Patch Blog: Why Are Kids Allowed to Bully Other Kids?

This month The Weinstein Company and Where We Live Films releases the documentary Bully. The film tells many stories about the daily horror many kids face simply because they are different.

The most heart-wrenching story is that of 11-year-old Mitchell Wilson who took his own life after being bullied relentlessly by his school mates. One can only imagine how painful this boy's life was for him to think that suicide was the only way out. Watching the trailer immediately filled my eyes with tears.

I know many people, myself included, who were bullied in school. Judged for their stature, smarts, appearance, sexual preference or any other thing they either had no choice over or should not be judged for. The pain is daily.

The ride to school was where the torment began for me. I was able to escape most of it by taking public transportation to school instead of the regular school bus.  There was only so much I could take from those people and on MARTA I was free to breathe and free from their torture. If I had to take the actual school bus I generally wore my Walkman (yes I am from the 80s) and blasted the music as loud as I could.  Not everyone was as lucky as I was. 

I was talking to a friend recently and the topic of being bullied at school came up. For him the torment lasted from the first bell in the morning until the last one of the day. Seven hours of hell.

His strategy was to stick to the walls during the time between classes. This stealth approach was his attempt to blend in with the lockers and other people and hopefully out of the line of sight of his tormentors. His goal was to reach his next class quickly and avoid notice which usually brought with it taunts and sometimes punches to the stomach or other physical violence.

Once in class he would sit as close to the door as possible to make for a quick escape when the bell rang;  and then he would do the hallway dance all over again. Although he is now in his 40s those memories are still as fresh and as painful as they day they were made. 

We eventually came to the same question ... why do people bully? What kind of household are you raised in where thoughts of pushing down the weak, kicking the different and posting hateful slurs on the Internet are nurtured. You could say that the kids are simply doing what their peers are doing. Many of the parents in the film whose kids were charged with being the agressors simply said, "Kids will be kids!" 

Seriously?

Call me naive but I don't think of that type of behavior appropriate for kids. Or anyone of any age for that matter. Shouldn't we be raising our children to be individual thinkers and to know right from wrong? Shouldn't values and moral standards set in the home be practiced in the outside world?

In the end you are responsible for the kids you raise. How about we lead by example,  teach compassion, love, understanding, respect and empathy for those who are different than we are. 

There have always been bullies of some form in life but does than mean we can ignore the problem? That's like asking our kids to ignore the taunts, punches and names; and that's not being realistic. 

I sat back and thought, "What would I do if my son was bullied?" Then I thought of an even scarier thought, "What would I do if my son was a bully?"

Let me tell you, the answers to the first question were far more tame than the answers to the second one. After discussing it with my more level-headed husband, cooler heads prevailed. He knew of my past dealing with the mean crowd and would have to take that into account when it came to my answer. In the end he agreed with my decision.

If years from now, you see a young man wearing a wooden placard painted with the statement "Please forgive me for I have bullied" standing in front of the courthouse you will know exactly who his mom is. 

To find local show times and to learn more about what you can do about bullying in your area visit www.thebullyproject.com.