Gets teased in school and instead of crying, actually does something about it - wow!

[indes]

Originally Posted by FlamesFanStrandedInEDM

Bullying is a huge problem in schools. This mentality of "Boys will be boys" or "It will make them stronger in the long run" is garbage.

Being bullied has a huge impact on how successful that student will be in school, and in turn...life. I've seen students change for the worse emotionally and academically in a matter of weeks as a result of bullying.

Bullying is the number one cause for kids chronically missing school. It should not be taken lightly.

But if you are a strong believer in survival of the fittest....Bullying can be looked at as weeding out the weak and leaving success only to the strong.

While I see how you could make that point I find it pretty concerning how parenting nowadays is almost entirely based upon having your child face the least amount of adversity.

I guarantee the kid who was bullied and succeeded through that adversity will do better in adult life than the kid who was home schooled and ran to mommy every time someone said something mean to him.

The whole bullying thing is way overblown. People have been doing it since the beginning of time. (doesn't make it right) But in all seriousness we are breeding an entire generation of pussies.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Yeah we're going to disagree.

I've worked with depressed people in both family settings and friend settings and I'm firmly of the opinion that when it comes to dealing with the situation and taking responsibilities in terms of suicide they aren't rational, they won't ask for help and they'll suffer in silence and let it overwhelm them.

In terms of emotions its a tornado in there and the rational thinking that you and I enjoy just isn't applicable.

There are millions upon millions of undiagnosed depressives out there because they are almost incapable of asking for help.

but that thought of "They would be better off without me" or "My life is ruined anyways" or "Everyone hates me, I'm useless" Are as powerful as a scream in a canyon.

We can't apply rational rules to an irrational condition.

Just my two cents.

If you start trying people for murder, all 10 of them, as you want for people commiting suicide then what?

Dude gets fired from his job for something he didn't do, but the boss thought he did. It is covered up by the guy that did do it. Buddy leaves, and blows his brains out because he is now financially ruined. It comes out he wasn't in the wrong, and was wrongfully dismissed. Murder charges against both I assume?

Woman leaves her clingy husband who has attachment issues. He cannot go on without her in his mind, and tells her such. She is scared and leaves, and he hangs himself. First or second degree?

Man picks up a stranger in a bar and they go home. He drops his pants only to reveal he has a tiny baby sized unit. She laughs at him and leaves. In a drunken state he decides to blow his head off. Manslaughter?

You start charging people for murder in these cases for someone committing suicide you open the can of worms above. I am not saying there isn't responsibility, but murder charges are a far reach.

Where I do have an issue, is when someone has disclosed to a mental health professional they are having these thoughts, they do nothing to help, and the depressed individual do exactly what they said... that's entirely different. However, I still do not think it is a murder charge they are responsible for.

[Devils'Advocate]

Originally Posted by Alberta_Beef

I was bullied endlessly.

And I am tired of it being treated like a national crisis. They have turned kids into pussies by not allowing them to defend themselves if they wanted to.

Also parents should try being parents, part of their job is to teach their kids how to cope with being bullied because it doesn't quit with school, there is a reason so many younger people quit jobs at the drop of a dime because their boss is mean.

Okay, when I was in high school I was a bit of a loner and the jocks decided that I'd make a perfect target for their bullying. Are you saying that it was my fault that I didn't beat these 8 guys up?

Are you suggesting that Rethaeh Parson's parents are to blame for their daughter's death since they didn't teach her to "suck it up" and "deal"?

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by pylon

If you start trying people for murder, all 10 of them, as you want for people commiting suicide then what?

Dude gets fired from his job for something he didn't do, but the boss thought he did. It is covered up by the guy that did do it. Buddy leaves, and blows his brains out because he is now financially ruined. It comes out he wasn't in the wrong, and was wrongfully dismissed. Murder charges against both I assume?

Did the boss phone everyone else and slam the person and have them call him every night to call him a criminal and worthless and a thief?

Originally Posted by pylon

Woman leaves her clingy husband who has attachment issues. He cannot go on without her in his mind, and tells her such. She is scared and leaves, and he hangs himself. First or second degree?

How is that even close to the same thing as a cyber bullying campaign?

Originally Posted by pylon

Man picks up a stranger in a bar and they go home. He drops his pants only to reveal he has a tiny baby sized unit. She laughs at him and leaves. In a drunken state he decides to blow his head off. Manslaughter?

did she post his picture on the internet, encourage her friends to spread the picture of his tiny package. Create a movement where a bunch of people are facebooking him and texting him. Plus did she rape him and then fire out the photos

Originally Posted by pylon

You start charging people for murder in these cases for someone committing suicide you open the can of worms above. I am not saying there isn't responsibility, but murder charges are a far reach.

