Let’s recall the first time you were being bullied or were bullying someone. Does it make you feel angry, sad? Or maybe good? if you think that it is pleasurable, you must have lost your mind since that day.
Bullying is evidence of how comfortable humans are with negative emotion.
The word ‘bully’ means “harasser of the weak”. Bullying is unwanted, aggressive behavior among school aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. The behavior is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated, over time. Both kids who are bullied and who bully others may have serious, lasting problems.
Bullying includes actions such as making threats, spreading rumors, attacking someone physically or verbally, and excluding someone from a group on purpose. As you all probably know, the victims are often girls because they tend to be more emotionally sensitive than boys. They mostly do the bullying in a form of taunting the victims’ physical appearance, behavior, social status, or even their diligence. While on the boys’ side, the victims are most likely the non-athletic ones. And above all, a really immoral thing is when the victims are people with disabilities (differently abled).
The sort of repeated behaviour that can be considered bullying includes:
•Keeping someone out of a group (online or offline).
•Acting in an unpleasant way near or towards someone.
•Giving nasty looks, making rude gestures, calling names, being rude and impolite, and constantly negative teasing.
•Spreading rumours or lies, or misrepresenting someone (i.e. using their Facebook account to post messages as if it were them).
•Mucking about that goes too far.
•Harassing someone based on their race, sex, religion, gender or a disability.
•Intentionally and repeatedly hurting someone physically.
•Intentionally stalking someone.
•Taking advantage of any power over someone else like a Prefect or a Student Representative.
Bullying can happen anywhere. It can be in schools, at home, at work, in online social spaces, via text messaging or via email. It can be physical, verbal, emotional, and it also includes messages, public statements and behaviour online intended to cause distress or harm (also known as cyberbullying). But no matter what form bullying takes, the results can be the same: severe distress and pain for the person being bullied.
Most bullies don’t think that it’s OK to bully people. They know that it’s against the rules. They know that it’s not socially acceptable. They do it anyway, because they don’t care.
The only way to stop people who don’t care about right and wrong is to punish them for their insensitive behavior. In the case of bullying, running to the authority is one way to stop them, but it’s not a permanent fix. For example, if a kid is bullying another kid at school, and the victim runs to the principal, the bully might get detention. If it’s bad enough, maybe the bully will get suspended or even expelled from the school. What happens when the bully finds the kid who ratted on him, outside of school? In all likelihood, the bully will do something far worse to the victim than he did on the playground. Now it’s more than bullying; it’s revenge.
So how do you stop a bully? By standing up to them. Whether that means telling them off or punching them in the nose. You have to make the bully feel like bullying you isn’t worth it, or better yet, that bullying you is ‘entirely impossible’.
Bullies rarely expect someone to fight back. They pick on those they think are the weakest. If someone fights back, they’ll have put the bully in their place. That’ll be hard for most kids to do because of their low self-esteem, but martial arts classes have helped many kids. If the bullying is only verbal, it’s best to find out what the bully’s dirty laundry is and give him/her a taste of his/her own medicine until he/she stops. Sometimes, you can even befriend a bully. You decide what’s best to do in this situation, though.
Bullying won’t stop until adults stop bullying.
We can’t put a full stop to bullying until adults step up and say enough is enough…. Until adults evaluate their own actions to determine what message their actions are really giving to our youth. Mindful behavior is the best way to make change. Change small, change often is the key to bring a positive change in the society.
Look at our words. Is it necessary? Might it be hurtful? If it is not necessary, why say it. If it might be hurtful, HOLD YOUR TONGUE! Daily evaluate your words. Your actions have a ripple effect around you.
Create a legitimate reporting system where bullies are put on notice and can be legally prosecuted, especially when it comes to harassment (repeated bullying against ethnicity, gender, religion, race etc.)
Choose happiness over constantly calculating how awkward or ugly you are. Don’t let the repulsive people to punish you because you are happy and they are not. Don’t forget happiness is still so uncomfortable to us as a society (Bitter but True).
People try to say suicide is the most cowardly act a person could ever commit. I don’t think that’s true at all. What’s cowardly is treating a person so badly that S/he wants to commit suicide.
Always remember, you have a right to feel safe and to be treated fairly and respectfully. Bullying is a serious problem with serious mental and physical impacts. Bullying can violate many of your human rights including:
•Your right to be free from mental, emotional and physical violence.
•Your right to education
your right to a safe work environment.
So, let’s join hands together to stop bullying by encouraging kids as well adults to speak up if they see it happening.
Don’t Stand by…. Stand up. Unite against Bullying.
