At the high school I went to text harassment was very much an extension of cyber bullying. Often kids would target one person and spam them with cruel messages and nasty photos.

I think that in a case like this the person being bullied really needs to step up and report the texts to not only their parents but also the school authorities. Technology is constantly changing and people have to know how it can be used to harm others.

If you have a teen and they have the evidence of bullying right on their phone, use it as evidence. Often schools take this kind of harassment seriously and the students doing it could easily be suspended or expelled.

If you want to avoid trouble like text harassment it is pretty easy to change your phone number or to get an unlisted number as soon as you sense a problem. If the person sending the messages is just doing it to bother you because they have a vendetta then it should be pretty easy to avoid them.

Now, the problem I think comes when text harassment becomes an outlet for a stalker. Often people feel that with new technology they are harder to trace but you can get a restraining order just from the texts if they contain threats and inappropriate material. If you suspect the person doing it will keep harassing you in other ways, the text messages can be a good way to get a retraining order.

@Sneakers41 -Text harassment is very real and teenagers are the most susceptible. Receiving harassing text messages can really disrupt a kid’s school day. Many of these kids are using provocative pictures and sending them to others in order to embarrass the person. I think that there should be warning classes in middle school about what happens when you send provocative pictures of yourself to people that you think are your friends.

hey then send it to everyone and this is also a form of text harassment and the one that generally receives the sexually explicit pictures are charged with a felony because it is considered child pornography.

They say that about 25% of teenagers participate in this type of sexting that really has a lot of potential for harassment as well as jail time. Maybe there should be a age requirement on texting like there is with alcohol because a lot of young kids really don’t realize that they are make life long mistakes that will affect them as long as they live with one simple little text.

Many do not have the maturity to understand what can happen to them and they can ruin their future with just one text.

@Icecream17 - I agree that that is the best way to avoid this because it must be really disturbing to have to read these harassing text messages and why would you want to ruin your day like that? I think that the text messaging laws that really need to be in place is the text messaging laws that do not allow people to text while they drive.

It is unbelievable when you think about the amount of people that do this while driving. To me that is the more severe texting offense and the general harassment laws should take care of text message harassment. I think that texting while driving should be a felony because you can not only kill yourself, but you can also kill an innocent person.

I personally don’t understand why there needs to be text message harassment laws. Harassment is harassment. It doesn’t matter if was through a text or made verbally, it is still illegal. I really never text message anyone because I rather talk to them over the phone.

I think that the easiest way to avoid text message harassment is to drop the text messaging service altogether on your phone. You really don’t need it, if you think about it. If the person wants to continue to harass you they will have to become more creative. I am sure most people would stop when they realize it is just too hard to harass somebody and they will move on.

That is what I would do.

@MrMoody - The situation you describe is not at all uncommon. I think, however, that most human resources departments provide some strict guidelines about workplace relationships, in order to avoid harassment lawsuits.

Companies who do so aren’t trying to restrict individual liberties. They just need to protect themselves as well against possible litigation. Again, I don’t know about your company by the HR manual should address these issues.

I’d like to offer a simple bit of advice to anyone who would like to avoid the charge of harassment in the workplace. No, it’s not, “Don’t do it.” That’s obvious.

What is not obvious is that a charge of sexual harassment can ensue when two co-workers develop a romantic relationship that later goes south.

This happened in one company that I worked at. To make a long story short, the female worker, who held a higher position, leveled a harassment complaint against the worker with whom she was having this fling. It was outside work hours, but when the relationship ended she felt threatened by his continued presence in the company and wanted him out, through no fault of his own.

I knew the guy, and he did nothing meriting the criteria of harassment. He did, however, resign.

So, in short-avoid workplace relationships, if you care about your job.

@Charred - This is the first time that I’ve heard of text harassment. It makes sense when you think about it; harassment includes any attempted communication with another person that is unwanted, and so I suppose that would cover all technologies, including email harassment, harassing voice mails, etc.

I don’t know that there is a need for text harassment laws, however, as harassment is a pretty big umbrella term that would cover all these situations.

As to your point about blocking technology not existing, I agree that it’s only a matter of time before that will change.

However, there is recourse for people who are harassed. They should just call the phone company. I’m sure they can take appropriate action to track the harasser and tell him that his messages are no longer welcome.

I’m scratching my head here. I don’t understand why phone companies don’t have features that allow blocking of text messages from a certain sender.

After all, we can block incoming calls with current technology and text messages come in through the same line, so in principle we should be able to block harassing text messages from a certain number.

That’s the theory anyway, and I smell an opportunity for someone who can develop such a tool. It may be left to a third party provider who can develop a text blocker utility.

Further, I think that such a feature should have automatic text re-dial, so to speak, so that it can immediately send a message back to the sender to the effect, “I’m going to call the police if you keep doing this.”