Bullying Is Not Acceptable In Any Way Shape Or Form

A current social issue that I have seen grow tremendously especially in the last decade, would be bullying, and violence at school. I believe everyone who has went to a public school has went through some type of bullying. Even if they didn’t go through a public school, some adults have dealt with bullying even in their work place or by siblings growing up. Some bullying is less severe then others. Some bullying could be as simple as mocking/ name calling. While other victims of bullying could be as severe as being physically abused. Sometimes the ones who were bullied often become the bullies as almost a barrier to prevent from being bullied again. I believe that bullies are so insecure with themselves that they put down other people to make themselves feel more superior as a sense of enjoyment and happiness.

Even though bullying has always been a thing, its wasn’t seen as a problem until a well-known newspaper made a publication of the behavior. In 1862, a newspaper that has been providing publications for seventy-two years, The Times, wrote their first story on bullying when it was reported that a soldier died from allegedly getting bullied. The Times were the first ones to publicly state the issues of bullying and the actions that followed after bullying had taken place. The writer highlighted how the soldier underwent “systematic bullying” in the army and was treated as an “object of constant vexations and attack.” When the story came out a lot of people were shocked to read such a thing because society then did not view the “bullying” to be harmful and potentially cause his death.

At this point and time bullying was seem as normal behavior because no one knew otherwise. However, once the word got out and bullying became more of a topic of concern, it began to draw more attention to people, especially researchers who were interested in the nature and wanted to know more about bullying. Dan Olweus, a research professor of psychology, was the first to conduct an intensive study on bullying among students using his own systematic researching methods. Today, bullying is viewed much differently than it was in the 1800’s. It took a long time for the term bullying to be identified as a serious problem. Due to researchers like Dan Olweus, gaining true understanding of bullying is now possible. schools have been able to gain insights of these issues so they can help stop them from happening. with the growth of technology like cell phones and social media, bullying will be a lot harder to track and school staff will have to stay current as technology will always continue to change. It is difficult to tell what the future of bullying will be, but the government will continue to mandate school safety laws and begin to strictly hold bullies responsible for their actions, schools will become a safer place for children.

I believe bullying is related to school violence a lot of times also. The kids that have had enough with the bullying and the failed school system try to take matters into their own hands and often are leaving the school in cuffs or in a body bag. Some of these school shooting are the kids that were bullied every day, and they mentally were no longer there. Some turn in the opposite direction and decide they would no longer like to live anymore, so they commit suicide. Not all victims of bullying take one of these directions, but I do believe that both of these are deeply related to bullying. Bullying is a very big social issue in todays world and the schools are trying to be proactive with helping, but sometimes they don’t step in enough, or at the wrong time.

Its seen all the time in the school systems and even popularized on the big screen, the bullies are the “cool” kids, always the most popular with all the friends and attention. But a new study called “Survival of the Fittest and the Sexiest” published in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence has found that adolescent bullies have higher self-esteem and social status, as well as lower rates of depression and social anxiety. From an evolutionary standpoint, these combined measures also make the meanest in the playground pack the ones with the greatest sex appeal. bullies are in some cases embraced and reinforced for their behavior.

Bullies can actually be very popular among their peers. One study that examined nearly 2,000 students at 11 middle schools in Los Angeles conducted surveys in the seventh and eighth grades. The kids ranked which of their peers were “coolest,” which ones “start fights or push other kids around” and who “spread nasty rumors about other kids.” “Coolness” and “aggression” were highly linked; bullies enjoyed the highest social standing among classmates, whereas victims were socially marginalized. This trend unfortunately continues as we get older; a recent study found that workplace bullies often have positive job evaluations and are considered highly skilled in work politics. rather than bullies being socially unskilled outcasts, some bullying might actually be helping people be more successful.

The question still needs answered, why do some kids or adults turn to bullying? Well the answer is simple with a little bit of understanding of bullying, when an individual bullies another person it solves their own social problems. It is a lot easier for someone to bully another individual than to work out their own issues, or learn to deal with their emotions. Bullying is their way to find satisfaction and happiness in themselves when they can’t control the other issues that are going on in their lives, turning to bullying is the easy way out for them. Bullying someone to make them feel less than the person bullying them is the gratification the bully themselves are looking for. Prime example are the men who scream at their kids, intimidate and beat their wives. Doing so to put fear in their families, so at the end of the day the bully gets his way because the family is in fear of being yelled at, hit or called names. The head of the household had already been established by force, and the whole mindset becomes “if you’d only listen to what I say we wouldn’t have an issues around here.” Making it their way or no way.

The victims of bullying have been linked to the alarming increase of violence in mass shootings, a victim of bulling was found twice as likely to bring a weapon onto a public premises with intent to cause harm to others, if not including themselves. “Students whose sense of safety had been violated or threatened in successively more ways had a greater propensity to carry weapons to school, with each additional risk factor further compounding this risk,” wrote Tammy B. Pham, BA, a researcher at the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Children’s Medical Center of New York in Lake Success. “The alarming percentage of students who carry weapons on school property signals that school campuses are still not the optimal, safe learning environments that we want for our youth,” the authors write.

There was a study conducted from the National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, which included responses from 15,624 high school students and the students reported whether they have been bullied at school and whether they had carried a weapon onto school property within the past month that the survey was given. Of the students asked, in any experiences of bullying, fighting at school, skipping out of fear and being threatened or injured, Close to half of the victims, about 46% had brought a weapon to school. Victims of bullying were four times more likely than non-victims to skip school because they felt unsafe. Double their risk of getting into a fight, and five times greater of being threatened or injured.

