Patrick McAuley Satire Essay 1/22/13 Bully for the Best According to an article written by MSNBC contributor Linda Carrol, everyday across our country one out of every six school kids is affected by the terrible use of bullying. Bullying is the largest problem concerning the safety and well-being of children at school. Students complain that bullying problems have driven them to lose focus in their learning, causing grades to drop and self-confidence to deteriorate over time. Bullies seem to target the weaker students, both physically and mentally. All schools say “no” to bullying, but why not say “yes”.
Author of The Bully Society, Jessie Klein, researched school shootings over thirty years and found that the majority of them had one similarity, the result of the shooter being bullied. The bullying was either name calling or not being accepted, (Klein, 2012, p.1). Many people hear of these stories of a gunman, or even two, shooting large masses and think that they must’ve been crazy or there was a lack of parental involvement. I know I used to think that. But did they truly have a mental disorder or were they driven there after suffering from being bullied over a period of
“Bullying is a big problem that effects millions of students, and it has everyone worried, not just the kids on it’s receiving end” (Lyness 1). Bullying does not just affect kids, but the parents too. It affects the parents because a lot of their children begin to be afraid attending school. In the novel Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Melinda was affected by being bullied lead her to think about suicide, scared of coming to school, and victims like Melinda begin to not care about school and fail. Melinda was affected by being bullied and led to many things and one of them is thinking about suicide.
Research shows that bullying is a very controversial subject that can be seen as a crime to some but not to others depending on the nature and severity of the bullying. It is a widespread problem that unfortunately most children have to go through at some point in their lives. Bullying is a conscious, wilful, deliberate, hostile and repeated behaviour by one or more people which is intended to harm others. What do people in today’s society really think of bullying? What can they do to help these victims?
Over 60% of students had cheated in the past month, which is fairly recent, and a staggering 83% had cheated in the past quarter. This showed us that cheating is an on going problem that almost certainly happens daily in Perry Hall High. To sum up our survey we asked students to tell us how big of a problem they though cheating was in our school on a scale from 1 to 5, 5 being the most serious. 41% responded a 3 with the rest of the figure split evenly between 1,2,4, and 5. We concluded from this that students don’t really care about the subject or are indifferent about it.
Within the 60 percent, Ray Windsor of Lansdowne is one of those victims. In high school he had to contend with many of the insults and taunts from fellow students because he was a victim of gross physical immaturity and not like the rest of the students. Since the bullies were bigger than him, they would knock him around, throw him into the showers, spit into one of his clothes and toss it out the window from a two-story building. This problem has still bothered Windsor until the age of 25, which he had become an alcoholic and had two major ulcer operations. Being bullied can cause destruction into one individual life.
It is to be hoped that now, the issue with bullying can be related to the increase of school safety. There has to be something done in account for the students who get hurt from other children who have anger issue and erupt sporadically. Raising eyebrows from various school board officials and parents, the concern to ensure safety in schools has forced teachers and principals to be the band-aid from any harm that may bruise its reputation. As much media as incidents over disputes in school get broadcasted, there is not enough attention on the ways these things are being put to a halt by the city’s government officials. Organizations, social media movements and strikes have elevated because of the concern t protect the futures of tomorrow.
They feel as if no one is listening and this is their only way of getting their voice heard. The shooter has more than likely made many attempts to solve this problem. Bullying, often dismissed as a normal part of growing up, is a real problem in our nation's schools, according to the National School Safety Center. One out of every four school children endures taunting, teasing, pushing, and shoving daily from schoolyard bullies. More than 43 percent of middle- and high-school students avoid using school bathrooms for fear of being harassed or assaulted.
Bullies can be anywhere, but there's no place they show up more than in schools (John Cloud, “When Bullying Turns Deadly”). Some students are so terrified of being bullied that they will not attend school. It is estimated that 160,000 children miss school every day due to the fear of being bullied (National Education Association). That is a lot of students missing school, missing out on their education just because people want to be mean and bully them; don’t you think? Sometimes it doesn’t occur to us that we are being bullies.
They will miss school more often and complain of such illnesses as colds, sore throats, fevers and stomach upset. Continued bullying can result in the child dropping out of school, developing bad habits such as smoking, drinking alcohol and getting into fights. The HRSA website also indicates that “60% of boys who were bullies in middle school had at least on criminal conviction by the age of 24. Bullying in school also has an impact on other students at school by creating a climate of fear and disrespect in schools and has a negative impact on student learning.” Those who are bullied are five times more likely to be depressed and far more likely to be suicidal than those who are not bullied according to the Groundspark