The new fashionable trend in Hollywood these days is the statement, "I was bullied in school, too." At first, this appeared to be a good thing. When celebrities talk, people listen. But now? Now people are saying to themselves, "Meh, everyone gets bullied. So what?" This celebrity bullying bandwagon has served to take the anti-bullying movement, which had gone from meh, everyone gets bullied to a growing awareness of a serious problem, right back to meh.
When I was dealing with some serious bullying issues as a kid, my mother told me a billion times how this celebrity was ridiculed about big lips, and that ones was teased for her height. "But look at them now! They got the last laugh," she would say. Thing was, I had exactly zero interest in celebrities, being a celebrity, or anything celebrities did. I didn't care what they were wearing, what they looked like, how much money they had, or how many people wanted to be like them. I never understood people who fawned over celebrities, and I still don't. So my mother's well-intended sharing this information with me basically accomplished nothing more than convincing me that she had no idea what I was going through and no clue who I was as a person. At all.
While I am probably a statistically significant exception to the rule on my opinion of celebrities, or lack thereof, I realize these idols do have the power to influence parents and young people. I'm glad they are trying to do something, even if it is just to look fashionable. Thing is, if getting teased about my name was my biggest issue, I wouldn't call it bullying. I want to hear from the celebrity who was bullied to the point their life was significantly altered, or they actually attempted suicide over it. Those celebrities exist, but they are few. And the impact of severe bullying tends to be lifelong; the shame of repeated abuse over years and years sticks with a person to the point they may be unwilling to share, even to help someone else. That is the sad, scary reality for many children and teens these days.
I have been thankful beyond words more times than I can count that I didn't have to grow up in the age of the internet, cell phones, texting, cell phone cameras, and so forth. It is the introduction of these technologies that makes it more critical than ever for bullying prevention to be implemented by everyone caring for children at every age and in every part of a child's life. Parents, teachers, school administrators, and individuals working in the school transportation departments all need to come together to make and enforce anti-bullying policies. Bullying is extremely serious, and it goes so far beyond name-calling or taking someone's lunch money. Children can be cruel, and teachers can be bullies, accomplices, or perpetrators as well. Childhood should be a time of innocence and healthy development. Bullying, abuse by one's peers or teachers, can destroy a child's chance at having that innocence or healthy development, and it can ruin their chances of academic success as well.
This topic is easy to turn away from if you are not directly affected. But don't. We shouldn't allow ourselves to become numb to the pain and suffering children are enduring on a daily basis when bullies turn their school days into a terrifying, demoralizing, abusive nightmare. Forget celebrities, because they make it easy to forget the lives ruined by bullying. The suicides. The high school drop outs. The ones who might have found the cure for cancer, who instead gave up and wanted nothing more to do with education because they associated learning with pain and misery and could never trust people again. The ones living with nightmares, even as adults, because of their tormented childhood years. Bullying is no less devastating than any other form of child abuse, and it absolutely must stop now. The only way that happens is if we all come together and stand against bullying. There is no excuse for abuse.
No comments:
Post a Comment