Let's say you have a piece of wood, a nail, and a hammer. Pretend the wood is a person, and the nail is a mean rumor  about that person. If you hammer in the nail, you're obviously hurting him or her. If you then pull out the nail, there's still a hole in the wood, and the damage has been done. There are many reasons why that nail of a rumor can be so harmful. Rumors are, quite simply, a form of bullying . When a person or a group makes up a rumor about someone or decides to spread gossip, it's usually to hurt someone, break up a friendship, or make someone less popular. It's the same thing as teasing, only it's done behind someone's back instead of to his or her face. When you spread a rumor about someone, you're sending a signal that the person is outside of the group, and somehow less worthy of friendship than others. You're making fun of that person or pointing out negative things about him or her. This can let others think that it's okay to make the person feel bad, and make him or her an outsider. We need to be able to trust our friends, and gossip and rumors can break this trust. If you tell a personal secret to a friend, and he turns around and tells it to someone else, you might feel like you will get burned if you ever get close to him again. Letting a rumor influence your behavior is like letting someone else make a big decision for you. Let's say you hear that the teacher plans to call a Snow Day tomorrow because a blizzard   is coming. Expecting a day off, you don't do your homework. The next morning, the blizzard turns out to be nothing more than a drizzle , and school isn't off after all. You get zeroes on your work. To tell a rumor and a tease apart, you depend on   _  .
whether it is done behind someone whether it is painful or not whether it is a kind of bullying whether it is spread fast.