Dexter Iowa Community Site

Consider this quote from Abe Lincoln

"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."

Sometimes not all the memories of childhood are good ones. As a poor farm kid growing up, we didn’t have fancy clothes or super new back packs or even sometimes a proper hair cut, but we weren’t really that different than anyone else.

I remember so enjoying going to school and to be given the opportunity to learn. I was excited to see that yellow bus pull into our driveway every morning, yet as I started my walk to the bus, my stomach would begin to hurt and I actually dreaded that period from the time I left the safety of my house until I reached the door of my classroom.

It wasn’t because I didn’t like riding on the bus, in fact I loved the bus ride, but it was because as a young chubby kid I was bullied. The older kids would taunt us and tease us and sometimes take things we had brought to share or even steal our hats. I hated them for that, for making me feel like less of an individual. There were some older boys who were especially cruel and would call us names.

As I got a little older I saw it more, the kids who weren’t the best students, whose home life wasn’t great, and even just someone who thought different, were picked on and stuffed in lockers and bullied. Even girls weren’t immune from being the bully or the victim, and in fact I dare say that girls can almost be more hurtful with their comments than boys could be.

In my life I’ve only ever been in two physical fights with anyone outside of my brothers. The one I most remember was a member of my own class. I must have been in 4^th or 5^th grade and he picked on me constantly. Calling me names, pushing me down, tripping me in the hallways. I did my best to turn the other cheek and ignore the treatment that he dished out on a daily basis. I don’t remember how it started but I know that it involved a girl in my class and him not being very nice with his comments during recess. I had enough and told him so. He pushed me to the ground and before I even thought about what was happening I was on top of him punching him in the face.

He wasn’t a bad kid, and I felt bad after the fight. I don’t know what made me snap that day, but after that day, having someone stand up to him, he no longer bullied anyone and in fact became one of my closest friends in school.

I deplore bullies of all kinds, and thought as I would get older that there would come a time when I wouldn’t find it. I was wrong. As an adult I have seen the bullying continue. I see it in relationships of all kinds. A girlfriend, who uses her narcissistic view of herself to twist your every action so she can have her way. A husband who bullies his wife into loosing her own sense of value. Bosses who bully employees to be more productive or to attempt to command respect when none is really warranted.

Why do we allow this to continue, and why can we as a society not stand up to the bullies? Is it our fear of not being accepted? Of loosing a job? Of not knowing if we stand up if anyone will be there to support us? We allow it to continue and allow the bullying to grow.

It doesn’t need to occur at any age, and unfortunately it remains something that can scar lives for years. We also can make sure that we never procreate a bully mentality in ourselves. We need to make sure that we deal with people fairly and understand that we are all different. We may not ever be able to have it go away completely, but we can stand together to demand it stops.

See you next week…Remember, we’re all in this together.