School bullying thread
Posted: Tue Apr 21, 2020 3:52 pm
Recently, I have been thinking a lot about this subject. It happens all the time, all over the world. Kids as young as 8-9 are getting bullied. So I thought I'd share something I wrote a while ago. I was thinking about doing a motivational speech in my daughter's school. Feel free to tell the story to anyone who needs to hear it. It's a real story.
I’d like to tell you a story that took place around 20 years ago. A story about two high school students. One I will name Ellie, the other – Inna. They are students in an Advanced Math School, elite secondary school – you need to take a hard exam to get in there.
Ellie is tall and thin. Not skinny, but thin, fit if you will. She’s smart but is not the best student. Perhaps because she doesn’t like some subjects, but most of all, she has a boyfriend and this and going out kind of seem more important. Not that she is not ambitious, quite the opposite, but the things she doesn’t find purpose for, like chemistry for example, she doesn’t feel the need to study. Given all this, she is still doing good at school, getting good grades and fitting in … it seems. She is one of the “popular” kids, although in this school things are not really like that – kids are more equal to each other, because they know they took the same exam to get in, so most of the students don’t play pranks on each other or look down on the others. Ellie likes to think of herself as a good person. And she is – she likes helping friends, she doesn’t do drugs, most of the time she gets along with people.
Inna is tall, very pretty, but quite chubby. She’s shy, a very good student, ambitious. Inna knows why she went to that school and it’s to study, to get good education, so she can go to a good university. Inna is very smart and is doing very well in school, but her passion is drawing. She doesn’t have a boyfriend yet, but this doesn’t seem to bother her at that time – it’s never too late and school is more important at the moment. Inna has few friends and is not the most popular girl at school, but she is nice to everyone.
The two girls are in the same class and are not friends. It’s a new class, both girls miss their old friends from the old school, so they don’t communicate much, except when Ellie makes sarcastic remarks about Inna’s weight. So sarcastic, in fact quite insulting. Day after day, Inna tries to not pay attention, but things escalate to name calling and harassment. Inna doesn’t tell anyone. She doesn’t want the bullying to escalate more and hopes Ellie will get bored and stop one day. No teacher knows what’s going on.
One day Inna decides, she’s had enough. Ellie has said something rude, some snarky comment about Inna being fat and she feels like she can’t take it anymore. She turns around and says to Ellie “I hate you! I really do! I don’t want to speak to you anymore! I don’t want to see you anymore!”. Suddenly, Ellie is stunned. She has nothing to say to those words. But at this moment, the harassment stops. Because this is the moment when Ellie starts feeling respect for Inna. Nobody before her had the guts to tell her something like that. Nobody has been so honest.
The girls don’t become instant friends. It takes maybe a year. But they are inseparable now. It doesn’t always work like that. Maybe because Ellie is smart and sensitive, she sees the error of her ways. She is deeply and truly sorry for how she treated Inna and Inna is kind enough to forgive Ellie for the way she treated her.
There is a back story though. Remember Ellie’s boyfriend? He’s 8 years older than she is and is a handsome young man, she is very much in love with him. He says he’s in love with her too but is constantly talking about his ex-girlfriend – how pretty she is, how thin she is, mainly because Ellie does not have her figure. She’s thin, but muscular, not really skinny. And this is what’s eating Ellie – she is not thin enough, not good enough. She is scared he’s going to leave her for a thinner girl. Not thin enough, not skinny enough, not good enough. After a while, in Ellie’s mind all people who are not skinny start to turn to weak people, lazy people who can’t stop eating, who don’t take care of themselves. People who deserve to be mocked. She is the strong one – she can go days without eating anything. Therefore, she feels the urge to mock the weak, lazy people who are not this strong.
This story has a happy ending. Ellie and Inna are good friends 20 years later. Ellie is not with this boy anymore. She tried really hard to stop judging people by their weight. Sometimes she can’t help herself but doesn’t voice her opinions, because she knows you cannot judge the book by its cover. How do I know that? Because I’m Ellie.
I don’t want to make excuses, I was a bully. A real one, face to face one. I regret it now, but at the time I really didn’t feel like I was hurting anyone. To me it was like “she must know she’s fat, she’s got a mirror, right?”. I didn’t realize my words are actually hurting people. I may have hurt others too, I don’t really know. My friend, she turned to me and told me she hated me. This is when I realized I did hurt her. This was the moment when I stopped being a bully. I haven’t mocked anyone because of their weight since this moment. Not one person. She cured me from being a bully right then and there and I can only be thankful for that. Because it could have gotten a lot worse. If she wasn’t as strong, I don’t know how much damage I could have done.
I can never defend my actions. I can only say that I was hurt, so it felt right to hurt others. And here someone would ask me – when you know how it feels, why would you do this to another person? You would be right to ask this question. Only, I didn’t feel like I was bullied. I didn’t know this is an abusive relationship. I really loved this person. And to be honest, I don’t think he meant any harm. Nor do I think he realized he bullied me. He was simply still in love with this other girl and I was an instrument for him to forget her.
