Bullying

[KAV]

Maybe I'm crazy or just naive, but I don't remember there being that much bullying in my school. I know this is a huge topic in schools now, but I graduated with about 700 people, less than 10 years ago. I remember there being the "popular kids, the band geeks, the nerds," etc but no one went out of there way to make fun of someone. There never would have been a dumping beer episode at my school or cruel nicknames that follow you through the years like "mellow yellow." People just hung out with their own friends and left everyone else alone. We even has a school ambassador program so new kids would have someone to eat with at lunch until they made friends of there own.

Did anyone else really have this much bullying and issues at there high school?

[Kaitlyn12]

I was bullied terribly though out high school. I only graduated 4 years ago, but it was bad. I had loved school, but once I started to stick up for the kids who were being picked on, I was put into the group of people that were bullied. I would come home crying because these kids would taunt me, and hurl cruel names at me. Once girl even went out of her way to go past my house when the daycare kids were outside (my mom ran in-home daycare) and would curse me out and threaten to beat me up. I would print off all the conversations she sent me on our school laptops and they did nothing about it. I even contacted the police about the threats she was making and they did nothing. I eventually got sick of it so once she came past my house and threatened to beat me up, I told her to do it and we got in a fist fight in the street outside my house. Once I stuck up for myself, she never bullied me again.

[aparsons]

I did, but my situation might be much different form some other people's. My family moved around a whole lot, I went to ten different grade schools in three different North and South American countries. These schools included homeschooling, private schools and public schools. My classmates spoke both English and Spanish, and there were times when I had to attend classes that were entirely in Spanish without knowing what int he world was going on.

Background over, there was one school where i got bullied a whole lot. The school I was in for the longest, from 7th to 9th grade, then the second half of 10th and the first semester of 11th. (My schooling was a mess) It is a private school in Cali, Colombia called Colegio Bolivar, and I was the ONLY American in the entire school. There were a few Canadian teachers, and one of them had her kids in the school, but not for long, and I was the only white student in my grade, out of about eighty other students.

To the bullying, I stood out. And middle school was not a good place to be standing out in. I was thin, awkward, quiet, and didn't make friends easily. People made fun of me for all of those reasons, they called me Casper, Whitey, Ghost, etc. They knew I loved trees and animals and would mime cutting down trees to see me cry, along with other silly things. This one kid (who I probably would have dated if we had matured quicker) would sidle up to me and say " Do you know what? I see dead people! " He thought he was so smart. I was a teller in that school, lots of kids acted out, and they learned quickly not to do it around me because I would tell on them, which didn't help my popularity. I had one or two friends in my grade, and a few more in lower grades. My mother offered several times to change my schools, but I refused, changing schools would be even worse.

I can't comment on how much bullying happens in current high schools and middle schools, but I know I was VERY, VERY sensitive to what other people thought of me, and I know teenagers right now are sensitive too. I know the bullying also almost drove me to suicide, but I never attempted it. Little things that seem so silly now are a big deal to young kids, and without any kind of support, it can end really badly.

[L_Therese]

I graduated from a very small high school. Bullying was rare, but it did happen on occasion. In my case, I was mostly ostracized by my peers because I was a bit nerdy and awkward. There were others in my position - typically only one or two in each grade. More relevantly, I work in schools now, and there is bullying there too. This time around, I'm in a position where there's more I can do about it, but I think bullying will always exist in some form because a watchful eye cannot be everywhere all the time. Bullying happens when someone finds that they can amuse their peers at another person's expense, and those people exist everywhere.

[MatthewAlexander]

I never experienced bullying like what was portrayed in the book. I think teenagers are always going to be cruel, but as time has gone by they've become more subtle about it. Most "mean" jokes and name calling happens indirectly on social media. People don't say things to other people's faces anymore; they either do it behind a screen or behind the person's back.

[CCtheBrave]

Honestly, I've seen more bullying as an adult I'm the ay than I did during high school. As dad as it sounds, I think anytime people are grouped together with a lot of time and very little stimulus, people will turn against each other.

