Bullying: What Can The Student Body Do?
By Karmen Bowie
Landmark Christian School
Fairburn, Ga.
Imagine this: it’s crowded in the school halls, and the new girl in town suddenly sees a group of girls she’s never met before laughing, pointing, teasing and calling her names. Throughout the rest of the year, she is taunted by the girls who are verbally abusive.
Bullying in schools has become a widespread epidemic just in 2010. Surveys say 77% of students in America are bullied mentally, verbally and physically (http://www.teendepression.org).
What some students don’t seem to realize is that the way we treat people can have an effect on a person’s life, and ultimately what was meant to be a joke to make one’s self feel better or just plain peer pressure carries farther than they know.
Suicide is the third leading cause of death amongst teens today. Out of the 100,000 suicides reported, 35 resulted from the teen being bullied and they couldn’t take it anymore (http://www.teendepression.org). Authorities suspect that there are far more suicides rooted from bullying than that but they are not recorded.
How do we stop this epidemic as a student body? How do we reduce bullying? The answer goes further than just “don’t do it.” It’s respect.
What our generation is missing is respect. Think about it. If we had a higher respect for ourselves, would we feel the need to put other people down? If we respected our peers no matter what the differences, would we exclude them? Abuse them? Because of ourselves not showing a sense of honor for our own peers, we close the doors to unification and expansion of thinking. We all, as a student body, have something to gain from everyone. But the fact that we are destroying our own generation is almost sickening.
So as we return to school this fall, think about respect, and we might just be able to save a life.
Landmark Christian School
Fairburn, Ga.
Imagine this: it’s crowded in the school halls, and the new girl in town suddenly sees a group of girls she’s never met before laughing, pointing, teasing and calling her names. Throughout the rest of the year, she is taunted by the girls who are verbally abusive.
Bullying in schools has become a widespread epidemic just in 2010. Surveys say 77% of students in America are bullied mentally, verbally and physically (http://www.teendepression.org).
What some students don’t seem to realize is that the way we treat people can have an effect on a person’s life, and ultimately what was meant to be a joke to make one’s self feel better or just plain peer pressure carries farther than they know.
Suicide is the third leading cause of death amongst teens today. Out of the 100,000 suicides reported, 35 resulted from the teen being bullied and they couldn’t take it anymore (http://www.teendepression.org). Authorities suspect that there are far more suicides rooted from bullying than that but they are not recorded.
How do we stop this epidemic as a student body? How do we reduce bullying? The answer goes further than just “don’t do it.” It’s respect.
What our generation is missing is respect. Think about it. If we had a higher respect for ourselves, would we feel the need to put other people down? If we respected our peers no matter what the differences, would we exclude them? Abuse them? Because of ourselves not showing a sense of honor for our own peers, we close the doors to unification and expansion of thinking. We all, as a student body, have something to gain from everyone. But the fact that we are destroying our own generation is almost sickening.
So as we return to school this fall, think about respect, and we might just be able to save a life.