Bullying is a topic close to my heart. Bullying another word for teasing. This word if it crosses limits can create havoc in a person’s life. Bullying someone can give you the enjoyment but it just messes up with the life of the victim. The scars if not detected due to bullying immediately that will remain for a lifetime. To make matters worse society says it’s normal and learn to ignore. It’s easy to tell but difficult to do it.
Bullying: Been a victim to it
Who better knows than me the feeling of being bullied. It’s the most disgusting feeling. I have experienced it. I was in 8th grade. As a student, I would fall ill due to the sinus. Due to that, I had to skip school. But a person who I thought was my friend became the leader in bullying me. She was my best friend from nursery to 8th Std. But she ganged up with others and started saying if you be with Pritika you might get sinus too. Sinus is contagious, she started spreading this and made jokes about me. To calling me names as the sick girl and laughing. Once during the lunch break, I was bullied for 30 minutes and that 30 minutes I would never forget all my life. I ran towards my school chapel and started crying. That time in 8th grade I made a new friend. She was my guardian angel. She heard everything I told her and complained to the class teacher about those girls who bullied me. My friend told my mother the incident which happened to me in school. My mother took the matter to the principal and the principal made those girls apologize to me. Those girls apologized but after that, I stopped talking to that best friend. My new friend of 8th std motivated me to come out of being scared and also shouted at me for not speaking up. She told me if she wasn’t there just imagine Pritika what would have happened to you? But there was emergent of new Pritika who didn’t trust people easily.
Bullying: People say “Ignore It.”
Bullying is not uncommon but due to societies ignorance towards it, the matter very rarely comes in the forefront. I have seen parents telling their kids to ignore it and everyone goes through it. But my question is, why we should ignore bullying? How do you know that everyone goes through it? People don’t know that by ignoring bullying, you are encouraging this thing. Everyone is not strong to face this issue. We need to stop this nonsense. This ignorance of society has led to suicides by the victims to even accused going to the length of killing the victim. There are so many movies to spread this awareness of bullying. But we only watch and don’t learn from it. Ignoring this matter is not the solution. Voice your opinion stop this in the initial stages and save innocent lives to get ruined.
School counsellor: Need to help
As a counsellor, I make it a point to stop bullying in the initial stages. I don’t want any kid to suffer from this. A student mentioned to me some years back that a girl keeps teasing her and this has started distracting her from her studies. I asked her, what does she do to answer the person back. She told me nothing. I told her if she is saying things to you then go up to her and on her face politely say yes, your saying is so right. I need to learn from you so much. I always mention if a bully is bullying you then it’s not your fault. But the bully is feeling inferior and is doing this to show superiority. The bully feels weak when they are confronted. The student did this and that bully felt guilty and apologized.
Tips to stop bullying:
Use it
- Don’t run away from situations
- Take support from your counsellor, parents, teachers, principal etc
- Confront the bully as when confronted they feel insecure
- Don’t show your weakness to the bully
- Don’t react negatively but give a positive reaction
- Try to find out the underlying problems of the bully
- Remember the bully knows that your far off better person than he or she is
Use these tips and always keep a person informed you can trust on and don’t let anyone demotivate you at any cost. Always know that you are the best and face situations head-on.
