[Damn] 11 year old boy bullied over cartoon attempts suicide and faces lifelong brain damage

I think he's saying that you should be a realist about people and the world around you and act accordingly. I agree with that.

But at 11 its asking a bit much.

 

The bullying i saw in school was like stabbings, group beatdowns, just straight out violence. So its hard for me to equate name calling or teasing to "bullying". Its not resentment, i just think we jump on that word too much.

 

They can be proud of and stand up for what they are. But that's not going to stop society from bullying them. For their own sake, be normal or at least try to be normal. I'm not saying that's ideal, but within the confines of reality bullying is not stopping any time soon.

 

The parents aren't filing a lawsuit. Did you get that from the last sentence of the OP's post? The situation is going in a completely different direction, even.

Not that I'm inferring I know more about the family/situation more than you do, but how do you know the parents didn't screen the cartoon before letting the kid watch it? Kids can only watch cartoons now, if the parents talk to them afterwards about it?

Also, what exactly are the parents supposed to teach the child? "It's okay to watch the cartoon? Don't worry about the bullying, it'll end?" I'm assuming that the parents taught the kid to never use violence. So the kid thought about the only way out.

Going to the principal / teachers / authority figures is like putting a small band-aid on a cut that require immediate medical attention. The bully / bullies will get immediately punished, but once they find out who told the authority figures, they'll harass you even more. And it'll probably be even worse the second time around.

 

This is strange thinking. In college or the work environment, you can largely be yourself and not face the same degree of scrutiny as you would in junior high school or high school. True you may not be popular or receive a promotion as much, but it probably won't drive you to severe depression. Watch the movie Disconnect (2013) if you can as adeelsiddiqui suggested.

This attitude is similar to a former partner I worked for. He thought that if you were gay, you kept that stuff to yourself or the bullying was inevitable. He also thought that if women dressed a certain way, them getting raped was bound to happen. He grew up in the 40s though. However, you are younger than 25 years. Did you go to schools where bullying happened?

 

Pretty much this.

It's only my opinion, but I think the first time you can truly be yourself is in college. Almost everything is socially acceptable, in a college environment, just because there is at least one person on that campus that is like you, no matter how different you are from what society labels "normal."

From being 18 and still playing the Pokemon TCG to being 18 and gay, I think the place where you'll receive the less bullying, is college. Or at least until you're out of high school.

 

I was bullied myself. On par for being Asian. And it wasn't verbal abuse either.
I didn't think of killing myself. I hit the gym and fought back. I got my share of bruises and then everyone grew up and the bullying stopped. I wasn't even in the hood or anything, just a typical suburban elementary/jr. high/high school.

No, my line of thinking isn't the same as gay people should hide their sexuality and women should dress more to prevent temptation. And my advice is for the YOUTH. Usually grown adults aren't as judgmental of other as kids are. Once you hit college all that **** goes away.

 

Wow, that is harrowing. I see where you're coming from. If it means anything, some people in Pakistan find it hard to sympathize with being homeless or living in the lower socioeconomic groups in America i.e. being African American in the Fifth Ward. They deal with beheadings, bombs tearing through markets/schools, acid attacks, hjackings, gang rapes, etc. People in Somalia and CAF don't empathize with Pakistanis because they deal with some of the above plus starvation and more.

Wherever you look in the world, there is a totem pole of misery and suffering. Getting into a pissing match about whose pain is more real is missing the big picture. In developed nations like ours, we have a higher standard:

Bullying is wrong whether it's the white teenager picked on for his music taste at an affluent HS, the black teenager in a dropout factory for the way he dresses, or any child regardless of their background. Trying to conform to the masses inhibits the creative and individual kids.

 

I guess you have never been to Dallas?

 

That's the problem. Parents, teachers and other authority figures teach us violence is not the answer. And if you do throw a punch, you'd get punished just as much as the bullies would be.

To be honest, I'd rather be kicked and punched than be called names, or have my mom be insulted or otherwise insulted, verbally. For one, there's proof (immediate action can be dealt) and two, physical bruises heal. Verbal insults hurt me, personally, more than physical beatings.

The phrase "sticks and stones...but words cannot hurt me" should be revised or deleted, because it's simply not true anymore.

 

This is one of the reasons why our public education system is in dire standing. I kept hearing Americans go on and on about how college was liberating. There are high schools in America, France, the UK, and the UAE where the environment was just as intellectually liberating as UT-Austin (just my personal experience). They just had different standards for what secondary education should be like. It's going to take a monumental effort to change our thinking and a long time, but American high schools need not be the conformist, bullying hell holes they seem to be for so many people. A safe, quality education atmosphere should begin in pre-K and stay that way for all Americans instead of beginning at college.

 

The problem is, the culture is different in those countries. And as for the high schools in America, you might be talking about either private high schools (where people actually care being in, and staying in, school) or high schools where there is a lot of diversity, and not just 75-90% of an ethnicity, and the rest are "outcasts," essentially. For the former, I'm not saying bullies and the notion of caring about staying in school positively correlate, but it might be a factor. The latter = strength in numbers.

And since you ARE in pre-K through high school, there's not a lot you can do about it, short of asking your parents for a transfer to a different school in the same district. Parents might not be able to afford sending a child to a better school, nor be able to move to a different district with better schools on account of work.

And if you DO somehow manage to change schools in the same district, the situation might not be different. The demographic won't change drastically from school to school in the same district, unless it's a large ISD.

As for the culture thing...I'm pretty sure other countries don't have (or have as many) garbage reality TV or cartoons that have a random adult following like "My Little Pony."

tl;dr? There's a lot that sucks about American media, and most of the time, it's near impossible for a kid to change their situation drastically.

 

I dont see the problem with keeping your sexual preferences to yourself. dont know about you but i dont sit around with my friends discussing what i like to do in the bathroom, and definetely wouldnt share that with strangers

 

Damnit, thats BEDROOM not bathroom

 

This is one extreme .. . .. the other is Columbine.

People need to teacher their kids about bullying
for the safety of ALL CHILDREN . . including the bully

Rocket River

 

i guess it's hard for pre-teens/teens to talk to their parents when they're going thru stuff like that.. the anger/sadness just harbors until they can't take it anymore... being a parent myself i can only try to prepare my kids by talking to them and let them know they have people they can go to in case they need to talk/vent.. sometimes just talking to someone can prevent something like this from happening... kids don't know that they have a whole life ahead of them, their world right now is their only world and everything is over the top when it goes bad.. but really it's just a miniscule in the whole scheme of their entire life... time heals all wounds and later in life they wouldn't even remember half of the bullying that was done to them... this kid lost out on living life, time with family/friends and being a dad/grandad.. his kids could have done great things.