Bullying

This blog, like most blogs, is about what is happening right now.  I like my life now, and I'm happy to blog about it.  

I'm going to step away from my usual chats about my experiences in HK to discuss an issue that absolutely everyone is talking about these days:

Recently, in the US, a string of suicides and their media coverage have caused Americans to start talking, in a very real way, about bullying and its consequences.

I was that Kid (a blog collecting stories from adults who were bullied)


Bullying isn't the issue ( an op-ed piece with very interesting and enlightening comments from the readers, which I liked better than the piece itself)


I am so glad about that, because all i ever heard growing up was "teasing happens to everyone and you just have to ignore it, or stand up to it, and it will go away".  None of those solutions ever worked.  if anything, it made things worse. 

Bullying has caused quite a stir in Japan as well.  Bullies, (as young as second or third grade) desensitized by violence due to modern media, devoid of any moral compass, and left to their own devices, have done some unbelievable things, like chopping off classmates heads and slitting classmates throats and watching them die.  At school.  In the classroom.

There needs to be a better word to describe bullying. A word that causes people to sit up and take notice.  Like "sociopathetic activities" .  But  "Teacher, she is sociopathicing me"  doesn't have a great ring, though. 

Here is the thing I don't like talking about or even thinking about: I was bullied.  Daily. For ten long years.  Sometimes, witnesses called the police.  I never would have done that on my own.   and some of my bullies went to jail (or JV detention).  Which made friends and families of the bullies step up their attacks on me even more, as retribution (which is why I wouldn't have dared call the police, or tell anyone with authority on my own).  just within the line of the law, they would torture me in ways prohibited by the UN.  In ways, which, if they did now as adults, would be called sexual assault or defamation of character or physical assault and allow me to at least get a court-approved restraining order.  yet were  permissible if done by children who are being bullies. 

But which was worse?  the daily assault and battery, or the social isolation?  Every other kid at school, understanding that showing any mercy to me (mercy, not even friendship; that was out of the question) would in turn cause them be bullied themselves.  the only friendships I had in school, until 10th or 11th grade, was with people who refused to acknowledge our friendship once we left our neighborhood because they were afraid of being targeted.

But somewhere between the 10th and 11th grades the bullying, although never ending, was manageable.  Even  laughable.  I was pregnant with 14 kittens?  obviously a rumor by someone too stupid to open up a biology book!   I was a devil worshiper because i was Buddhist?  obviously someone too ignorant to know their ass from their face.  this stuff, utterly tame and lacking any imagination or intelligence, didn't bother me at all. Ok, maybe a tiny bit, but nothing to lose sleep over. If anyone actually believed rumors that silly to be true, they were sad pathetic ignorant fools and deserved pity more than anything else.   

Why did the most vicious and traumatic bullying stop?  was it because the school had a bullying crackdown?  No.  Because ignoring them made them go away?  No.  Because I had a fight and stood up to my tormentors? No. Because I told a trusted adult who gave me valuable resources? No.    Because, as they love to tell you in Hollywood, I changed my clothes, ditched the glasses, and wore pink lipstick? No, no, No! Did i take up karate?  No.    What saved me?   

Ironically, I was saved by the myriad of accidental deaths and suicides which occurred in my high school between my Sophomore and Senior years, giving the bullies other things to contemplate than ways to torture me.  Even back then, i saw the sad irony in that.

Yet i was told by adults i must have done something to deserve it.  And i was told to just ignore it. And I was told "everybody gets bullied at some point, so just deal with it."

These are not solutions.  Does bullying have to get to the point where either they kill you or you kill yourself?

Here is an article by an Austrian who has done some very scholarly research and has offered her views why past solutions at schools haven't worked and offers new solutions:

Student Behavior: Bullying

If you were never bullied, good for you.  read these links to understand more about what is happening so you dont say the same useless ridiculous comments I grew up listening to.

If you were the bully,  you need to think about what values (or lack thereof) you are passing on to your children.  Will your attitudes, amplified by modern desensitization and access to bullying tools you never had access too (weapons, social media, etc) cause your children to step over the line to do things that will put them in jail?  is that what you want for your children?  to keep the power struggle cycle going?

If you were bullied, take heart that you are not alone and share your thoughts.  As adults, we have more power and freedom to express our feelings and stand up for ourselves than we ever did as children.

But whatever you don, DON"T do nothing.  Do Something!  read! learn! speak! change your mind!  be active! Don't let it go on this way!

Note: looking back, there are a lot of typos.  Rather than correct them all, I will just mention they are due to impassioned feelings overtaking my language teacher sensibilities.  But I'm almost always a better writer in the classroom! :-)