Bullying is bad . . . Unless It's Done For Religious Rerrasons

Absolutely amazing:

Michigan Republicans turned what was supposed to be a new law protecting victims of bullying into a law pretty much declaring open season on them, thanks to a last-minute clause exempting anyone who can provide a moral or religious reason for their harassment.

"Matt's School Safe Law," which just passed in the state Senate and is now moving on to the House of Representatives, is named after Matt Epling, a gay teenager who committed suicide as a result of bullying. However, the president of the American Family Association of Michigan explained that the bill had to include the "religious motivations" loophole to prevent it from becoming "a Trojan Horse for the homosexual agenda."

I expect this kind of thing to happen in the South, or even where I live in Kansas. Not Michigan. So disappointing.

It Gets Better

Photo of Mitchell Wilson from Huffington Post

Over the past year or so, the "It Get's Better" has garnered much attention to the issue of GLBT teens committing suicide after they were bullied in school.  It started out as a project to GLBT teens, but has seemed to morphed into a message for all teens who are bullied, regardless of their sexual orientation.  It is a wonderful message that more teens need to hear.

Above is a picture of Mitchell Wilson.  Mitchell was an 11-year-old boy with muscular dystrophy in Ontario, Canada who committed suicide after being beaten up and robbed by another student.  Mitchell was the previous recipient of bullying, and after the assault, he was so terrified of going back to school and running into that student that he took his own life.  More details on Mitchell's death can be found here, but there is so much to be disturbed about this story on so many levels.  It is more than just the fact that he was a young man who was bullied, and committed suicide.  It is the fact that Mitchell was so young (not even a teenager), the fact that he was physically disabled, and the fact he wasn't merely teased or pushed around, but violently assaulted.  There have been very few stories in my life that have made me as sick as this one. 

Certainly, bullying is an all too frequent part of school growing up.  Traditionally, adults have taken a nonchalance attitude towards it.  Some will say it's merely a case of "kids being kids".  Others see it almost as a right of passage, or it will make someone a stronger person in the long run.  I can't say there isn't a hint of truth in any of those assertions, but it doesn't mean that bullying is harmless, and it certainly shouldn't be tolerated by anyone (especially adults).  Fortunately, times have changed, and people are not starting to wise up to how damaging bullying can be.  Since I started my career as an educator a couple of years ago, I have always had a zero tolerance attitude towards bullying in my classroom.  Mitchell's story has only renewed my commitment to stand up to bullying.

Like so many others, I was bullied growing up.  I wasn't bullied or assaulted in the same fashion that Mitchell was (although I did take my share of physical abuse from peers).  And I am straight, so I was not picked on for my sexual orientation (although I was called words like a "queer" and a "faggot" on several occasions).  I was simply a social awkward young man who was trying to fit in where I could.  Middle school was the most miserable three years of my life because of bullying.  I remember it being a good day at school when I was only called a "faggot" once, and maybe flicked in the ear a couple of times.

Oddly enough, a number of the students who bullied me I considered friends for the longest time.  For a while, I thought that beating each other up and calling each other hurtful names were how friends treated each other.  By the time I left middle school, I figured out that wasn't how friends treat each other, and I had almost no self-esteem left.  Suicide never crossed my mind, although I was probably really close to that becoming an option in my mind.  I do remember thinking that no one would ever love me and my life would never amount to anything.  There was very little I felt I could do about my own bullying at the time, although if I had to do it again, I would have probably tried to seek out help from school counselors. 

When I entered high school, I decided I would keep my mind and energy focused on getting good grades so I could go to college, and get a fresh start.  The bullying situation, for the most part, got better for me as high school went on, although I know that for so many others, the torment of bullying gets only worse.  One major regret I do have is not standing up whenever I saw other students get bullied.  I didn't stand up because I didn't want to get singled out myself.  I was afraid I would somehow divert the attention of bullying to myself.  I now wish I would have stood up and said something.

I ended up graduating high school and going to college.  I have done so much with my life since then.  This includes graduating college, starting my career, having lots of great friends, and getting married to a wonderful wife.  While I won't say I don't ever think about all those years I was tormented with bullying, I now know that my teenage years, as hard as they were, are only a small part of my life.  For anyone reading this post who happens to be in school now and is being bullied (regardless why you are being bullied), I want to let you know that IT DOES GET BETTER.  Know that no matter how hard it feels right now, it will not always be like this. 

I would like to add something else, and I know this may be hard for you to do if you are being bullied.  Do not look at your bully with hate.  At my current position, I work with students who have sever behavior and conduct disorders.  The students I work with frequently bully other students.  One thing I can tell you about such students is that they aren't bad people, and they aren't naturally prone bullying others.  Often times, they come from broken homes, and lives of dysfunction.  They may even be the products of bullying themselves, except the bullies in their lives may not be peers, but members of their own family.  By no means am I trying to justify their actions, and I would not go as far to say that you shouldn't take it personally.  Just know that generally, bullying comes from a place of pain and torment on the part of the bullier.

If you are having trouble dealing with bullying, there are a number of great outlets that you can go to and get help.  For starters, there is your school counselor, but there is also the National Suicide Prevention Hot line (1-800-273-8255), as well as stopbullying.gov.  Please, don't hesitate to get help if you need it. 

A Video for Sunday

Recently, the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell has allowed gay and lesbian active members of the military to come out of the closet.  Here is a video that has become a YouTube sensation.  It is a soldier stationed in Germany calling his father and telling him he was gay.  You may have already seen this video.  But if you haven't it is worth a watch.  It is both moving and coragous.




By the way, if you are someone who still thinks repealling Don't Ask, Don't Tell is a bad idea (I'm looking at you Republican debate audiences), you might want to not only take a look at yourself as a human being, but also who also supports it's repeal.  Two Words: TOBY. KEITH.

Onion: "Future U.S. History Students: 'It's Pretty Embarrassing How Long You Guys Took To Legalize Gay Marriage'"

Here is an article from The Onion I read a week or two ago, and it took me a while to post it.  It is funny as always, and more importantly, it does speaks some truth.  There will be a day where U.S. History students will wonder why the hell it took so long to legalize gay marriage, just like students today question why the hell it took so long to end slavery or give equal rights to African-Americans.  As someone who teaches an American social studies class, I can tell you that students do question these things.  My favorite passage:

Mr. Bernard, 58, told the class that he himself could remember how in the 2030s gay marriage was still a somewhat touchy subject in certain parts of the country.

"It's true," said Mr. Bernard, gesturing to a holographic projection of late-20th/early-21st-century antigay preacher Fred Phelps on the classroom's V-screen. "Most people had come around by the time I was your age, of course, but you would still read and hear things about how certain people in New Washington were trying to overturn the court's ruling. Hard to imagine anyone being that adamant about gays not marrying, but those were different times."

"In fact, I remember President Romney even gave this speech once calling gay marriage 'an issue that continues to divide many in our nation, including myself,'" Mr. Bernard continued. "Of course, that was before his openly gay son, Craig, served four terms as president a couple decades later."

 The last paragraph of the article really depresses me, mainly because I afraid it might be true:

After concluding the week's examination of the history of gay marriage rights, classroom sources in the year 2083 said they would be moving on to the topic of how their grandparents' generation was too late to do anything about global warming.