Recently, I’ve found myself questioning basically everything. One of these things happens to be social media. We hear stories all the time about people reuniting over Facebook, or random acts of kindness someone witnessed.

But on the flip side, there’s the not so nice part. Cyber bullying. I’ve read tons of stories about people that have been bullied over the internet, but never really thought I would have something quite like that happen to me. That changed this week.

To summarize the event, some strangers commented on one of my old photos on Instagram, and when I didn’t recognize the people I decided to check them out to make sure something fishy wasn’t going on. What I found instead was heartbreaking. These two girls were making fun of me on their pages. From making fun of my captions to insulting parts of my body. Girls I had never met before–people that didn’t know me–somehow felt as if they needed to ridicule me. The conversation went something like this.

Sarah* commented on her friend Jane’s* photo: “JANE THE GIRL U JUST TAGGED ME IN. IM DONE PLEASE TELL ME THAT’S FAKE,” with several of the ‘laughing’ emojis.

Jane replied with, “No idk wtf that is but it’s not,” with some more ‘laughing’ emojis.

I mean, that’s not horrible, but it is pretty rude. I’ve never been the most confident about myself, but I know for a fact I don’t look like an alien, so I’m not quite sure what exactly about me is fake. Unfortunately, that was only the beginning.

Sarah, who must have had problems with the caps lock, continued the conversation with the first personal comment: “WTF IS HER NOSE MAN?”

Immediately after reading that, I went to my profile and studied my face, with a multitude of insecure thoughts running through my head. My nose isn’t that bad, is it? It’s pretty big, but not comically large. What if it is big, but I’m just used to it? The conversation then switched to making fun of my height and hair.

At this point, I was more frustrated than offended by their comments. What could I do now? Retaliating back with mean comments would put my at their level and ignoring them would make me a bystander to my own case. So, with the help of a friend, I asked them why they thought it was necessary to insult someone that had never done anything to them. The response I got surprised me.

Jane had recently gone through a breakup and needed something (or in this case, someone) to take her anger out on. Sorry Jane, but hurting other people is not going to fix anything.

After stating that I was sorry for her heartbreak, but it wasn’t an excuse to bully other people, Jane, yet again, managed to surprise me: “Get tf over it. It’s life. I was bullied…it happens…you just got to suck it up and deal with it.”

Wait, what? Being bullied is an excuse to bully others? Being bullied is a part of life? Victims of bullying need to “suck it up and deal with it?” This is all news to me.

That is like saying that its okay for rape victims to rape other people, which is completely false. If this is what society is deeming acceptable, then we need to open our eyes and rethink this.

Bullying is a very real thing that is happening in today’s world, and if we don’t take action, this may never end. Schools are doing an okay job about raising awareness, but what they don’t teach you is how to handle bullying that’s happening outside of school.

So, to anyone out there going through a similar situation, or for people that just want to be prepared, this is my advice:

Don’t let your emotions take control of what you say. Keep cool, state your point and be done. Making it a huge public spectacle doesn’t help either. If you do ask a friend for help, make sure that their input doesn’t make the situation worse. If it is over social media, act formal instead of relaxed in your writing style. This can help with the tone of the message. Lastly, if you’re scared about confrontation, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Especially if it involves getting face to face with someone, as safety becomes an additional issue.

Even though I was nervous about the confrontation aspect, it ended up working out. Maybe I was lucky, but the owner deleted all the comments ,and all traces of the conversation are gone. Standing up for yourself is one of the best things you can do. If we fail to do this, we hurt ourselves more than anything. Whether this was just another story or revealed something new, I hope everyone can take something from my experience.