this behavior shown so readily reduces the impact and its importance. For boys, its a mixed message: if girls can do it, so can I. Look at all the TV shows where meanness and abusive behavior is enabled by having it seen as entertainment. (Its like an electronic version of being in the lion's den or the gladiators) instead of thumbs up or down you get electronically voted out of a house for horrible behaviors or high television ratings.
The blurring of boundaries in any situation has an emotional price. We see this politically with the encouragement of violence by politicians. Joe Wilson became famous for "you lie". The problem with the use of taunting words as was the case with the most recent suicide story and others is that words do hurt and often kill. The question for me is : where were the adult to say "this is not acceptable. There are consequences for verbally abusive behavior. It will be interesting to see how accountable not just the taunters are but school official and the parents of the taunters.