In the case of this recent suicide, and the one in california and the one a couple of years ago they're different and frankly you know deep down you know it. The girl was violated physically and then she was violated mentally by a bunch of people that pushed her and pushed her hard with the intention of causing harm to her.

Originally Posted by pylon

Where I do have an issue, is when someone has disclosed to a mental health professional they are having these thoughts, they do nothing to help, and the depressed individual do exactly what they said... that's entirely different. However, I still do not think it is a murder charge they are responsible for.

I think in the case of cyberbullying causing death its at the very least manslaughter which is action or inaction causing death unintentionally.

I don't think your scenarios are even close to the same thing as what these people did.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Did the boss phone everyone else and slam the person and have them call him every night to call him a criminal and worthless and a thief?



How is that even close to the same thing as a cyber bullying campaign?



did she post his picture on the internet, encourage her friends to spread the picture of his tiny package. Create a movement where a bunch of people are facebooking him and texting him. Plus did she rape him and then fire out the photos



In the case of this recent suicide, and the one in california and the one a couple of years ago they're different and frankly you know deep down you know it. The girl was violated physically and then she was violated mentally by a bunch of people that pushed her and pushed her hard with the intention of causing harm to her.



I think in the case of cyberbullying causing death its at the very least manslaughter which is action or inaction causing death unintentionally.

I don't think your scenarios are even close to the same thing as what these people did.

The point I am making CC, is it takes the responsibility off the induvidual, and opens up an entirely new set of circumstances, and legalities regarding suicide. What you are saying is, you can be responsible, for the actions of another, even if your intent wasn't for them to kill themselves....I have an issue with that.

Correct me if I am wrong. No where, did this girl tell her tormentors she would kill herself if this continued. Sure there were being mean a-hole kids, but I guarantee you, even the meanest kids would stop, if they knew this would be the end result.

You would have to prove the intent for her was to kill herself, for the charges to stick.

I am not disagreeing with you these kids are sick a-holes. I was bullied by a lot of kids growing up myself, and I know how it feels. The kids here that need to be prosecuted, are the kids that raped the girl. And they need to be prosecuted to the maximum as adults.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by 1stLand

Bullying is a part of life.
It doesnt stop after school.

Bosses Bully Their Employees
Women/Men Bully their spouse or partner or bf/gf
The Government Bullies Taxpayers
Lawyers & Litigators Bully Defendants on behalf of their Clients
Neighbours Bully Neighbours.

Fact is, we cant eliminate bullying in our schools because its Human nature to bully one another.
Also, we need to prepare kids for more legal forms of bullying once they reach adulthood.

There is no principal you can go to if you are bullied in adulthood.
Only cops and lawyers, but in most cases they will just laugh at you

At least you don't sound totally stupid when you say that.

[Devils'Advocate]

Originally Posted by pylon

You would have to prove the intent for her was to kill herself, for the charges to stick.

Only for murder. But not for manslaughter.

[Devils'Advocate]

Originally Posted by 1stLand

Fact is, we cant eliminate bullying in our schools because its Human nature to bully one another. Also, we need to prepare kids for more legal forms of bullying once they reach adulthood.

1) That's a very sad, sad statement about human nature. I don't remember bullying anyone.... am I not human?
2) Again, are you blaming Rehtaeh's parents for her death for not preparing her for the bullying she received?

[pylon]

I just started reading around the web and found this, which does make a lot of sense, and she raises a good point. Should the bullies, that torment a kid into a mass shooting, be punished for those murders too? And I think it is a fair statement. In one case the tormented kid kills himself, in the other, he blows away a bunch of other kids and even the ones that bullied him. But in those cases, the Bullies are always hailed as victims, and the shooter is evil. But the same bullying mechanism and circumstances were in place to drive them to that point:

No. Suicide is, by definition, an act that someone intentionally commits upon themselves. Suicide is a choice. They killed themselves; no one else killed them regardless of what drove them to that point. If the bullied kid had decided to kill someone else to take out their frustration instead of killing themselves, would you still want to charge the bullies or would you charge the kid who did the actual killing? It's the same thing; the only difference is that their victim happens to be themselves and not someone else. That's not to say that the bullies shouldn't be punished. They should be punished and made to realize that their actions have consequences. Murder just isn't the right charge, though. The problem is that bullying should be stopped long before it gets to such a point, but no one seems to care until it's too late.

[CaptainCrunch]

No. Suicide is, by definition, an act that someone intentionally commits upon themselves. Suicide is a choice. They killed themselves; no one else killed them regardless of what drove them to that point

I agree with most stuff in your post except for this. This is a typical cookie cutter response from someone who has never been in that place where a person is contemplating killing themselves, or talked to someone after a suicide attempt.

