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This article is from Today's
Native Father, issue #135, September/October, 2004. Related articles from this issue: |
Bullying: It's Not Just a Stage of Childhood by David Hertzler |
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Bullying is on the increase, if reports in the media are to be believed. It is estimated that bullying incidents happen in the average school every 7 minutes in the yard and every 25 minutes inside, each lasting about 37 seconds.1 Should parents be concerned? Isn’t it normal for children to test their social skills against each other in ways that sometimes hurt? Perhaps. But what is normal may not always be right. Bullying can be deadly. When 14-year-old Emmett Fralick of Halifax, NS, shot himself in April, 2002, he left behind a suicide note saying that he could no longer take being bullied.2 Bullying has also been suggested as a cause of shootings at Columbine and other schools. Both bullies and their victims are more likely than other students to carry weapons in school, a recent study finds.3 Besides, children do not “grow out of it,” claims a report based on a fifteen-year study of bullies in Canada.4 There is evidence that children who learn how to acquire power through aggression on the playground may transfer these lessons later to sexual harassment, date violence, marital abuse, child abuse, elder abuse and workplace bullying. Bullying used to be seen starting among 8- to10-year-olds. Now it is increasingly seen among younger children. It typically begins with physical aggression. As the child’s skills increase, the bullying becomes more verbal and social. The Internet has ushered in cyber-bullying, which takes place mostly in chat rooms. Social bullying is especially common among girls, to whom relationships are of utmost importance. “If the motivation is relationships, then to destroy relation-ships is a powerful form of aggression,” reports a recent radio documentary.5 Social bullying can be just as damaging as the more physical kinds. The old school-ground chant, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me,” is certainly not true, especially for girls. When 14-year-old Dawn-Marie Wesley of Mission, BC, committed suicide, she left behind a note that named three of her “friends” as bullies. “If I try to get help, it will get worse,” the note read. “If I ratted, there would be no stopping them.” The other girls in Dawn’s group were frightened and confused. “We were all doing the same thing, including the victim,” one girl said. Clearly, children do not always associate bullying with illegal behaviour. They would be shocked to hear it called “slander” or “assault” or anything else that would be criminal if an adult were doing it. Why don’t teachers and other adult supervisors catch and stop the bullies? Sometimes it is because they have not been trained to do so. Often it is because bullies become very adept at hiding or disguising their actions. Sometimes it is the child who is sweetest and most compliant under adult supervision who becomes the terror on the playground. Getting this child’s parents to believe the negative reports about their child may be one of the most difficult steps in an anti-bullying campaign.6 The granddaughter of a Cree woman is hoping to change that. Susan Buchanan does workshops in schools across Canada, teaching students skills such as how to apologize, how to give and receive complaints, how to develop respect and empathy, how not to send “victim messages.” She also offers a five-hour training program to teachers and other school staff, teaching them how to develop a bully-free school. Students and teachers have responded well to these workshops.7 A number of family factors have been identified as related to both bullies and victims. Some of these are:
These causal factors also suggest a number of ways that parents may help their children avoid becoming either bullies or victims.
Bullying is not just “kids being kids.” Both bullies and their victims need help. It may be their parents who are in the position to give them the help their young souls crave. Works cited 1. Trueman, Anne. School can be scary for victims of bullies. Ottawa Citizen, August 15, 2002. 2. McLaughlin, Peter. School bullies to be tracked by database. The Daily News, April 13, 2002. 3. Rubin, Rita, Study: Bullies and victims tend to be more violent. USA Today, 4/15/2003. 4. Peplar, Debra, and Wendy Craig. Making a Difference in Bullying. pavlov.psyc.queensu.ca/~craigw/makediff.pdf 5.Glazier, Lynn. It’s a Girl’s World. CBC Radio Ideas documentary, May, 2004. 6. Ibid. 7. Garrick, Rick. How to Stop a Bully. Wawatay News, May 6, 2004. 8. Trueman, op. cit. |
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