In the U.S. on a regular school day, three of ten children are involved in bullying incident. Either as the ones causing it, witnessing it, or actually being the victim of the bully (Greenya, 1). In our western culture, perfection and being unaccepted for being imperfect is becoming more and more pervasive. From as young as grade school kids are worried about being socially accepted. The trend is becoming: be the bully, or you will be the one bullied. From children to adults bullying seems to be a "desperate [way] for some people to maintain a circle of human contacts (Marano, 3)." Although children are the ones seen as being rude and mean to their peers, this same attitude is found in adults although it may be portrayed on a different form. Whether it's because of someone's weight, their sexual orentation, a disability, or that one is social unacceptable, kids are being judged and bullied at higher numbers than ever before (Greenya, 5 and 20).There is no standard age or definition of a bully, but it seems to be a pattern of intentional destructive behavior toward one or more person (Marano, 3). The U.S. seems to have the most violence and occurrence of bullying and its intensity is growing and more kids are becoming depressed and are enduring the serious psychological effects of being bullied.
Westernized culture seems to be at the core of the cause of bullying. It is the type of culture that seems to be: a race to who is the best, and who will dominate who. Everyone is racing for power and bullies seem to have that power over their victims. In addition, not only do bullies get the power, but they never seem to have their victim retaliate against them. Therefore their confidence level and social status is at a high in how ...
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... and how it effects people in the short and long run. A kids social acceptance and reputation all fall into why bullying is one of the biggest problems adolescence are facing today. These days schools focus too much on programs like the No Child Left Behind Act when programs that teach kids about behavior and social concerns are left out. Some schools have found anti-bullying programs to deal with such behavior, but for every school to get involved the government needs to help. Another way to prevent bullying is that children should be raised with nurturing care, so as not to cause them social conflict as they grow older. Also children need to also be taught to be assertive and confront their problems so that it doesn't effect them. Our young children today are becoming victimized by each other and it is becoming accepted when really the situation needs to change
Experts say that bullying begins around middle school, where children are changing to young adults. In bullying there are three people involved the bully, the victim, and the bystander. The bystander also holds responsibility when bullying occurs, because they are present but never take part because they fear the intimidator. Often targets are considered to be “different” from others, and that consists of students having specials needs, being gay, bisexual, overweight, or most importantly students who are viewed as easy prey. When bullying is attempted it can ruin a student physically and emotionally influencing the capability of a pupil to learn. It is recorded that in the United States 160,000 teenagers skip school in order to avoid bullying, and one out of ten teens quits school because of continuous tormenting. In 2014 statistics in the U.S. showed that only 20-30 percent of students who are bullied tell an adult or the authorities. The only way bullying can be prevented is when schools make a great effort to create no tolerance programs, and effective rules. That will result...
Bullying has become a major problem facing the United States today. The American Psychological Association reports that roughly 40% to 80% of children are involved in bullying on some level during their time in school. (APA, 2014) The magnitude of the problem can be observed in the statistics. In the United States, a total of 4,080,879 children between the ages of five and 18 have been the victims of bullying compared to 3,892,199 who have reported that they have engaged in bullying someone else. Additionally, 851,755 said that they have been both the victim and the bully. That's a whopping 8,824,833 people in the United States that have been involved in bullying behavior on one level or another. (High, B., 2000 Census)
Over the last decade, bullying has really been a worldwide issue. Bullying is affecting children all over the world and has grown into a huge epidemic. According to the National Education Association, “160,000 kids stay home from school each day to ...
In the article, “The Myths of Bullying” by John Cloud, bullying is described as an exaggerated epidemic. Cloud presents details of high-profile cases including; the school shooting at Chardon High School and a suicide at Rutgers University. The aforementioned school tragedies suggest that the widespread international attention that these cases have obtained have “cemented in public opinion” (Cloud, 2012) the idea that bullying has taken on a persistent upward trend in the United States. Furthermore, he attests that the drastic measures immediately implemented to prevent bullying in school districts have also contributed to the overwhelming fear among parents and students alike, that bullying is an absolute growing epidemic.
With so many cases in the media these days of children who have taken their own lives due to varying levels of bullying an alarming new term has been coined to define this phenomenon, bullycide (Bullycide, 2013). It is more important than ever to develop a deep understanding bullying in an effort to put an end to this epidemic that is taking over in our schools in America. Before we can really dive into the problem of bullying and discuss the different aspects of bullying such as what makes a child become a bully and how to relate to them, the signs of bullying, or the characteristics of a bully as well as their victims’ characteristics, as well as what we as educators can do to curb the problem, we must first fully understand the definition of bullying.
Bullying is something that is present in all stages of life. Whether it is pulling someone’s hair, beating someone up, cyberbullying, slander, workplace harassment, or domestic abuse, it is bullying. Bullying occurs in schools, workplaces, in homes, on playgrounds, in the military, and in nursing homes. The documentary Bully sheds light on the bullying that occurs in schools across America. Bully takes us inside the lives of two families who lost their child due to suicide from bullying and profiles three kids who are still toughing it out. There are many factors that feed into the production of creating bullies, but the underlying cause beneath all these factors is the yearning for uniformity.
