Bullies

[bktheirregular]

I was a target of bullies in school for about six years. To this day, I refuse to have anything to do with any school acquaintance from before eighth grade, when my folks pulled me out of that school and into a different school.

Childish of me? Read about this poor kid. You tell me.

Comments

[gehayi.livejournal.com]

I can remember being so scared to go to school that I had a sick stomach every morning when I woke up. I recall being chased home by twenty-odd boys armed with baseball bats and hockey sticks. I remember having stones thrown at me. I remember having my glasses ripped from my face and ground to dust under boys' shoes. I can remember being grabbed and run headfirst into a tree while the playground monitor turned carefully away so that she wouldn't have see it...or stop it. To this day, the word "retarded" is so painful that I can scarcely stand to type it; that was the word I was taunted with for six years. Recess was dangerous; I generally hid in the library, if I could get away with it. It was quiet, and there was at least one adult there.

It wasn't just elementary school, either. Junior high featured a janitor who kept trying to corner me when I went to my locker. High school involved vicious, gossipy, lying girls in one school; after that school was forced to shut down because it wasn't giving big enough kickbacks to the diocese, the next one featured four psychotics who ran the school because their fathers were rich. One was a thief, one a sadist who used the chem lab as his own private torture chamber, and all four were rapists. And they picked on everyone who was small, physically weak or an outsider. I qualified on all three counts.

Adults always gave the same useless advice--ignore the bullies and they will get bored and pick on someone else. Bullies NEVER get bored. If they don't get a reaction, they just get mad and attack harder.

Besides, what kind of situation is it when you have to hope that someone else will get beat up instead of you? Why can't you count on someone to do something about the fucking bullies?

My parents were understanding while I was in grammar school, but not after that. They could not conceive of bullying by girls or by adolescents. To them, bullying had a cut-off date. Once you hit seventh grade, you didn't have to worry about bullies any more.

None of my bruises, black eyes, stolen property, or bookbags flung into toilets convinced them otherwise. Despite the fact that it kept happening, my parents persuaded themselves that I was clumsy (which I was and am, but not on that scale), argumentative to an "unfeminine" degree, careless and lazy regarding personal property and "provoking" other students. Somehow, it was always my fault. "They don't mean any harm," was my parents' mantra. I knew damned well that the bullies did mean harm. A lot of harm.

From first grade through twelfth, I lived in fear that the bullies would either kill me or injure me so badly that I'd be no more than a mental vegetable.

I will never give money to any school I attended, go to a school reunion or speak to anyone whom I went to school with. I survived twelve years of what might be called a children's war...but that doesn't mean that I'd ever want to re-visit the battlefield.

[mermaidrain.livejournal.com]

That is just fucking ridiculous! And frankly, screw the school officials in this scenario, what about the parents?! If they're so concerned about their kid's safety, WHY NOT move him to another school district or even home school him? There's no reason to keep subjecting your kid to something like that if it appears that no one is going to do anything about it.

I think the problem here is that there isn't one repeat offender. Good grief! HOW can those school officials ignore this situation in this day and age of school shootings?! We've seen how this kind of crap ends up!

GRRR!! That just makes my blood boil on so many levels I can't think straight right now. I'm going to stop cursing in your LJ now. *sees red*