Cyber and other bullies

It's disturbing to hear that some kid has been so tortured by other kids that they commit suicide. They kill themselves. I don't know how anyone who caused another child to take his or her own life can sleep at night.

My daughter and I had a short discourse on the subject recently after the young student jumped from the George Washington Bridge. 

The world has been exposed via the internet. Very little is sacred and hardly anything is secret anymore.

Cameras can be attached to computers and anything that they "see" can also be seen instantly by anyone who has access to viewing the camera's subject. In this case a young man was secretly recorded having some intimate time with his partner who also happened to be a young man.

I don't believe that homosexuality is a choice. Let me get that out and on this page right now. I honestly don't believe a boy, or a girl, would, or could, consciously choose to situate themselves in a lifestyle that could, and often does,  bring derision, cruelty, danger and acts of violence, menace, and even death to them. I do believe that if they try to keep it hidden, that they suffer inwardly in ways that might equal the torture heaped upon them by others.

I believe that homosexuality is genetic. I believe, yes, that they are born this way, just as some men and women are born without the ability to conceive. They can't help it and they certainly didn't ask for it.

Just because they are different it does not give others the right to ridicule and torture them.

The religious wing-nuts who gather and protest at Military funerals because they say that God is letting our soldiers die because of the sins of homosexuality that we tolerate... I can't get my head around the reasoning here, but I'd say that if there were a God who was pissed off about gay people, the last people he would let die would be the soldiers who are out there protecting the rights of the haters of homosexuals. That's just my thought.

But the choice of sexual partners is not what this is about.

How did we get to where we are today, and what happened to our kids?

Maybe we should ask instead " What happened to the parents of those kids?"

My daughter said that children have always had a mean streak, that they have always had to capability to be cruel and that the internet and computers have just allowed them to do what they might do anyway, but with a wider audience.

She's right.

Kids have always been capable of absolute cruelty to other kids. Given an opportunity, they'd exercise their rights to make fun of kids wearing glasses, children who were in wheelchairs, special needs children, mentally handicapped children or adults, disfigured children or adults, and anything that they percieve to be 'not normal' or 'not like me'.

We've all done it. We've seen someone with a deformity. We looked. We possibly even stared. We pretended not to see when they looked back.  Some of you might have dared to ask " What happened?" or "What's wrong with him?"

You did it as kids and you still do it as adults. But somewhere in your past, if your parents were worth a damn, you learned that you don't make fun of people just because they aren't like you. You don't tease them just because they aren't what you think of as pretty, or cute, or smart, or thin, or fast.

I was teased and picked on at school. I had freckles and was always teased about them. As I grew older and my parents became members of a church that frowned on dresses above the knee and no pants, and no make-up right about the time that I started high school when EVERYONE else was wearing these things. Add insult to injury here and acknowledge that most of my clothes were hand me downs because we were definitely below povery level and the height of fashion wasn't in the budget for my sister and I. So, I suffered. And I didn't tell anyone! When I got to school I tried to roll my skirts up around my waist so they were at least just above my knees. I borrowed lipstick and mascara from a friend in home room and had to make sure I washed it off before I got home..I can tell you that it was no fun. I can only imagine that had the internet been around and had the opportunity to announce to the whole 'world wide web' that Sue Christopher dressed, and looked,  like a granny at 13 years old, I might have been a statistic, too.

We had twin boys at High School. One of them had Epilepsy. At any given time he would fall down in a seizure. It was horrible to see because he flopped and stretched and rolled and shuddered, and was frightening in a sense because it was not normal. Not everyone did it. Few understood it, but I would have rather have had my tongue torn out than to snicker or laugh or make fun of that boy.

My parents taught us not to make fun of those less fortunate than we were. My cousin, Chris, was mentally challenged. We spent a lot of time camping with all of them and Chris was a sweet boy who could, and would, if given the chance, bring all wars to a peaceful end. But he was slow, and different.  If we didn't include him in the things we did, we were quickly shown the error of our ways. We were taught to accept him as he was. I don't think people do that now...

Society. 

We've inserted so many laws and prohibitions, and so many strict guidelines for parents on how we raise our kids anymore that it seems like we don't have to do any raising. If you spank your kid, you teach them to hit. If you raise your voice at your kid, you teach them verbal abuse... Bullshit! There are limits, yes, and there is a responsibility to temper the punishment, but that does not allow you NOT to punish your kid if they're misbehaving.

There is a saying that "It takes a village to raise a child." Well, it does. But not in the way that people take it to mean. We have to be ears and eyes for our kids as well as the kids of our neighbors... I  eavesdropped in our neighbors house one time... When they found me they didn't even call my parents to ask - they just spanked my goofy little ass and then marched me home and told my parents who spanked my goofy little ass again.