Bullying is not a solution. It’s not a cool thing to do and no one should think it’s OK. It never is. But when someone says something nasty, writes a horrible comment, please speak up, don’t just stand there. They may be hurting and may need help just as much as you do. And sometimes even bullies and bullied can be friends. Real ones, for life.
I’d like to tell you a story that took place around 20 years ago. A story about two high school students. One I will name Ellie, the other – Inna. They are students in an Advanced Math School, elite secondary school – you need to take a hard exam to get in there.
Ellie is tall and thin. Not skinny, but thin, fit if you will. She’s smart but is not the best student. Perhaps because she doesn’t like some subjects, but most of all, she has a boyfriend and this and going out kind of seem more important. Not that she is not ambitious, quite the opposite, but the things she doesn’t find purpose for, like chemistry for example, she doesn’t feel the need to study. Given all this, she is still doing good at school, getting good grades and fitting in … it seems. She is one of the “popular” kids, although in this school things are not really like that – kids are more equal to each other, because they know they took the same exam to get in, so most of the students don’t play pranks on each other or look down on the others. Ellie likes to think of herself as a good person. And she is – she likes helping friends, she doesn’t do drugs, most of the time she gets along with people.
Inna is tall, very pretty, but quite chubby. She’s shy, a very good student, ambitious. Inna knows why she went to that school and it’s to study, to get good education, so she can go to a good university. Inna is very smart and is doing very well in school, but her passion is drawing. She doesn’t have a boyfriend yet, but this doesn’t seem to bother her at that time – it’s never too late and school is more important at the moment. Inna has few friends and is not the most popular girl at school, but she is nice to everyone.
The two girls are in the same class and are not friends. It’s a new class, both girls miss their old friends from the old school, so they don’t communicate much, except when Ellie makes sarcastic remarks about Inna’s weight. So sarcastic, in fact quite insulting. Day after day, Inna tries to not pay attention, but things escalate to name calling and harassment. Inna doesn’t tell anyone. She doesn’t want the bullying to escalate more and hopes Ellie will get bored and stop one day. No teacher knows what’s going on.
One day Inna decides, she’s had enough. Ellie has said something rude, some snarky comment about Inna being fat and she feels like she can’t take it anymore. She turns around and says to Ellie “I hate you! I really do! I don’t want to speak to you anymore! I don’t want to see you anymore!”. Suddenly, Ellie is stunned. She has nothing to say to those words. But at this moment, the harassment stops. Because this is the moment when Ellie starts feeling respect for Inna. Nobody before her had the guts to tell her something like that. Nobody has been so honest.
The girls don’t become instant friends. It takes maybe a year. But they are inseparable now. It doesn’t always work like that. Maybe because Ellie is smart and sensitive, she sees the error of her ways. She is deeply and truly sorry for how she treated Inna and Inna is kind enough to forgive Ellie for the way she treated her.
There is a back story though. Remember Ellie’s boyfriend? He’s 8 years older than she is and is a handsome young man, she is very much in love with him. He says he’s in love with her too but is constantly talking about his ex-girlfriend – how pretty she is, how thin she is, mainly because Ellie does not have her figure. She’s thin, but muscular, not really skinny. And this is what’s eating Ellie – she is not thin enough, not good enough. She is scared he’s going to leave her for a thinner girl. Not thin enough, not skinny enough, not good enough. After a while, in Ellie’s mind all people who are not skinny start to turn to weak people, lazy people who can’t stop eating, who don’t take care of themselves. People who deserve to be mocked. She is the strong one – she can go days without eating anything. Therefore, she feels the urge to mock the weak, lazy people who are not this strong.
This story has a happy ending. Ellie and Inna are good friends 20 years later. Ellie is not with this boy anymore. She tried really hard to stop judging people by their weight. Sometimes she can’t help herself but doesn’t voice her opinions, because she knows you cannot judge the book by its cover. How do I know that? Because I’m Ellie.
I don’t want to make excuses, I was a bully. A real one, face to face one. I regret it now, but at the time I really didn’t feel like I was hurting anyone. To me it was like “she must know she’s fat, she’s got a mirror, right?”. I didn’t realize my words are actually hurting people. I may have hurt others too, I don’t really know. My friend, she turned to me and told me she hated me. This is when I realized I did hurt her. This was the moment when I stopped being a bully. I haven’t mocked anyone because of their weight since this moment. Not one person. She cured me from being a bully right then and there and I can only be thankful for that. Because it could have gotten a lot worse. If she wasn’t as strong, I don’t know how much damage I could have done.
I can never defend my actions. I can only say that I was hurt, so it felt right to hurt others. And here someone would ask me – when you know how it feels, why would you do this to another person? You would be right to ask this question. Only, I didn’t feel like I was bullied. I didn’t know this is an abusive relationship. I really loved this person. And to be honest, I don’t think he meant any harm. Nor do I think he realized he bullied me. He was simply still in love with this other girl and I was an instrument for him to forget her.
Bullying is not a solution. It’s not a cool thing to do and no one should think it’s OK. It never is. But when someone says something nasty, writes a horrible comment, please speak up, don’t just stand there. They may be hurting and may need help just as much as you do. And sometimes even bullies and bullied can be friends. Real ones, for life.