Boston Bullying: Not the Real Issue

If you have not heard of this case then lift the rock up you are living under and crawl out. This poor girl was stalked, mentally tortured and lived in fear and not one person lifted a finger to help her. Now everyone wants to cry foul and enact a law to prevent such events from occurring in the future. Can we really litigate our children into becoming civil human beings?

I realize we live in a different time than that of when I was in high school and that I lived in a different time from that of my mother but do we really believe an enacted law will curb this behavior? Bullying has gone on for generations and each generation has overcome it in their way but each preceding generation had the necessary social skills to achieve such a victory. Schools were a place to educate, grow, nurture and learn social interaction, not a place of social status, adult daycare and social networking. With that statement I pose the question; “where was the rest of the students while this severe bullying was going on?


The real issue here is that not one so-called descent student came to the rescue. Not one child felt they would make a difference enough to stand up and be counted. Why is that? Why are there no parents asking, “did you know about this?” If we are raising these kids with the pretense that they will mature and change the world something is not working. These kids need coping skills and to realize there is strength in numbers, stand united against any injustice and they will prevail. How do we expect these children to lead the country or change the world if they cannot even take charge of their own high school?

I speak to the topic of bullying because I too was faced with such an event. I grew up when racism was the order of the day and was relocated to a small country town in an effort to avoid racism. But that  was the year the local county school (all white) and the local city school (all black) had just merged. I immediately became bully bait but had been given the social skills to solve it.

The first time I was a bully victim I was saved by the bell. The second time and I knew there would be a second time I had concocted a plan. Taking a step back from my attacker I put my plan in action. I leaned forward and whispered to this bully, “please do not do this, I have a medical condition that causes me to go into violent fits, I did not take my medicine today.” I could tell by the confused look on her face she was thinking about it, so I immediately went to phase two.

As she stood there looking confused, eyes all wide, I slowly started to jerk my head in a tilt to one side, her eyes got bigger and she took a step back. Just then I began tapping my foot to an imaginary tune in my head, all the while keeping my head jerking, her mouth flew open. I then added swaying my arms back and forth, it was then I knew then I had her. Here I stood jerking my head, tapping my, foot, arms swaying that I burst out singing “God Bless America” as loud as I could and just as I got out “land that I love” she took off.  It was the only song I could think of and to this day I’m not sure if it was my song selection or my signing that drove her way, I just know it worked.

Though this was a solution for me, I’m not using it as a solution; I’m using it as an example. The example is that I could access, solve and enact a solution without further harm to any party. What I am saying is sometimes the best defense is insanity. Our children need this skill to be contributing adults lets not sell them short. Teach them it is okay to be different and sometimes act like a fool, it is what makes us human.

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