Not anymore does that happen. I'll promise you that if your kids live near me and I see them misbehaving, I won't spank them but I'll sure as hell tell them off and give them an earfull. Then I'll take them home and tell you that you need to spank them.

We send the kids to school and when the kids misbehave,  we expect the teacher to pull some kind of magic 'be good' pill out of the hat, administer it with love and great care, and to let the parent know that according to the rules and guidelines set down by the department of social services, the child was disciplined and that no further disciplinary action is needed - because they fear that dad might whip off that belt and bust junior's ass for being rude or being beligerant or downright disruptive. When the kids don't learn in school, it's the teachers fault... despite the fact that the student who is getting E's and F's is the one who is disrupting class and refusing to co-operate.

When my son was in kindergarten in his first week of school he kicked dirt into another little boys face. The principal called me at work and told me about it. He asked me for permission to paddle my son. I absolutely granted it. When we got him home from school, he got another spanking. He's not damaged from it. He learned that his actions have consequences. Serious ones. Painful ones. People now are afraid to hit their kids because the neighbors are going to call DSS and accuse them of abuse... The same neighbors are calling 911 because their own kids are abusing them! 

I worked with a man who had a daughter who was getting into trouble frequently. She's been staying with her mother, and when she got out of hand, the mother sent her to live with her dad. One evening the girl was caught sneaking out of the house, well after midnight. Her Dad pulled her back into the house and took his belt to her. She picked up the phone and called 911 while he stood and watched. He told her " Now, go to your room and pack your clothes because when they get here, you're going with them."

She refused, and stood there till the police and DSS came. When DSS told him that he couldn't hit his daughter he told them " Fine. Wait right here while I go pack her bags because you're not going to tell me I have to feed her and house her and clothe her and not discipline her.That's bullshit, and I ain't having it. I'll be right back down and you can take her with you." He was a fireman - Captain of Ladder Truck 5.

DSS refused, and the daughter was taught then and there who was in charge in that house.

People today are scared when their kids need to be disciplined. DSS is almost like some kind of evil sub-surface militia that gleefully takes the sides of parents and frightens them into doing anything that the kids want them to do.

I watched a mother and father try to REASON with a 2 year old about eating candy before he had supper one night. I was at Olive Garden waiting for friends and the boy was laying on the floor, kicking and screaming because he couldn't have Skittles before dinner. The mother tried to coax him to quieten down by promising him  "Stop crying and you can have one peice of candy." So he stopped and had his candy. When he wanted another, the episode was replayed with the same outcome. Eventually it progressed to this child hitting his mother and her struggling to hold him while daddy fished the Skittles out of her purse and to the kids mouth. After 7 or 8 pieces, they told him that he couldn't have anymore because he wouldn't want any supper... He was barely 2! Do you think he cared? But that is the problem with our society today. If she'd spanked the kid, no doubt someone would have been horrified. No doubt that anyone who had raised a kid on spankings and owie kisses would have praised the parents for teaching this kid the proper behavior and that sometimes "NO!" is the only right answer.  Those who were raising their kids by Dr. Spock have naught to look forward to but visiting day at the prison, I say. You can't reward bad behavior by inaction.

Spare the rod- spoil the child. I believe that.

I have to believe that in the age where both parents are working, that it might be easier to sit the kids down in front of a computer and give them games to play. If you've seen any of the games kids play now, you can understand why it must seem almost harmless to -say- something to another kid or to taunt them as was the case with the kids who commited suicide. After all, it's not like they picked up a flame thrower or a machine gun and blew them away like they do to the people in the computer games. The avatars are unfeeling and deadly force is the norm.

I watched the news two weeks ago when a father, absolutely fed up with the kids teasing and taunting his daughter on the school bus, got ON that bus  with his daughter and told those kids " This is my daughter and you have been teasing her and making fun of her and I have had enough! I'll mess you up if you hurt her!"

I cheered him on for that because those kids, malicious little brats, were well on their way to causing another girl to go home and throw a belt over her closet rod and hang herself. The bus driver knew what was happening and did nothing. The child was getting up later and later, intentionally missing the bus so she would miss the taunts and cruel remarks. She has Muscular Dystrophy or something...She wasn't saying anything to her parents, but Dad suspected something... and he finally got her to tell him.

You can bet that those kids on the bus will think long and hard about saying something because another pissed off Dad just might get on at the next stop and he might make good on his promise.

Had the parents of those kids done the same thing, they'd had been a little more sympathetic to the girl and possibly even been willing to help her instead of trying to hurt her.

It's going to happen again and again, this bullying and this taunting and torturing kids till they take their own lives. It's terrible, but it's not too late to save a life... Sit your kids down, talk to them, teach them, discipline them if they do bad things, and make them learn that just because they can, does not mean that they should, tease, taunt, hurt, or make fun of other people... ever.