The aggression that comes from bullying can be taken into the forms of emotional abuse or violence. Bullying itself can come from a number of sources, one is bullying at home, either from siblings, family members or even parents who use aggression or intimidation to get their way. Other sources have linked bullying to learning disabilities, stating that the development of bullying can stem from some type of undiagnosed or diagnosed learning disability which inhibits the child’s ability to learn both social and problem-solving skills. scientists also found strong evidence that being bullied as a child puts kids at high risk for depression as a young adult, according to the study, published online in the journal JAMA Psychiatry. the findings suggest that being victimized by bullying in early childhood increases the risk of depressive disorders that need psychiatric treatment later in life.

Previous studies have found a link between bullying and a higher risk of mental health problems during childhood, such as low self-esteem, poor school performance, depression and an increased risk for suicide. But less is known about the long-term psychological health of adults who, as children, were bullies or victims of bullying. Between 1 in 4 and 1 in 3 students in the United States reports being bullied at school, according to the National Center for Education Statistics and Bureau of Justice Statistics. In grades six through eleven alone, over a quarter of students have experienced some sort of bullying, either being verbal, physical or even the new age of bullying, cyber-bullying.

Cyber-bullying has been the new way for bullies to get their satisfaction with little to no effort, without leaving their keyboard and with little to no physical confrontation. Cyber-bullying can be described as “an aggressive, intentional act or behavior that is carried out by a group or an individual, using electronic forms of contact, repeatedly and over time against a victim who cannot easily defend him or herself”. With cyber-bullying, bullies can go onto social media sites and do a number or things to not only bully that individual alone, but to bully that one person to where everyone else can see it. This would include posting rumors, threats, sexual remarks, a victim’s personal information, or pejorative labels. Cyberbullying may be more harmful than traditional bullying, because there is no escaping it. One of the most damaging effects is that a victim begins to avoid friends and activities, which is often the very intention of the bully. Studies have shown that bullies lack prosocial behavior, are untroubled by anxiety, and do not understand others’ feelings. They misread the intentions of others, often imputing hostility in neutral situations. They typically see themselves quite positively.

I was able to do a personal interview with a well-known friend of mine, Cj Allen, that I knew was personally bullied in school. I stared the interview very basic asking questions to just get things started, first question “were you bullied in school?” Cj’s response was “my early years in school, no. bullying didn’t start until about the eighth grade, I remember I had art class and was always criticized by the classmate that sat next to me, he would always make fun of the project I was working on. I remember we were making clay figurines and before we were finished with them and about to put them into the kiln he smashed mine to nothing. I was devastated.” Next question was “how did bullying affect you through your high school years?” his answer was “I didn’t really understand bullying when the whole art class situation was happening, in high school is when I got my real taste of bullying. I had a small circle of friends that I felt like I fit in with, but no knowing my friends we also the ones being bullied.

We would get pushed down in the hallway, get our lunch trays flipped out of our hands before we could eat, pulled into the bathrooms and punched and kicked. I remember one time I was in class and I sat next to a female I really liked but never worked up the nerve to talk to her, someone in the class tied my belt loop to the chair without me knowing then proceeded to push me out of the chair to where my pants fell to my ankles in front of the whole class, everyone started laughing directly at me, including the girl I liked.

That was the worst experience I’ve ever had.” My last question was “how did bullying in school affect who you are today?” his response was “I have social anxiety, I have a hard time talking to anyone new, I still have my friends but if they invite me anywhere I have to know where it is, if there is going to be a crowd I usually come up with an excuse why I can’t go. I have no self-esteem and no confidence in myself. I fear rejection and cannot force myself to talk to anyone I am interested in.” Now when I say that this person was well-know, I mean that I’ve known him for years, But I’ve never known it to this extent. Not only has this interview opened my eyes to bullying in a new perspective, its shown me that you can know someone for years and they can never fully open up to you because of an act of hatred.

I know that for the ones doing the bullying it’s a form of release, a way to show their power and make them feel like they have control over a situation when they don’t have control over other aspects in their life, but they are doing more harm to others than they think they are. Bullying has been a social issue for a while, and more than likely will continue to be an issue for years to come, but there are ways to prevent if not stop bullying all together. The most obvious way is for parents to change the way they parent their children at home, of course every parent is different and its a lot easier said than done. As I stated before most bullies come from homes where the parents fight a lot and physical punishment is used and children have been taught that being physical is the way to handle problems.

Effective discipline, boundaries and early intervention are the best ways to stop bullying, but either way that won’t change the bully’s home. Nowadays most schools have a program for bullying that involve counseling by their peers, principal or the school counselor, one way to improve this would be to get the parent involved in the program with the facility. Teachers are more likely to see bullying happen before it escalates to something more severe, the teachers that witness this bullying should get involved and work with the students on bullying. Children understand role-playing and modeling, action out bullying situations is a very effective tool to help prevent bullying outside of the classroom. I feel like since bullying has become such a social issue many schools have adopted the ideal to help prevent it before it starts, and I feel most schools should adopt a zero-tolerance policy against bullying.

In conclusion, bullying is not acceptable in any way shape or form. Personally being a victim of bullying as well as many that I know, it forces people into depression and destroys ones self-esteem and self-worth. Bullying is everywhere you go, anywhere from severely seeing physical abuse to as little as seeing someone drop papers and be called a “loser”. It may seem meaningless or like it won’t affect the person coming from the bully but it leads the victim to issues further down the road. Issues that take years and even professional help to get over, even issues that will never be able to overcome. It forces children to not want to go to school because of it, ending their own lives because of the torture. There is no reason any child or anyone in general should be bullied. How someone could be so heartless as to continuously physically and emotionally hurt someone is beyond me. I just can’t fathom it.