However, as children, these types of things are taught by our parents. When I was in school, I was instructed just to ignore it, let it go. They'll stop. However, this type of thing rarely ever stops, regardless of what is done by the target of the harassment. This type of anger and hatred towards others came to a head 12 years ago, in the small town of Columbine, Colorado. It was there that two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, stormed into their high school, using a combination of small explosives and firearms, and killed twelve students, along with one teacher. For those of you are reading this post, beware. It is going to get very dark, as I feel that I have to take you back a long journey in order to fully describe the message that I am trying to present. To each story there are two sides, however, a side like this has only come from a tragic event, and I intend to bring a light to the epidemic that has reached our children.
However, before we take the trip that far back in time, I would like this post to go on a guided journey back through time, starting with a student named Gaby Rodriguez. As a student of Toppenish High School in Toppenish, WA, she is required to do a student project for graduation. The one she chose actually made national headlines. Her project was titled, "Stereotypes, rumors, and statistics", in which it detailed the stereotypes and rumors that float around school, based on her "pregnancy", and recorded any comment that got back to her or her friends, in order to formulate data about how students view each other around a high school environment. This type of study on, essentially bullying and harassment, is the first of it's kind done in a high school setting by an actual student.
For six and a half months, Gaby faked her pregnancy, telling very few people about it in order to not taint the subject pool for her experiment. At the end of the experiment, Gaby held an assembly in front of her entire school, in which she presented cards that had comments made about her during the time of her test. Near the end of the assembly, she took off her fake pregnancy belly in front of the entire school, to a shocked crowd.
Over the six and half months of the experiment, Gaby gave up her senior year in order to record the results and deal with the aftermath of her undertaking. However, she faced many disparaging comments about her personality and body, with harassment from a lot of the students in the school. This is the type of thing that happens in our schools, and it's sad. While a pregnancy is a horrible thing to happen to a high-school student, students in schools pick out differences in a person and use them as a weapon against them. This type of behavior has gone on for years, and no one has made any moves to stop it.
Gaby should be praised for her efforts to make moves to bring this type of harassment to light, and our psychological and sociological communities should start making strides to improve the way of life in our schools for our children. There is a major difference between a bit of poking fun between friends, and the comments and actions taken by people we don't really know or associate with. To illustrate my point, we need to continue down the rabbit hole to September, 2010.
Last year in September, a wave of suicides in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender community sparked attention on bullying and harassment as well. The most prominent one was that of Tyler Clementi, a student at Rutgers University in New Jersey. His roommate and a hall-mate streamed him having sexual relations with another man in their dorm room, against his permission and knowledge, spreading it around the internet. Tyler learned about the first time after his roommate used his personal twitter account to tell that there was going to be a second stream going live.
Tyler went to his Resident Advisor, requesting a room change. From an online post by Tyler, he said that the RA seemed to take if very seriously. Now, whether or not the RA actually did take it seriously or not, I cannot find anything on the news about it. If you find something, go ahead and comment below. However, whether or not he did, on September 22nd, Tyler went to the George Washington Bridge and jumped into the water below, leaving his car, wallet and cell phone on the bridge where he took the plunge. It was also discovered that he left a message on the wall of his Facebook, saying that he was going to jump off that bridge.
His death had two different effects. In the Rutgers area, the two students who recorded Tyler surrendered to police, one of them still facing criminal charges. However, in the more national news, more cases of suicides based on the same types of bullying that Tyler did. The four other students, ranging from 13 years old to 19 years old, committed suicide in the same month as Tyler. The parents of these students have all petitioned for better control and laws in order to make sure that are schools are safer for any child who passes through the doors. I can't help but agree with them in every aspect. The names of the students who took their lives are still remembered by many, including the band Rise Against. In a song on their latest album, Endgame, the song 'Make it Stop (September's Children)', directly references the students by name, and speaking out against homophobia and bullying.
These events are devastating, as well as being a part of a pattern. One of the biggest things you should notice is the use of the internet in order to stream Tyler. As we continue our journey back to that fateful April 20th, 1999, I must go off on a small tangent of how the internet was first born, and how the internet has evolved since it's inception.
Now, I won't go as far back as 1958, in which it was known to researches as ARPAnet. However, I will go to 1991, when the World Wide Web project was introduced by CERN, a group mainly involved in particle research. While back then, websites were nothing more than text, images soon were able to be placed on the internet. Within a few years, you had flash animation, and by 1996, the word 'Internet' had become commonplace.
However, in 2000, and then again in 2002, the internet and the world began into a new age. The social media age began with Makeoutclub and then Friendster, along with the former social media powerhouse, Myspace. After Myspace, in 2004, Facebook was launched by Mark Zuckerberg, which soon became the largest social media website in the world. These websites sparked an entirely new wave of interaction and connection with others. Photos that used to be put on bulletin boards or photo albums in a room could now be shared among friends online. Public journals of thoughts could be shared with hundreds, if not thousands of people at once.
