WASHINGTON —
When Melania Trump pledged to make combating cyberbullies a pet issue last
November, the idea was met with a healthy measure of skepticism. After
all, her
husband was just finishing up a presidential campaign fueled by heated social
media attacks.
Now, almost
six months after Melania stood at Donald Trump’s side as he took the oath of
office, she has done nothing publicly to live up to her original promise — and
probably has lost her chance to do anything effective, given the president’s
continued aggressive behavior on social media, according to experts in the
field.
“I wish
Melania would really take this on. There’s no way that she can,” said Parry
Aftab, founder of WiredSafety, an advocacy group. “She can’t. It won’t work.
There’s no credibility.”
In fact,
advocates fear that President Trump — through his tweets — may actually be
providing aggressors with a model for lashing out at those perceived as weaker.
The federal
government defines cyberbullying as behavior between school-aged children, but
experts said that President Trump’s behavior fits their understanding of the
phenomenon.
“The tweets
over time speak for themselves and meet the definition of bullying,” said Susan
Swearer, who is on the Research Advisory Board for the Born this Way
Foundation, an antibullying group founded by Lady Gaga.
Swearer, who
is also a professor at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, described bullying
as repeated, intentional, mean behavior “in a relationship characterized by an
imbalance of power.”
In recent
days, the president has used his Twitter account to attack MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski,
saying that on New Year’s Eve she was “bleeding badly from a face-lift” (she
wasn’t) and accusing her of having a “low I.Q.” (she doesn’t). The president
labeled her cohost, Joe Scarborough, as “psycho” (there’s no evidence it’s
true).
When Melania
Trump’s office was asked about his Twitter outburst, her office issued a
statement defending it. “As the First Lady has stated publicly in the past,
when her husband gets attacked, he will punch back 10 times harder,” Melania
Trump’s spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham.
Even after
the Brzezinski tweet was widely denounced, the president again attacked the
media, with a tweet showing a video of Donald Trump body slamming another man
back in the day when he was promoting professional wrestling. The video that he
tweeted had been altered: The face of the man Trump was attacking was obscured
with the CNN logo, a network that the president frequently criticizes.
The promise
that Melania Trump would work to reduce cyberbullying came in a brief speech
she gave in the Philadelphia suburb of Berwyn, Pa., on Nov. 3, where she
discussed how upsetting bullying can be to children.
“Technology
has changed our universe. But like anything that is powerful, it can have a bad
side,” she said. “As adults, many of us are able to handle mean words, even
lies. Children and teenagers can be fragile. They are hurt when they are made
fun of or made to feel less in looks or intelligence.”
Melania
Trump added that the culture has become “too mean and too rough” and said: “We have
to find a better way to talk to each other, to disagree with each other, to
respect each other. . . . It will be one of the main focuses of my work if I’m
privileged enough to become your first lady.”
Her
comments, which came at the end of a roughly 15-minute speech, were widely seen
as a response to criticism leveled by Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
A week
earlier, Clinton had released a plan to combat cyberbullying that would have
provided federal matching dollars for states that developed programs.
At the same
time, the Clinton campaign began airing a 30-second spot featuring a boy with
muscular dystrophy who explained that he’d been the target of bullying and was
offended when Donald Trump mocked a disabled journalist during a November 2015
rally.
“I don’t
want bullies in my life, and I don’t want one in the White House,” said the
boy, who identified himself as Bryce, in the Clinton ad.
Earlier in
the campaign, Donald Trump also used social media to disparage Alicia Machado,
who had been named Miss Universe when he owned the pageant. After winning, she
had gained weight, causing Trump to publicly ridicule her. After Clinton
highlighted these comments during a debate, Trump fired back on Twitter,
calling Machado “disgusting” and urging his followers to “check out” her “sex
tape.”
A
spokeswoman for Melania Trump declined to directly answer a question about
whether the first lady has taken any steps to combat cyberbullying.
“The First
Lady continues to be thoughtful about her platform and we look forward to
announcing something in the coming weeks,” Grisham told the Globe. She did not
respond to follow-up questions requesting clarification.
The federal
government runs a Twitter account called @StopBullyingGov along with the
website StopBullying.gov. A blog hosted on the website has been updated twice
since Trump took office, but the Twitter account has been far more active.
Both are
hosted by the Department of Health and Human Services, which would see deep
cuts under President Trump’s proposed 2018 budget. No reductions are expected
for the website, which cost $150,000 to run last year, said Mark Weber, a
spokesman for the department. “We’re planning on updating the site and
embracing new initiatives,” Weber said.
Much of the
education on combating cyberbullying is provided by nonprofits or through
partnerships with companies, rather than via federal grants. That’s why there
was some enthusiasm in the prevention community about the idea that the first
lady could be taking on the issue from her high-profile role at the White
House.
But none of
the experts reached for this article were aware of Melania Trump doing anything
on it since her initial comments.
“She nor
anyone at the White House has contacted us. You’re the 50th person to ask,”
said Justin Patchin, who is the codirector of the Cyberbullying Research Center
and professor of criminal justice at the University of Wisconsin Eau Claire.
“We know everyone in the field. And we don’t know anyone she’s reached out to.”
Patchin said
it would be difficult to square Melania Trump’s defense of her husband’s online
behavior with best practices for discouraging cyberbullying.
“Retaliation
is not among the top options for students who are targets” of cyberbullying, he
said, referring to President Trump’s tendency to settle scores online.
He said that
if the White House wanted to seriously take on the issue, there would have to
be some kind of acknowledgment that the president’s behavior is problematic.
“It could be
an important lesson, that we get caught up in the moment, and when people say
hurtful things about us, we want to react,” Patchin said.
“This could
be an opportunity for her and the president to step back and say, ‘The moment
got the better of me. I regret what I said.’ ”
Instead the
president continued his attacks two days after the initial face lift tweet,
though with a very slightly more conciliatory tone.
“Crazy Joe
Scarborough and dumb as a rock Mika are not bad people,” Trump tweeted.
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