Once known for “boys being boys” bullying has evolved into something much more sophisticated and complex. Since the beginning of time, humans are instilled with survival instincts to outperform others and overcome obstacles. These survival instincts, along with a cutthroat society, have remained the same even though the human race has evolved at lightening speeds. In America’s highly competitive educational system, children are taught that they must be the best, do the best, and outperform everyone else. “The constant drive to surpass others and surmount obstacles has become an ideology where bullying is unintentionally instilled as a survival tactic from a very young age” (Donegan, 2012, p. 34). Students have adapted various corrupt tactics to keep up with this philosophy, thinking this is the only way to get their needs met. “These tactics can be dangerous because once a student realizes their effectiveness, he or she may construct a life style from them” (Donegan, 2012, p.34). Over the past decade, considerable research has been done on bullying due to national and international tragedies, with findings having a significant impact on bullying, the understanding of its meaning, and the importance of
Bullying and harassment have been long time problems in public schools worldwide. Factors such as race, skin color, physical features, gender, or religion can play a role in the way school children and adolescents are mistreated. Although bullying and harassment has always existed, these two problems have recently worsened. Over 3.2 million students are victims of bullying each year and suicide is the third leading cause of deaths among young people making it a whopping 4,400 deaths per year. This is an alarming number regarding how much the numbers have risen that concern bullying and harassment. When bullying is brought up, people tend to automatically link bullying and American schools. However, it goes much more deeper than that, and the roots of bullying have not only spread out of school districts in the United States, but throughout the world as well. Just as bullying is a worldwide problem, harassment is too. It can range from a kid picking on another kid in the school hall to a grown man criticizing a work member in Australia. Several cases have been reported as well as several stories have been spread throughout the world, and no matter where they came from, these all have one thing in common: the involvement of bullying and harassment.
Bullying has been around for decades and yet it is still a reoccurring problem, and it is only getting worse. The National Center for Educational Statistics, in 2009, said nearly 1 in 3 students between the ages of 12 and 18 reported being bullied in school. Eight years earlier, only 14 percent of that population said they had experienced bullying(Ollove,2014). There are two types of bullying the direct form and indirect form, in the direct form the victim receives physical harm example kicking pushing shoving. In the indirect form the victim receives emotional or mental harm by name-calling, rejection, gossip, threats, or insults(Green,2007). It doesn’t matter which way the victim was bullied it still causes
In a CNN study by Chuck Hadad he states “That bullying is pervasive even though the schools have anti-bullying programs from kindergarten through 12th grade, assemblies throughout the year, and a peer-to-peer program where older students talk to younger students about the dangers of bullying” (Hadad). Robert Faris, a sociologist found that bullies and victims are generally the same person. Whe...
Everyone has been bullied or encountered someone being bullied at some point of their life. Whether it would be physically or verbally both can be exceedingly traumatizing and can have a long-term psychological influence on children’s development. Majority people may define bullying in a more physical term; nevertheless that’s not always the case. The act of bullying can occur in several ways and in reality affect the individual in the same way. Bullying is generally defined as repeated, negative, and harmful actions focused at target throughout a course of time, exhibiting a sense of power difference between the bully and the victim (Olweus, 1993; Limber & Mihalic, 1999 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005). A survey was conducted in the United States estimating that over six million children, about 30% in grade six through ten have experienced frequent bullying in a school environment (Nansel, 2001 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005). Many people might debate that bullying is something that every child goes through and is simply a part of growing up, although there are several damaging consequences that happens to the child’s brain. Bullying causes the child to feel upset, isolated, frightened, anxious, and depressed. They feel like they reason they are being picked on is because there is something wrong with them and may even lose their confidence feel unsafe going to school (Frenette, 2013 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005) Anthropologically, sociologically, or psychologically, bullying can be analyzed through different perspectives and several questions can be asked based on the topic:
Bullying is something that is not something new and is actually something that society continues to face. Over the years, bullying has been looked at as being so ordinary in schools that it is continuously overlooked as an emanate threat to students and has been lowered to a belief that bullying is a part of the developmental stage that most young children will experience then overcome (Allebeck, 2005, p. 129). Not everyone gets over the extreme hurt that can come as an effect from bullying, for both the bully and the victim. Because of this, we now see bullying affecting places such as the workplace, social events and even the home. The issue of bullying is not only experienced in schools, but the school environment is one of the best places
Bullying has always been present within the United States. Although the issue has been around for a long time, it continues to grow and become more of problem. It is said that about 160,000 children within the United States are refusing to go to school because of bullying. Another statistic is that within American schools alone, there are an estimated 2.1 billion bullies and 2.7 billion victims (Dan Olewus, MBNBD). The numbers presented here are outrageous and although there are organizations to stop bullying, obviously there needs to be a new set of solutions. Any type of bullying presents problems to children, “Suicide, depression, anxiety, substance abuse, trouble with the law, poor performance in school and work, and lack of involvement in socially accepted activities are some of the difficulties resulting from bullying (Austin, Reynolds, Barnes, Shirley). Of course, there is more than just a single type of bullying. Feeding ground for bullies can range anywhere from text-message or cyberbullying to physical bullying in schools. Also, bullies can begin to strike at a young age and could also be; teenage, middle-age, or even the elderly. Even though there are these many versions of problematic bullies, the largest bullying problems take place within the school setting: a place that is supposed to be safe for children rather than harmful. Although it seems impossible to completely get rid of bullying, these are a few suggested solutions; making the school informed on bullying issues, schools implementing rules on bullying, and having students positively use electronics to stop bullying.
The article, “Bullies and Their Victims”, by Berk (2010) gives an analysis of how bullies and their victims develop, what makes them persistent and how they and their victims can be assisted. Bullying is an activity that thrives mostly in a school setting because of peers and the various cultures and diversities among them. Interactions are inevitable among children, but bullying is destructive because it aims at peer victimisation. Both boys and girls have the ability to become bullies but the majority of them are boys who use physical and verbal attacks on their victims. In the more recent generations, the means of bullying is amplified in the adolescent stage by using electronic means like cyber bullying. Students will rarely like bullies but if they do, it is because of their leadership abilities or influential personalities. Their peers may join or stand by to watch as the victims are bullied.
Bullying can also be considered as a major problem in the teenager bracket. This can occur in any social environment not just schools as mostly portrayed. Bullyi...