Bullying Is a Gift

I probably won't be able to maintain an intelligent level of snark about Bob Parks' ode to bullying, because I was bullied. Relentlessly, mercilessly, cruelly bullied from the time I entered the first grade until about 16. I never had any friends. I threw up before each and every school day and usually before lunch, too. I honestly don't remember too many happy moments of my childhood because the bullying overshadowed all of it.

I was regularly called names I wouldn't repeat as an adult. I was pushed, pinched, slapped, punched and spit on regularly and kicked in the head a couple of times. I was picked last, no, not just picked last, they fought over who had to take me. I distinctly remember praying to god that I would die before gym class. Once, a girl befriended me over summer vacation between 7th and 8th grades. I was pathetically eager to have a friend, so I followed her around like a puppy and confided in her. She befriended me purely to mock me in front of everyone on the first day of 8th grade, and to tell my confidences to everyone who hated me. Which was everyone.

The teachers did nothing. I needed to learn to "get along" with everyone, as if I were the problem. I needed to learn to ignore the name calling and physical injuries. I needed to stop being different. I was a suicidal 9-year-old and it was ALL MY FAULT.

To this day, I don't trust easily. Or really at all. I expect people to hate me, to betray me. I know that if anyone ever really knows me, they'll reject me, because there is something wrong with me. Every kid I ever went to school with could see it, and eventually, so will you. So will everyone.

Bullying isn't a joke. It isn't a normal way to grow up. Its victims are scarred for life in all the places no one can see. It will never, ever be okay. And teachers and parents and the Bob Parks of the world wave it away with "kids will be kids" and "toughen up". Fuck them all.

(This is even harder than I thought it would be. So if this post ends abruptly, that's just where it's ending.)

After more than a decade of sports with no score kept as not to hurt the feelings of the defeated, the banning of Tag and Dodgeball during recess, “Do Something!” state legislatures are now poised to outlaw bullying because young people are too intimidated by Facebook posts and mean text messages.

Odd, they keep score at my niece's softball games. She's eleven. I do know that they don't keep score in really little kids' t-ball and soccer games, but that's because scoring means nothing to small children. Go read a child psychology book, asshat. As for outlawing bullying, it should be outlawed. See above.

In the uproar around the suicides of Ms. Prince, 15, and an 11-year-old boy subjected to harassment in nearby Springfield last year, the Massachusetts legislature stepped up work on an anti-bullying law that is now near passage. The law would require school staff members to report suspected incidents and principals to investigate them. It would also demand that schools teach about the dangers of bullying. Forty-one other states have anti-bullying laws of varying strength.

You tell me what's wrong with those laws. Seriously. Teachers and school administrators will be responsible for protecting children from harm- just like they already ought to be. Does anyone send their children to a school where live electrical wires line the walls and the water is infected with e coli and rabid raccoons roam the halls? No? Is it maybe because parents care whether or not their children are safe? Ya think? OMQF, you are a stupid jerk!

While what happened to Phoebe Prince was truly tragic, what are today’s youth going to do tomorrow should they be in charge during an international crisis with a taunting, foreign enemy? I’m sorry but dealing with bullies is a part of childhood that develops character. How you deal with it determines what kind of person you’ll be.

Apparently, I need to be made senior ambassador to Iran, because being bullied has made me the most qualified person in the world for that job. Seriously, that's what Mr. Parks just said. Even if I were willing to grant you that bullying was a normal part of growing up- and I'm not- measles, mumps and polio used to be normal parts of growing up, too. Does Mr. Parks want those back, too? Because I have no problem giving them to him. Hell, I'll throw in starvation and lead poisoning for free!

Then we get Mr. Parks' story of bullying:

While in second grade and attending the Blessed Sacrament School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, I was the target of the school bully (whose name I won’t mention because he may be a nice person now).

I remember it going around one day that he was going to beat me up after school. It was a terrifying experience as the threat loomed.

But instead of just succumbing to my fears and deciding to end it all, I began to use my brain.

I tried to plan an escape route, determining which exit to use vice how much time I’d have should the bully find out and become even angrier that I was going to make his life harder. I planned an out-of-the-way route home. Asking a nun to walk me home was out of the question, so being stealth was key. Eventually I was caught, the beating was not as bad as advertised, and after that, the bully moved on.

That's not bullying, Mr. Parks. That's a fight. That was one event, one person, not an entire childhood of constant torment. For you to compare your one after school fight with what Phoebe Price went through is obscene, and you ought to be ashamed. You even imply, with the statement I’m sorry but dealing with bullies is a part of childhood that develops character. How you deal with it determines what kind of person you’ll be that you are better than Phoebe. She killed herself, you took your beating, so she's a whingey little bitch and you're the better person. Picking on a dead 15-year-old girl, your momma must be proud.