When considering a Civic Media issue that is interesting and something that could be supported by a digital platform and a social media aspect of the internet- I immediately turned to children and Facebook. Children are very involved on the Internet and because of that I know parents are more involved also. I wanted to examine the platform of StopBullying.Gov because before starting Communication studies, I was originally on the field of Education. Topics about children and parents really interest me and I know they are topics with a lot of subtopics and continuous change.

When I was student teaching for the first two years of college, I was given the chance to observe kids in schools. When a child misbehaved, I often heard “don’t make me call your mother” from the teachers. I began to wonder why it was always the mothers being called and never the fathers. Then after talking to a few professors about it, they considered the idea that fathers were pushing the “get tough, suck it up, stand up for yourself, brush it off, or be brave” ideas. These ideas could quickly go from common phrases to an incident within bullying. Parent’s roles in bully prevention are interesting and I want to figure out how those roles are different especially between the two different parents.

The question that this project will be observing will be:

“Why are women involved in the StopBullying.Gov platform more so compared to men?”

Then I began to look into the idea of perhaps women are just more dominant on the Facebook world. This idea came to be true and supported by other studies and this is where the entire project came together and began. It’s easy to say that mom’s are more involved because they are around, but why are they more involved with social media aspects of topics as well. Dad’s can be on the computer just as much as Mom’s, so why are the mom’s making more of an effort to be involved. Why are more than half the likes and comments on Facebook from women? Any child could be bullied, male or female, and yet it is usually the mothers being called upon to actually make the difference and Stop Bullying.

Even in the Facebook Platform, besides having the posts and comments mainly by women, the posts and pictures on the actual website of StopBullying.Gov are for women. This connects the idea that since the women are on the Facebook page, they then go to the webpage to search into the ideas further. Women are affecting the platform because they are more dominant in the platform through the social media pages it controls.

1. Literature review