Anti-Bullying

[author_by_night]

I'm not complaining about the recent anti-bullying memes, because I know it's well-meaning, and the part of me that remembers trying not to cry on the school bus appreciates it. But the part of me that remembers the "helpful" generic advice adults pulled out of an old can and fed me doesn't really find it worthwhile.

You know what really helped me? When a teacher let me switch groups during a long-term group project. When a teacher let me vent to her one day after class even though I'm sure she had better places to be and do. When a girl who I was only casual acquaintances with told her friends to leave me in a firm voice. It helped another girl when my teacher told me to go comfort her, not because he knew I'd want to please him, but because he knew I'd want to help her.

That's what helps - kids taking other kids seriously and adults taking kids seriously. Moms and teachers banding together and exchanging Facebook statuses wouldn't have done anything for me back then. I just needed someone, everyone just needs someone, to simply say "I hear you."

Comments

[secondmezzanine.livejournal.com]

Moms and teachers banding together and exchanging Facebook statuses wouldn't have done anything for me back then.

Man, I hear ya. And really, this is true for pretty much all of those copy-and-paste awareness statuses...

[timeofnoreply.livejournal.com]

I think you really hit the nail on the head with this post. As we already know my contempt for "awareness campaigns", I'll leave my comment at that.

[white-serpent.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I seem to recall that what I found helpful was being able to stay in the library during recess for a few weeks in fourth grade... or the teachers who let me *not* sit next to the obnoxious boys ("I like to put quiet girls next to people who cause trouble!" Do let's consider the important life lessons here.)

The first step to solving a problem may very well be acknowledging that there is one. But it's not a particularly meaningful first step, frankly, and it's a mistake to think of it as one.

[kakeochi-umai.livejournal.com]

Yeah, those "Look at me, I care!" posts irritate me anyway, but as an ex-bullied kid, this one is making me RAAAAAAAAAGE. You want to help a bullied kid? Stop saying shit that basically says it's their fault, thereby a) making it impossible for them to confide in you and b) reinforcing the message they get every goddamn day that there's something wrong with THEM. Stop believing the bullies when they say their "foot slipped" (no, seriously, that happened to me.) And for the love of all that is holy, STOP acting like an ex-bullied kid is going to gun down the school if she just happens to be wary of her fellow students and wants to hang out alone for a couple of years (again, this happened to me. I sassed the teachers, an offence that would earn a "normal" kid a detention, but oh no, just because I hung out alone, that must mean I'm a future school shooter.) THAT is what you need to do. Until then, you have NO right to pat yourself on the back for "making a difference". Fuck you, slacktivists.

Maybe someday I'll reach the point where I can acknowledge the good things that teachers did for me, but right now I'm only just getting to realise that it wasn't me and that my parents and teachers really sucked at handling it.

[ani-bester.livejournal.com]

I'd take realizing that a lot of time it really is the rich white kids acting in appropriate and not the poor and often not-white kids over reacting to "kid natured fun"

Because there's absolutely nothing good natured about saying that the black girl never bathes and that's why her hair is how it is and no one should sit next to her on the bus or they'll be stinky. The solution isn't to tell the black girl on the bus to ignore them >.>

There was nothing good natured about girls taking my doll from me and mocking me for it and the solution sure as hell wasn't to yell at me for bringing the doll and take away the privilege (something that had previously be okayed before I started school)

On a random tangent, I think that's part of why Katy Perry's fireworks song never went over well with me. I saw it with the video first and it's all "oh you'r awesome just ignore the haters" which is REALLY not helpful because there is only so much you can ignore, especially when, as happened with my doll, I get in trouble for apparently provoking them with my existence -_-

Sorry Venting ^^;;; I'm 30 and this still bothers me.

[kakeochi-umai.livejournal.com]

Oh, believe me, I know. I'm 27 and until I started getting therapy last month I thought it was way stupid to still have issues because of the little brats who made my elementary and middle school life hell and the adults who didn't do shit about it (or came down on ME.)

I agree SO MUCH about "just ignore it". It made me feel like I was a wimp for not being able to keep those little asshats from making me feel like crap.

Firework made me laugh uproariously, because this is the woman who penned not one but TWO songs making fun of LGBT people. My all-time favourite, though, is Bieber's Hollywood-primped girlfriend saying "I'm no beauty queen". I mean, if it had been followed by "I look this way because of all kinds of super-expensive clothes, products and treatments and all my pictures are airbrushed", I could've got behind it, but the message was "Hey, all you regular people who feel insecure about how you look...I don't think I'm pretty either!" Either sing something sincere or shut up, you little twat.

[scionofgrace.livejournal.com]

::applauds::

Knowing people care; giving and receiving care, sympathy, and love; a little time, a listening ear: yeah, they go pretty far when it comes to healing the effects of bullying.