Fighting back against bullying
The Autism News | English
They’ve been pushed down on lunch room floors and taunted mercilessly on school buses. They’ve endured cruel remarks in locker rooms and been bombarded with hate-filled comments on social network sites on the Internet.
They’ve been bullied simply for being different.
For one girl, it was because she was dark-complexioned. One girl had a medical condition that left her bald. One boy was targeted because he has Asperger’s syndrome. One teenager was born a girl but now identifies as a boy.
Each of these young people has found ways to fight back against bullying — with the help of friends, family, schools and communities.
The story of Jamey Rodemeyer, a 14-year-old Amherst boy who killed himself after being taunted by bullies, has struck a nerve with these young people.
They all agree that more needs to be done to stop bullying. They are heartened to hear that lawmakers are calling for tougher legislation and educators are trying to find ways to make people aware of the problem.
But they also have found strength in taking on bullying themselves, whether or not they’re the victims.
Adults alone cannot solve the problem, said Amanda Nickerson, director of the Jean M. Alberti Center for the Prevention of Bullying at the University at Buffalo.
“Having kids be part of the solution is always the way to go,” she said.
Nickerson was careful to point out that urging victims to become part of the solution shouldn’t send the message that they deserved to be bullied.
“This is not to blame you,” she explained. “This is to empower you. We can’t get toward the solutions unless we get to all the players. That includes the target. That includes the bystanders, whether they’re adults or peers. This is just one piece of the puzzle.”
Barrage of hurtful words
For one 14-year-old girl from Buffalo, the bullying came at school and from family.
“They were telling her horrible things. Saying she was ‘retarded,’ she was ‘slow,’ she was ‘ugly,’” the girl’s mother recalled. They also made fun of the girl because she had a dark complexion. The mother and daughter spoke to The Buffalo News on the condition of anonymity because they didn’t want to spur more bullying.
The hurtful words were instigated by a girl the daughter had known since elementary school but who had turned on her in middle school. Other kids would join in with the former friend. They taunted the girl at school and were particularly nasty to her on the school bus. They started writing nasty comments on her Facebook page, too.
Things got so out of control that the former friend even threatened to shoot the girl.
Relentless teasing When the girl’s mother went to the police, she was told she had to go to the school administrators. They did nothing, the mother said.
“I felt very helpless,” the mother said.
Earlier this year, the victim indicated to her parents that she was thinking of taking her own life. She was hospitalized for about a week, and then was entered into a program through Gateway-Longview. She was assigned a counselor and mentors. The mother and daughter also joined several groups, some faith-based, to help them work on the girl’s self-esteem.
The mother said she has seen a change in her daughter. She was especially happy when her daughter told her about an incident that occurred on the school bus a couple of weeks ago.
The daughter explained that she had “stuck up for a little kid.”
“He was being bullied by an older kid. I didn’t like that,” she told The News. “That’s not cool to be bullied.”
The older boy has stopped taunting the little boy, she said.
“I felt better,” the girl said.
She also now stands up to people who make fun of her.
“I stand up for myself,” she said. “I tell the teacher what happened and I say: ‘I’m not in the mood. You really need to stop picking on me.’”
Emily Tout had been teased much of her life for being bald. The 15-year-old Cleveland Hill student has a condition called alopecia areata, which caused her immune system to attack her hair follicles. She wore a wig to school to mask her condition.
Her friends didn’t pay any mind to her baldness, but others at school teased her. The teasing turned nasty. People were leaving anonymous notes on her locker and on her social networking accounts.
“You’re worthless,” they would write. “You should kill yourself.”
Tout confided in a couple of friends about the extent of the bullying.
One of the friends, Hannah Foss, decided something needed to be done. She went to the principal to explain what was going on. The notes at school stopped but the online comments continued.
Then Hannah came up with a radical idea. She asked Emily, “Would you find it offensive if I shaved my head?”
Emily said she wouldn’t. But she didn’t believe her friend would do such a thing.
But Hannah did. She went to the Supercuts on Harlem Road and had the hairdresser shear off all her hair.
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