But the main thing about the internet is, while things said and used on the internet can be used in a criminal case against someone, the internet is widely uncontrolled. And because of social media and it's uncontrolled nature, a new type of bullying has emerged. Cyberbullying has become a staple on the internet today, ever since our society changed from meeting face to face to living almost entirely online.
To get back on track, we now have to continue our time travel to January 14th, 2010. It was that day in which Phoebe Prince took her own life. Students in her school harassed her endlessly, calling her names and harassing her in school. When she got home, she would find that some of the most mean-spirited comments about her had made their way online by her classmates. Phoebe's aunt had warned school officials to watch over her prior to her enrollment, saying that she was susceptible, but no school official stepped in to to help her.
It was on January 14th that Phoebe was walking home from school. She had been harassed all day, when someone driving by threw an empty can at her, shouted a heinous insult, and then drove away. This event sparked her actions later that day, in which she hung herself in the stairwell of her apartment. The aftermath of this incident sparked outrage by other parents in her Massachusetts community. A meeting was held at the school by other parents whose children were also harassed and felt that their concerns were particularly ignored by the administration. State lawmakers passed anti-bullying legislation in a hurry, trying to stem a much larger epidemic. As a help for a national anti-bullying legislation, "Phoebe's Law" has been proposed to the U.S. government.
But cyber-bullying doesn't always happen by classmates, but even by adults to children as well. It is here we learn of the case of Megan Meier. Megan was a 13 year old girl in Missouri who attended Immaculate Concept Catholic School. It was a school of uniforms, no makeup, and strict guidelines. Like any parent who is trying to help their daughter, they thought it could help her fit in.
During this time, she created a Myspace account in order to stay in touch with her friends like anyone else. And it was on her Myspace that she was messaged by an account using the name 'Josh Evans'. However, a neighbor of Megan's named Lori Drew confessed to actually creating the account along with her daughter and an employee of her company. Lori Drew was the mother of one of the kids in Megan's class, and wanted to gain information about Megan, and how Megan felt about other people. She believed that Megan spread rumors about her daughter around their school, as did her daughter.
Megan was interested in the Josh character, Lori's own daughter and an employee of hers controlled 'Josh' and made him seem convincing. They continued to communicate through Myspace, sending messages back and forth. However, the tone of the texts soon changed. On October 15th, 2006, Lori used "Josh" to tell Megan that, "I don't know if I want to be friends with you anymore because I've heard that you are not very nice to your friends". Lori then continued to share messages that she shared with Megan to others, as well as posting bulletins and other messages calling Megan more names in a more public forum.
It was learned later that the employee of Lori's had sent the final message sent to Megan before the tragic end of the story was a horrible message, stating, "Everybody in O'Fallon knows who you are. You are a bad person and everybody hates you. Have a bad rest of your life. The world would be a better place without you.". This wasn't the first message that this employee had sent to Megan, as the Myspace account was used by Lori, Lori's daughter, and the employee. The fact that Lori, a mother of a daughter of her own, organized an event of this nature is horrifying. This kind of message would be horrifying for anyone to read, and the fact that a grown mother of a daughter had sent that to a 13 year old girl is sickening. A person of that age and stature in a community ought to know better than to do anything of this nature.
After Megan's suicide, Lori Drew was arrested and convicted of conspiracy and violating the terms of use set by Myspace in order to protect people online. Her harassment fell under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and it was by that law she was charged. However, her conviction was later overturned. But, as a result of Megan's death, the Missouri law on bullying was amended to include online communication. The Drew family however, has been scorned by the community, asking them to leave. However, things did turn somewhat violent. Death threats came to the family, a brick was thrown through their window. Her business was forced to close as her clients all left her.
To present our last and final example before we reach our destination, I bring you the tragic suicide of 13 year old Ryan Halligan. When he entered Middle School in 2000, he was targeted by a popular group of bullies who deemed him a target. He did have a learning disorder, and was more into arts and crafts than in sports. It was because of this, that a group of kids that had been bullying him on and off since fifth grade (These two did go to elementary school together), had continued to torment him. His parents discovered that he had been bottling up his emotions, holding them back.
While his parents wanted to go to the school, Ryan had told them not to, because it would only make things worse. Kids in this kind of situation often believe this, and I have experienced it myself when I was in school. However, if the administration deals with the problem effectively, then bullying can actually be stopped by them. But getting back to the story, Ryan sought to learn how to defend himself. His parents bought him boxing gloves, a punching back, and tapes in order to help him learn. After learning this, a fight broke out between him and the bully, which the school's vice principle broke up.
Ryan then befriended the bully, and thought that they were friends. However, after Ryan told him an embarassing story that had happened, the bully thought that he must be gay, and decided to spread the rumor around to his classmates. It was after this that Ryan approached a popular girl at his school online, who pretended to be interested in him. They began to "date", well, date as much as 13 year olds really can. But the girl only wanted to get information to pass along to other kids. When he met her in person after the summer vacation ended, she called him a loser straight to his face, and admitted that she was only joking and wanted to embarass him.
