August 26, 2011

>Bullying Shouldn’t Be ‘A Part of Growing Up’

>Student Ambassador Brandon S. is a sophomore from Los Angeles and is making it his mission this year to put an end to the notion that bullying is just an acceptable stage in adolescence.

This year I will begin my work as a GLSEN Student Ambassador and a proponent of a simple message, ‘safe schools for all.’

I’m from Los Angeles, California, a city known as a progressive Mecca to say the least, but even here I have faced constant bullying and harassment at the hands of my fellow pupils as well as, unfortunately, some teachers. Throughout my elementary years I learned to fear the environment at my school and would try to miss it as much as I could. Eventually it grew to the point where I would skip school at least once a week. This, inevitably, led to my grades dropping. I even lagged behind the classmates who tormented me, it was miserable. The worst part about it was that I thought that the administration couldn’t do anything about the situation, that I was on my own, completely. The truth was that they most likely didn’t know what to do about a student being called a ‘fag’, or ‘gay’ or ‘girl’ so much that it would bring him to the point of tears almost daily. Either way, I felt helpless. If the teachers weren’t going to protect me, who was?

I spent my elementary and junior high school years hating every day of having to put up with the teasing and harassment. I even began to believe that I deserved every bit of it, every shove, every punch in the stomach, every exclusion from anything that I was deemed to “feminine” to partake in, such as drinking from the “boys” water fountain, or playing kickball. I was not worthy of respect by anyone. I survived that ordeal, but barely. I attempted to take my own life on more than one occasion, but, luckily, every attempt failed. What really stuck with me was the administrations apathy. I felt that they believed that bullying was something “everybody had to go through” during school, like the flu.

Well, I beg to differ. This year, thanks to GLSEN, I can and will tell people that bullying is not and never was a natural part of childhood. That people aren’t born hating people that are different. Being bullied is certainly not a natural part of childhood. Everyone, no matter the age, should be protected from all forms of harassment and bullying.

   

About Elizabeth Free

       

Elizabeth Free is the communications manager at GLSEN--the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network. Elizabeth joined GLSEN in 2009 to make schools safer for all students and says one of the best parts of her job is working with GLSEN's Student Ambassadors. She is originally from Texas and has a B.A. in Public Relations and Advertising from the University of Houston.