Saturday, April 7, 2012

In the quiet between the long night and the bright morning.

In the dark of the morning, the television news programs focus on some fascinating stuff.

I am curious about this film, BULLY.

Apparently, bullying amongst the young in this country has reached alarming levels.  But this is a topic that's never been easy to discuss.  I know I have a hard time discussing it.

I was bullied.  I'm sure, on some level, at some time in their lives, everybody has been bullied.

I can still remember the worst of it.  Dreading the walk home from school; knowing that no matter which route I took, they would be waiting.

Yes.  THEY.  Multiple HE.

The least of it was being spit on.  The worst of it was.....well.  And resistance simply prolonged the abuse.  And for some reason, children are creative in their abuse.  And tireless.  But eventually, they would go.  They would leave me.

And I would tell nobody.

Because you get two kinds of advice in this situation; you get fight, or flight.  One group telling you that you need to cultivate the spirit of defiance; learn to fight.  Ball up your fist.  Know where to hit and how hard.  Give as good as you get.  And the other group telling you that running is not cowardly.

I defied once.  They broke my nose with a solid right hook to my face.  I don't remember the punch being thrown, but I can still, to this day.....thirty six years later.....feel it.

But I lived through it.  Because there was more to me than they could take away.  And I was lucky in that regard.

But times have changed.  The bullies now have experience in Mixed Martial Arts.  The bullied have access to firearms.  And that mixture never ends well.  And when the dust settles, and the media gnaws the nine-day wonder to the bone, and moves on to the next thing......nothing has changed.

Because until everybody agrees on some basic rules of behavior, there will always be those that bully and those that get bullied.

The only thing that can possibly change is this:  If you sees something, DO something.  Take it upon yourself.  Insist on the set of rules.  Do right.

That's all I'm sayin'.

Yours Truly,

A Bullying survivor.

3 comments:

misti ridiculous said...

it's a thing, isnt' it?

"I had more to me than they could take away"--THAT is the key. For all of us. Parents, godparents, aunts, uncles, friends, teachers. But mostly Parents. It starts there and trickles down.

We've got to instill in our children, more. MORE.

More than anyone can take away.

because what's coming?
It's going to try to take everything.

that's probably harder than defeating or surviving the bully itself.

Gertrude said...

Social aggression. Its time for a new set of rules... certainly. Gone is the time of the soc's and the greasers... Meet me at the park. The park is everywhere. FACEBOOK.
When it is my child... my child that came out of me... it is much more painful than when Robin Lawson was pulling me around 8th grade corner by my hair and my best friend Missy was running away.
The parents are hostile. The encourage their children to be hostile, aggressive.
One of the sites I visited for sage advice said Teach your child self defense early. Seriously.
The war on social aggression is being waged one viral hateful video at a time.
And the shit ass part of it is that its not just words and videos... since school shootings have become a norm in this country... you not only have to teach the child self defense early... you have to arm them with weapons and take them to the gun range everyday.
Grace and dignity be damned.
Misti is correct it does start with the parents... but what to do when the parents are fighters too? I fight like my Mother. This is true. I walk away. This is not the case these days.

Kizz said...

I went to see Hunger Games on Friday and Bully was the only preview. Whoever made that decision was pretty danged smart, I think, even if, in the little art house cinema, they were preaching to the choir.