[HorrorFan87]

I was home schooled so I didn't have real "school" bullying. However, I was still bullied by a lot of other kids on my block or during the summer when I would volunteer at the zoo or babysit. I think in general kids are just mean this day and age. Not necessarily on purpose but I think that the way schools are today is broken up into three categories: true bullies, victimized bullies, and victims. The victimized bullies I think play a larger role than true bullies as they try to stick up for the victims and get picked on or bullied in turn. That then turns into them bullying others because they are tired of being pushed around. Unfortunately though I think the adult world is a lot worse. Between workplaces coming down very poorly on employees and employees being sick and tired of being treated the way they are, it is a never ending circle of bullying. This stems from childhood - perhaps bullying in your school wasn't huge because there may have only been one or two kids actually doing it...but the older those couple of kids get, the tougher everyone else gets. Either those couple of kids grow up to be incredibly cruel or they get a large amount of payback from people who are sick of getting bullied themselves. So I don't think it's a winning situation no matter how old you are. Just the vicious circle of life. I'm kind of wondering what would have happened to characters like Sam in the future, and if she would have been kinder as an adult. Wow, kind of got off track there...sorry. Honestly I'm glad that you never really had bullies in school - it's gotten way too out of hand now. I'm wondering if this book will raise some awareness to the horrors of school bullying. Bullying as a whole will never stop but a little awareness is never a bad thing.

[HorrorFan87]

So I'm just wondering what you guys think of this book maybe being read in schools. I know that it's not what is considered a classic, but the message it delivers on bullying and the penalties that it causes not just for the bully but for the victim as well. I know that Juliet's case was probably caused by more than just bullying but we hear in the news every day that bullied kids commit suicide - in this case, Lauren Oliver really brought the message home that bullying really messes kids up and causes all sorts of mental and physical problems. Do you think if this book was read in schools that kids would actually learn the repercussions of bullying and that bullying could be more contained?

[Anki_Real_Reviews]

I detest the bullying and the after effects of the same. Although reading this book in the schools may help in planting the seed of good behavior among the kids, the ultimate power lies only in the hands of the parents and the kids.

[steampunk_girl]

Yeah, I feel like this book could make an impact on many kids lives. I myself have been both the victim and the bully and neither role can keep you happy.

[saturday+deviant]

I actually mentioned this in one of the other topics, but this book reminded me of Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson in the way it portrays bullying and the effects that it can have on the people that are bullied, but also on the bullies themselves. I think that having it in schools would offer a variety on the types of bullying that can occur in schools, because there was nothing "wrong" with Juliet and yet, the students had no problem siding with Lindsay. The mob mentality of bullying was portrayed well.

[aparsons]

I went to all sorts of schools, and even in the small, population 100 Christian school, I still saw bullying. Kids giving out wedgies, small fights, etc. I think bullying can take lots of different forms, and you don't have to be violent or crazy to bully someone. I think that some students can be extra sensitive, but also, what hurts, hurts.

[dhaller]

In my experience, the bullying was worse in middle school than high school. Middle school was that horrible middle ground where kids had learned how to be mean but not when to be mean - by high school I think most kids figured out that they had little to gain from bullying. Where it does happen, though, it can get vicious.

[katiesquilts]

I was always at the bottom of the social casts in my schools because I never put any effort into fitting in. I always felt like bullying affected me most in elementary school, back when it was just expected that kids would play with whoever was with them, but that was when I heard the most hurtful words and felt the most segregation. Kids made it clear that they didn't want to play with me, and even my best friend (who stood up to the bullies for me, but then turned around and said cruel things to me as well because "only she's allowed to hurt my feelings") had her hot and cold days.

Once I moved up into junior and high schools, though, I realized that that's all they were. Mean people saying mean words. I was never bothered to the point of tears, and I suppose that the lack of reaction is what made the bullying stop, for the most part.

[Heidi M Simone]

I don't remember being really bullied. There was once when I had these short tights that I wore underneath a skirt. During choir practice, someone must have said something to one of the popular kids because she literally picked up my skirt a little to see if I actually had these tight shorts on. I was so shocked that I didn't really say anything - pretending it never happened. I don't really think she was impressed. I mean they were black, nothing too crazy! So, I don't anything else came of it.

Aside from that, I never felt bullied. Was I taken advantage of because of my kindness and work ethic, absolutely! But, in the end I felt safe going to school and just stayed away from the "popular crowd".

I did witness some bullying because someone was gay, but pretended not to be and when my best friend at the time caused a huge scene desperately wanting to be part of the "in crowd" - I didn't care. Because she cared, they pulled a prank on her. They told her there was going to be party at someone's house, which I didn't particularly wanted to go. However, it was important to her, so drove by the house, and guess what? The house was pitch black and no cars in the driveway. I don't think she tried to get in the popular crowd after that...

Long story short, there's definitely still bullying going around and not enough adults take notice.