# English Essay: Bullying



## xXSerendipityXx

This is an essay I wrote back in 7th grade. (4 years ago). I remember how proud I was of myself when my teacher read it to the class, saying that it was the best essay in the class. Later, it was published in our school's newspaper during anti-bullying week 2 years in a row. Anyways, I was going thorugh some old files on my computer, and found it again. Looking back, I see a whole bunch of mistakes that I'm itching to fix, but decided not to. Im hoping that maybe this essay will change somebody's perception on bullying.


Bullied​ 

What is bullying? Bullying is everywhere. It’s that horrible thing that destroys people’s happiness and life. Bullying is the big guy picking on the little guys at lunch, the popular girls spreading rumors about the nerdy one, or even the mentally challenged kid being made fun of everywhere he goes. Bullying is the intelligent college student who committed suicide after being humiliated via the internet by his best friend. I’m sure just about everyone has either been a bystander to the horrors of bullying, heard about someone (most likely a student,) who decided to end their life just to get away from a bully, or have possibly even been bullied themselves. You may be wondering what kind of a person would do this, possible reasons for it, and even how they would go about bullying someone. Also going through your mind may be thoughts about the dangers to a society a bully can cause. Hopefully you were also thinking about ways that everyone including yourself could help to put a stop to bullying once and for all. Let me give you some ideas.

Some people bully others because they believe that doing so will make themselves feel better, even though the outcome is usually the complete opposite. Maybe for a moment they feel amazing, but looking back on it, bullies probably feel really bad about what they did. These bullies, although they appear to not have any sad feeling themselves, probably have a lot of unwanted things going on in their lives (such as divorced parents, the loss of a loved one, the fact that they have no friends, ect.) so they put people down by either physically harming them, verbally abusing them, or by use of a rather recent source: the internet. When you hear of bullying, the first thing you imagine is probably someone getting beat up. This method of bullying is called physical bullying, which is basically any undesirable form of contact from one person to another. This can be as simple as just an unwanted friendly hug, but as in the case of Jamie Nobozy, a gay high school student, it can be so bad that you find yourself in the hospital. Jamie Nobozy’s harassers also bullied him through uncomplimentary comments and bad names, which is known as verbal abuse or bullying. The final form of bullying is a relatively new discovery that was rarely used during Nobozy’s time. Cyber-bullying has proved to be possibly the worst form of bullying all over the United States today. It is when the internet, cell phones or other electronical devices are used to send/post hurtful and/or embarrassing words, comments, pictures or videos. In short, bullies will do whatever necessary to bring a moment of joy into their lives, only to find themselves suffering tremendous amounts of regret later.

Bullying plays a very dangerous role in society. In the case of thousands of children every day, the stress of bullying is too much to even handle going to school. For others, the same stress (although probably at a much larger scale) causes them to do the unthinkable – end their misery themselves – by committing suicide. In this year alone three people have killed themselves as a result of severe bullying. Seventy five percent of all people have been bullied at some time or another. That means that three out of every four people have been trashed by a very mean person who has probably done the same thing to several other people. When you bully someone, you risk their happiness, and in some cases their life.

Now I will tell you about how you and any other person could help to stop an instance of bullying anywhere. It may sound very simple, but as you may already know it takes a very brave person to perform this act. It would be completely normal if any person had nightmares about doing it: turning a bully in. Many people never tell anyone about another person’s bullying or even their own just because they are worried about the fact that they would most likely become the bullies’ next target, or worse, being given a label such as “snitch”, or in younger grades “tattle-tale”. By stepping past your own fears and realizing how big of a difference you could make in someone's life, you will not only free the world of another bully, but you will also find a deep sense of amazement in yourself.

So that’s it. Now you know what bullying is. In summary, almost all bullies have at least one thing, (if not several,) that is giving them a reason to want to make themselves fell better by shoving someone to the ground (literally and figuratively). They will use three main forms of bullying to achieve this moment of happiness. Physical bullying (or any unwanted contact,) verbal bullying, (in short, saying mean things to someone,) and cyber-bullying (or use of the internet to embarrass someone). In the end, bullying is very dangerous to people of all ages, and isn’t acceptable ever. This is why you should never allow yourself to be bullied, or just stand by and watch a peer be bullied for any reason.


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## Missy May

Nice essay. Interesting and disturbing subject. 

Bullying can be observed in most all higher order mammals - it can easily be seen in horses, for example, if one is around enough of them. The Lord of the Flies demostrates the point, to a rather exagerated extreme, that the "bully humans" of the human species can be "made" to behave in a civil manner by civil society. They may not think civil thoughts, but they _will_ behave civilly. Bullying is not a result of anything other than a breakdown in civilized society. It isn't a result of amoral, ill-mannered, nasty people...such people have ALWAYS been among us and always will be. However, if a bully of any species is _allowed_ to attack another w zero consequences, then, not surprisingly, they will do it again. It is the removal of the "consequence" that _allows_ bullies to bully. 
Kids shouldn't be afraid to turn in a bully, nor should they have to! Where are their parents, btw? And, it isn't due to lack of funding to the department of ed that is to blame for the vast reduction in "consequences"; the cost per student in this country is higher than anywhere in the world. They don't need more staff to hang out in the office over the crockpot and gossip, that won't solve it - but they WILL take advantage of the "problem" and ask for more funding and grant money for "bully prevention", and probably get it! And, a spare crockpot, too! Which is, just another sort of amorality, and is exactly why bullying will only get worse -count on it.


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