Bullying in Malaysia Is Climbing but the Root Cause Isn’t Just in the Schools.

It starts, as these things often do, with a clip on your feed. A shaky phone camera in a school hallway. A shove, a shout, a face turning away from the lens. You scroll past it, maybe you tell yourself it is an isolated case, kids being kids. But the numbers say otherwise. In Malaysia, bullying is not just happening more often, it is becoming part of the background noise of childhood.

Official reports in schools rose from 3,887 cases in 2022 to 4,994 in 2023. By October 2024, the figure had already passed 5,700 nationwide. This is not the curve of a random spike. It is the steady climb of a culture shifting in the wrong direction.

Photo by Mikhail Nilov

Now add the online world, where cruelty scales with bandwidth. Complaints about cyberbullying to the national regulator were 3,199 in 2023. In 2024, that figure jumped to more than 8,300 according to government-cited data. That is the difference between a problem you talk about in a teacher’s lounge and a problem that shows up in cabinet briefings.

Reuters reported that in just the first quarter of 2024, the government flagged over 51,000 pieces of harmful social media content for platform action, with cyberbullying listed among the priorities. The state does not move like this unless something is really wrong.

Responsibility for addressing abuse lies with everyone. Schools have a duty of care, with rising abuse reports highlighting the need for action. While campaigns and directives are in place, schools require trained counsellors, consistent consequences, and efficient reporting mechanisms. An increase from 3,800+ to nearly 5,000 reports in a year indicates a systemic issue needing clear enforcement and accessible support for students.

Source: Sinar Harian

Parents cannot rely solely on schools. Every screen is a potential playground, and home rules influence behaviour. Bullying and cyberbullying are linked to psychological distress and suicidal thoughts. Addressing this requires agreed device norms, awareness of online activity, and a supportive relationship where teens feel comfortable sharing concerns.

Platforms also play a crucial role. Government reports indicate varying compliance with content removal, showing moderation is an ongoing challenge. Platforms must improve response times to threats, provide visible tools for teens, and establish effective escalation paths for schools, without becoming national censors.

The goal is to swiftly eliminate abuse as it spreads. Education Ministry data shows school bullying cases increased from 3,887 in 2022 to 4,994 in 2023, with fewer cases in 2021 due to movement restrictions. MCMC data shows 3,199 cyberbullying complaints in 2023, rising to over 8,300 in 2024, with a sharp increase in harmful content early in 2024. Lawmakers and agencies are setting guidelines. The doubling of complaints requires clearer definitions, improved data sharing, and funding for school mental health.

The ministry advocates proactive measures with timelines and targets. Publish school intervention stats, average resolution times for bullying reports, and the number of counsellors by district. Transparency is crucial. Students play an active role, and bystanders can influence bullying outcomes. Campaigns should address bystanders, encouraging them to save evidence, report to an adult, and refuse to share humiliating footage. These actions should be normalised, not exceptional.

Source: Astro Awani

The data is already here. The rise from 2022 to 2024 is not in dispute, and the harm it causes is not abstract. Each case is a life nudged towards distrust, isolation, or worse. We can choose to treat this as an inevitable byproduct of growing up, or we can treat it as the social emergency it is. Schools, parents, platforms, lawmakers, all have levers they can pull today without waiting for another study or another press release. Many of these levers are not glamorous, trained counsellors, faster reporting systems, clearer rules for online moderation. But they work. And if we do nothing, the next report will not surprise us. It will simply confirm what we already knew, that we saw the tide rising and decided to watch.