Bullying

The story about the young woman who suffered torment from her peers after having surgery to remove a brain tumor was heart breaking. How sad in an advanced society we still have children bullying others. Where was the school staff when this was going on, the parents of the mean kids? An observant adult witnessing or suspecting this mean behavior should have or could have intervened to prevent the ongoing bullying that evidently went on for years. That is totally unacceptable. I hope parents and school staff learned a big lesson; how this preventable behavior ruined this poor young lady's childhood. Perhaps these bullies are being teased/tormented by siblings even parents so it is a pattern they have learned at an early age. Sometimes parents don't realize how cruel their words can be to their children and the root of bullying begins. Or, they turn a blind eye to siblings who torment each other thinking they need to figure it out for themselves. But, this is a time to take these situations as a learning experience and teach their children right from wrong. They should teach their children how to be sensitive to others especially those with handicaps, illnesses or disfigurements. They should teach their children to take the extra step to make these children who are different to feel welcome; to help them fit in. When the bullies get of school age their unwelcoming behaviors ends up in our schools with a vengeance. Many times I have been on play grounds where students are bullying others under the watchful eye of a teacher and nothing is done to stop this horrible behavior. Other times I have walked by high schools where coaches are bullying their players sometimes using vulgar language. Even though this isn't the norm for most school staff there are some who ignore bullying or behave like a bully. Instead, they need to diffuse the situation or use these incidents as a time to stop bullying and inflict consequences on those who need it. School staff would benefit from classes on how to spot bullying, where it is happening on their premises( during school lunch and in bathrooms) stop it, and inflict the appropriate punishment. School staff need better training on how to prevent bullying at their schools. With social media and other ways to bully others we as a society need to do more about teaching our children not to bully. Examine our own behavior to be absolutely sure we are not bullying especially our children. There should be classes starting in kindergarten about how not to bully, report bullying to parents and teachers anonymously ,etc so children understand this type of behavior will not be tolerated at any age. And, that they have a safe place to report it so they themselves don't start getting tormented by these bully children. Most the time when we hear of young students shooting others bullying is part or all of the motive behind the violence. We are the adults and we are failing our children. We need to do more to teach our children, be very observant, react accordingly and enforce that bullying on any level is not tolerated at home or in schools or there will be serious consequences (no excuses by adults).