Courage Connection

www.cbc.ca/news/pointofview/2010...egy.html

 



My earliest memory of bullying was in Grade 1 at my old school. It was the first day in a new school for all of us in Grade 1. There was a boy - I call him Billy - who made fun of the kids that cried. He laughed at them and teased them. You wouldn't expect Billy to be a bully. He was a little plump and wore spectacles, and his mother walked with him to our classroom every morning! I mean, he looked like a geek and a mummy's boy!Billy terrorised almost everyone in our class. He would push other kids' books off their desks, or throw their schoolbags out of the classroom. Sometimes he would trip someone who walked past him. He didn't care whether you were a boy or a girl. He didn't care whether you were bigger than him. He just bullied everyone.But Billy had a favourite victim, Julian, who sat beside me. He bullied Julian more than anyone else.


 One day some classmates and I were playing hide and seek after school. I was looking for a hiding place when I heard someone scream. I went to check what happened. I saw Julian lying on the ground with Billy standing over him. Billy was stamping on him and I could see blood on Julian's face. I quickly hid behind a wall because I was afraid that I would get beaten up too. I wanted to help Julian but my body didn't move at all. The only thing I could do was stand there like a statue.Eventually Billy walked away. I went to Julian and helped him up and asked him what had happened. He told me he had tripped and injured his face. Julian didn't come to school for the next few days. When he came back to school, I went up to him and told him I had seen what happened. I apologized for not doing anything. I thought he would get angry and wouldn't want to be my friend but I was totally wrong. He just said "don't worry about it". I felt so guilty.I think if that incident happened today, I would have stopped Billy from beating up Julian. But maybe the incident happened because Julian or other people didn't speak up against Billy before the bullying got that bad. Maybe not speaking up or fighting back gives the bully the confidence to do worse things. I think that today I would join forces with Julian and the other kids to tell Billy to stop being so mean. If a bully sees that other people are ready to stand up to him, he will stop bullying them.

My two goals are to help whenever I see someone getting bullied and to always defend my friends. I would never want to see someone in that situation ever again, I will always save anyone who needs help. But bullying can happen in many different ways, not just fighting, and can happen to anyone, not just the smaller kids. We must recognize when someone is being bullied and then do something to help the victim.