The Monster Within

When I was in elementary and middle school I was bullied for being fat. (I wrote a little of my story here a while back.) I would say that especially my 5th and 6th grade years in school, it happened every day. I still had tons of friends, was involved in activities and was generally a happy kid, but it still hurt. Those insults launched at me by my skinny peers pelted my psyche with hate and chipped away at my self-worth. I was never pushed, hit, or otherwise physically assaulted, and there were plenty of kids who had it worse than me.

Where were my parents in all of this? They didn’t know because I didn’t tell them. I was too embarrassed to say a word to anyone, thinking that if I were thinner or prettier (like my older sister) the bullies wouldn’t have anything to pick apart on me. I didn’t realize that once you are a target they will always find something, anything about you to psychologically mutilate in order to make them feel better about themselves.
In today’s world there are so many more ways to bully. For me, the two bus rides of the day were the absolute worst, but that only involved a verbal beating. I wasn’t mocked on Facebook or Twitter, no humiliating pictures of me getting changed for gym class were texted around the school. But nowadays, bullied kids take it from all sides. They can’t escape the hateful words and snide, mocking comments just by stepping off a school bus – they get home and logon to social networking sights only to find that they are being made a laughingstock all over the internet. Their phone fills up with text messages from their tormentors – some including picture perhaps taken during a private moment when that person was trying to fit in by doing something he or she regrets.

Eventually, for some kids (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/08/4-bullied-teen-deaths-at-_n_755461.html) the pain becomes more than they can endure. They become locked into a mindset that the only way out is the ultimate way out. Maybe they don’t understand the finality of their choice, maybe thinking it won’t “work” and someone will finally hear their cries for help. Cries are heard, but they are only those of their devastated family and friends at their funeral; those left behind that can only ask why and how come I didn’t know?

I do believe there is a difference between teasing and bullying. All kids tease at some point in their lives, and all kids are teased. Particularly in a family with siblings, I am not sure you can go a day without someone teasing you for something and returning the favor all the same. Bullying is a systemic target of one person without rhyme or reason. A person’s appearance, presumed sexual orientation, nationality, religion – all of them and more seem to be fair game for bullies who are less than confident in their own lives and choose to lash out at someone they see with a weakness. But it’s not a weakness – it’s a difference and those two things are not one in the same. Calling someone/something “gay”, “retard”, fat, “n-word” is bullying. Intimidating someone through physical violence is bullying. Excluding someone and turning people against them is bullying.

To me I think part of the answer is simple; if you see bullying. Stop it. If you are a kid, go get help. TELL someone. Even if the person being bullied doesn’t want you to, for whatever reason – embarrassment, shame – TELL someone. Adults , if you see it happening, or if a child tells you about it happening – believe them. Tell someone. March into school, or the gym, or wherever it is happening and refuse to leave until you have some sort of action plan as to how the bullying will be addressed. Talk to the kids in your life; tell them how smart they are, how kind, how much potential they have. Teach them to be an advocate for their peers, and teach them that it is never ok, not even if the entire rest of the world is doing it, to bully someone. And for the love of all that is holy, please do not condone or perpetuate bullying actions by your child by engaging in it yourself.

I believe there is a monster within all of us with an incredible capacity for the hatred and anger that can lead to bullying. Hitler? Bully. Kim Jong? Bully. Muammar Qaddafi? Bully. Sure, these are extreme cases of bullying on a much larger scale that have lead to the extermination of millions of people. Look at the statistics – the numbers might not be as high, but bullying in our schools is leading to the extermination of the world’s youth. It’s causing the deaths of young people who have yet to even realize their full potential, let alone reach it.

At the risk of sounding cheesy, in addition to our capacity for ugly, within all of us also lies an immense capacity for kindness and acceptance. You aren’t going to like everyone you meet in this world, dare I say you might even hate some people. But kindness and acceptance can still govern your actions by you saying, “I don’t like this person and don’t agree with their actions, but it’s THEIR choice, not mine and I can accept their right to make that choice.” Shockingly, you will find in life, that you aren’t perfect either and that not everyone is going to agree with your thoughts and actions. The only way to cure this epidemic of bullying and the suicide it causes, is to slay the monster within.

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