(no subject)

[rm]

http://www.thebostonchannel.com/cnn-news/19141470/detail.html

BOSTON -- Sirdeaner Walker, 44, has been surrounded by family after discovering her son, Carl Walker-Hoover, 11, hanging by an extension cord in the third-floor landing of the family's Northampton Avenue home in Springfield.

Walker said her boy, upset yet again over another bullying episode at school, had committed suicide.

"They were always saying, 'you're gay, you must be gay, you act like a girl,'" said Walker.

Comments

[rm.livejournal.com]

My experience, despite my parents witnessing my bullying, was to be asked what I had done to make people hate me.

[britgeekgrrl.livejournal.com]

Seconded. Sigh.

[woogledesigns.livejournal.com]

"ARE YOU BEING BULLIED AT SCHOOL?"

"Er..no."

"GOOD. THEN YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE FOR BEING CONSISTENTLY LATE. GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER IN THE MORNINGS."

Yeah... smooth move there, Dad. Real perceptive.

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

Yes.

[genmaicha.livejournal.com]

Thirded. Well-meaning mother asking, "What are you doing to these kids that makes them say and do these things to you?"

[1-mad-squirrel.livejournal.com]

I was told I needed "to learn to be 'street smart'" like my sister.

[newsbean.livejournal.com]

Indeed. I even had a little "behavior" report card that I had to have my teachers fill out every day. So that I would learn how not to be bullied.

This is not a joke. My parents sent *me* with a behavior report card. Despite the fact that I went to an incredibly small school (less than 50 kids) and they knew the parents of the actual perpetrators.

[redstapler.livejournal.com]

"You know, you're your own worst enemy" was an oft-repeated phrase my mother really liked.

[woogledesigns.livejournal.com]

I think parents can confuse 'being anti-social' with 'being yourself'.

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

Speaking as a parent, that is...so wrong I can't even describe it.

Meaning wrong in the sense of "what kind of parents are those that are doing that?" It's pretty much the antithesis of what parenting should be.

[ophymirage.livejournal.com]

"well, you must have done SOMEthing."

That phrase makes me cringe even now...

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

I could not have fit in if I'd wanted to.
That's not supposed to be an offence
At least my family got that...

[nickelchief.livejournal.com]

I don't think I realized until I read this thread how common that response is from authority figures. A guidance counselor told me in seventh grade, when I complained about incessant, violent, daily bullying from perpetrators who thought I was gay:

YOU MUST BE DOING SOMETHING TO INVITE THEIR ABUSE. WHAT ARE YOU DOING THAT MAKES THEM COME AFTER YOU?

LOOK AT YOUR OWN BEHAVIOR. YOU ARE LEAVING YOURSELF OPEN AND VULNERABLE.

THEY ARE NOT THE PROBLEM. IT IS UP TO YOU.

I can't even begin to describe the damage those few words did to me. I was so fucking quiet and so fucking scared to begin with, I drove myself out of my mind trying to figure out how this was my fault.

It still hurts. I feel desperately sad for this kid.

[meirion.livejournal.com]

That makes me almost incoherent with rage.

No-one ever said like that to me — but that'd be because I didn't trust anyone enough even to let them know I was being bullied.

I still don't. I'm amazed when people act decently rather than abominably, because I don't expect it, because so few people do.

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

My dad liked to quote Hamlet to me:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?

In retrospect, not the greatest advice for a disturbed teenager...

[chite.livejournal.com]

In my case, my parents did intervene, and the school intervened, and it got worse. It's almost like there's no way to win when you've become the target, except to brass it out and live through it.

Ironically, the person who bullied me the most in Junior High became an honest to goodness friend in high school. Life can be weird that way. I just wish someone could tell kids that it doesn't last forever.

[offbalance.livejournal.com]

Wow. Did this person ever explain to you why he/she felt it necessary to make your life hell? Did they apologize?

[chite.livejournal.com]

It was really weird. One day we ended up sitting next to each other in class, and he started talking to me like I was a regular person and not the object of his bullying for two years. I think it had been more than a full year since I had spoken to him.

I think he had some major problems of his own. (actually that's pretty obvious.) It kind of became this unspoken thing--that was a crappy time in everyone's life and now it's 2 years later and we're all different people now. I never pressed the issue.

[used_songs]

I'm a middle school teacher and I've seen this happen, too. I've had students who were bullied and the teachers, counselors, and admins got involved and it still didn't stop - it just went underground. It's so frustrating!

On the other hand, this year I persistently worked the system (write ups, parent phone calls, counseling referrals) on a student who has been harassing others for 2 years at our school; this student picked on a kid in my class last month, calling him gay. When I wrote the referral, since I had all of the background documentation, the admins were able to get the student placed at the alternative campus and now he has been reassigned to his home campus. So it can be done.

[alchemia.livejournal.com]

Yeah, in Junior High, I was being bullies by among others, the kid of someone on the school board. My parents intervened, but it was like going up against the Malfoys, except that they had the Principal/Albus in their pocket; it made things worse and the principal tried to expel me. We had to have a court hearing over it! (we won, which just meant my records were cleared, but nothing was ever done about the actual bullying problem).

[ladyaelfwynn.livejournal.com]

I left girl scouts because half the girls in the troop decided I was a convenient target. Luckily, it wasn't at my school, so I didn't have those girls after me there too.

My mom did her best to keep the girls in the troop from bugging me too much, but since she wasn't there to actually yell at them, there wasn't a lot else to do, (This was the late 1970s.) so she let me quit.

The next time I was seriously bullied in jr. high, I had enough friends/protectors (some of the tough girls liked me, so that kept me somewhat safe) that it didn't fly and those that were bullying me went and bothered someone else.