It was all of this piling on top of Ryan, his father feels, that led Ryan to commit suicide. And after reading his story, I can agree whole-heartedly with the assessment. The fact that these kids, while most likely didn't mean to cause him to commit this action, did hurt him greatly. The depression of all this caused Ryan to turn inward, which forced him to trust only himself, and that he didn't want the pain anymore.
Now we get to twelve years ago, April 20th, 1999. I won't go into the horrific details of what happened, because it's public record and unnecessary. However, the tragic loss of life that happened that day could've been prevented. Things could've been changed. The actions undertaken by Dylan and Eric are reprehensible, and they were never model citizens. However, there were many who harassed them. Interviews of students after the incident proved that.
However, after the incident, people went to blaming the media for the events at the school. Movies, Video Games, and Music became the forefront in the war against violence in our media. But in the anger and sorrow of a nation grieving the senseless loss of life that these two brought on the school, they failed to see the real target. Could these two students have been prevent from harming others, if maybe the school had realize that people were harming them?
Their hatred was all around, they hated everyone, but that hate has to come from somewhere. People don't just wake up one day and hate people. They hate them for a comment said to them or about them, for seeing something horrifying that changes them. People change because of their environment that they are placed in. And it was this fact that was never shown on T.V.
But in this day and age, people still fail to recognize this. Even through all the anti-bullying legislation and prosecution of students involved, many states and many schools fail to see the truth behind the issues. School, while recognizing the laws, fail to enforce them to a level that either prevents or eliminates problems among students. Usually, the student being harassed is the one that is sent for help, while the ones who are tormenting him are the ones that are left on their own.
It is because of this, that we see the wave of suicides that we have in recent years. It's because, while people under duress handle problems differently, people who torment them don't care what happens. While they may not be looking to kill, they are doing damage. And it's because of this, that our schools don't see, or choose not to see, that when someone is fighting back, or trying to get the attention of a figure in power, they are trying to defend themselves against an attack. While it may not be an attack on their body, it is an attack on their mind and their heart. However, as we see in some of these cases, some people just couldn't fight anymore, and chose to go on their own terms. Others decided to take the fight to a level beyond what is acceptable.
And yes, I know that our schools are facing cutbacks, and our teachers are trying to teach northwards of thirty plus students in a classroom. But the thing is, they are the position of authority in a classroom. If a student is being harassed and he goes to them for help, it is their job to maintain peace in that classroom. If a teacher ignores that, thinking that they truly don't have control, they're wrong. As they are the position in power, they have every right to tell that student that what they're doing is wrong and it has to end now, or there will be consequences, job be damned. If that student decides to take the fight to the teacher instead of learning from his actions, then that teacher has every right to put that child to the floor and set him straight.
I never had that from anyone while I was in school, save one teacher. Mr. Ngyuen was the only one who stood up for me, the only one who ever thought that I deserved to be helped. When students made fun of me in seventh grade, and he had a chance to see it, he made sure that he acted to put at least a temporary stop on it, and I know that if I had anything happen, I could go to him for help.
There needs to be more teachers and administrators like that, willing to step in and step up to students who choose to target others for their differences. Because in all honesty, where would we be as a country without differences? Would we have cars, trains, airplanes, without people daring and striving to be different than the rest out there. Would we even have social media if there weren't those people aspiring to be different from the rest of us?
So, this post, I use it to honor the dead. The ones who have lost their lives from the heartbreak of tragedy of those who couldn't rein in their children, or those who couldn't see that people didn't deserve the punishment that they got.
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| These are the victims of the Columbine High School Massacre. Rest In Peace, for while Columbine still honors your memory, that day will never be forgotten |
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| Tyler Clementi - You may be gone, but you will not be forgotten. Equality will always be fought for, for there will always be those who will fight for it. With you, we mourn the other four of September's Children: Asher Brown, 13, Billy Lucas, 15, Raymond Chase, 19, and Seth Walsh, 13. |
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| Megan Meier - A victim of the brutality of those who should understand but refused |
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| Phoebe Prince - May you rest in peace, for people mourn on both sides of the pond |
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| Ryan Halligan - A life cut tragically short by people who can't see difference as a strength, not a weakness |
Credits for Images:
http://www.yakima-herald.com/stories/2011/04/20/pregnot-toppenish-high-student-fakes-pregnancy-as-social-test-about-stereotypes-rumors - Yakima Herald Website, Article about Gaby and her Experiment
Bibliography:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/09/30/national/main6913514.shtml?tag=contentMain;contentBody - Article about Tyler Clementi
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/01/27/earlyshow/leisure/gamesgadgetsgizmos/main6146385.shtml?source=related_story&tag=related - Article about Phoebe Prince
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/11/17/national/main3517133.shtml?tag=mncol;lst;3
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/07/national/main3587960.shtml?tag=mncol;lst;5 - Articles about Megan Meier
http://www.ryanpatrickhalligan.org/ - The Website setup by Ryan Halligan's parents, telling the story of what happened to their son.
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