By the time that the person reaches that point where they pick up a knife or gun or pills or whatever they feel that they don't have a choice. Its especially amplified when a person has a mental illness like depression where they feel like there is no path but to end the intense pain and torment that they are feeling.

I'll tell you a personal story. Back when I was about 10 a immediate family member went through a very rough time, I won't go into super detail because I don't want to and don't feel that its appropriate.

She suffered pretty much in silence, she didn't show symptoms in the light of day. She didn't complain or moan, she didn't sit around and cry, then one day one event drove her to the point where she took a whole lot of pills and we came home and found her sprawled out on the kitchen floor.

Of course an ambulance was called and she was sent to the hospital, and the bloody awful thing about it was that first visit when she was lying in a hospital bed all tubed up with her arms in restraints.

Then we spent those dark days after in the hospital waiting room staring at each other in our little nuclear family and we all said the same thing. If she would have asked for help, and we never saw this coming, and she seemed ok, one little incident shouldn't have done this.

Now remember this was in the tough guy 70's as well. But we as kids were forced to go and sit down with a trauma Councillor who would also be working with her and they tried to dig up nformation from us to help her and also to make sure that in terms of mental states that we were ok.

Now kids are incredibly resilient, but I made the decision to never talk to her about it, and never bring it up again, bury it and let it go.

She came home and we tried to pretend that it didn't happen.

So here's the crutch.

After I hit adulthood I finished with the military and school and floated around directionless, and I eventually began to look at my career and my personal relationships and my views of them began to skew. I began to really hate myself for no good reason, I didn't think I was good as a person, I would get angry, I started to drink more and more. But I was always seen as that good guy to hang out with. I was smart and engaging in conversations and fairly outgoing, but I really had to work with it. Then little things and comments began to upset me and anger me a lot, I slowly began to withdraw from my friends and make up excuses not to hang out with my family. I would go to work and even when things were going well I would almost find little ways to ruin my successes internally. I began to mistrust people and except for work became fairly reclusive (I am still that way to this day in a lot of ways).

Then the wave hit where everything, every emotion and every dark thought hit me like a wave. I was good at putting a happy outside face on. But the thoughts that I had were incredibly dark. I'm not talking about hurting others. I'm talking about hurting myself either to gain sympathy or a break, or just to end things

Then one day that family member that I talked about from the start pulled me aside at a family function, pulled me into a different view and started the conversation with "I think your in trouble, your fooling a lot of other people, but your not fooling me and your not fooling yourself". She made me get help no matter how much I resisted and just wanted to be left alone and I could deal with it myself.

You can't deal with it myself. I was lucky, someone saw those real signs that sometimes aren't apparent.

Talk to any mental health professional, any suicide survivor, they will say the same thing. to the person, suicide is not a choice, its a end point, to some a relief to some an escape, but they don't debate it when they get to that point.

Let me tell you something else, as I've grown older I've grown really jaded especially around people who pick on the vulnerable and know that they're doing it. Picking on a girl that's been assaulted or raped especially from behind a computer keyboard is repulsive, and I'm onside with Harper when he says its a criminal activity. They drove a 17 year old girl into a depth that they will never experience and then kept pushing until she killed herself because she felt that stigma would never ever go away. So is it murder? On reflection, no, is it manslaughter? Yeah I could see that their actions caused her death.

I think that we need to understand that the scumbags that assaulted her and spread pictures were the catalyst. The people behind their face book and email accounts sure as sh%t killed this girl. And her parents in their wildest dreams probably never contemplated how far down this poor girls despair and pain went because like other victims of depression she put on a brave face, and smiled and wiped her tears away every morning and said "I'm ok" or "I'm better then yesterday".

Anyways sorry for getting personal here. I don't think that you can convince me that her act was a choice and that the bullies on line didn't cause her death.

My story is certainly different then hers, but her story hits hard because while everyone can claim to be down at some point or depressed, I don't think we as the untouched truly understand how deep that well goes.

[Traditional_Ale]

Very well said, CC. Thanks for sharing.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by pylon

The amount of bullying is no different nowadays, the only difference is the medium has changed. The amount of kids killing them selves because of bullying hasn't changed, the fact that the bullying is done with a public record in social media, is telling us why these kids are killing them selves.

The difference is you can't leave it at school like I could when I was growing up. I didn't have to deal with the endless threats, taunts, pictures etc against me posted on the internet and through social media. Once i left the school grounds it was over.

The one huge issue I have with this phenomena, is how people are blaming bullies for the suicides of their victims. No matter how rough you have it, no matter how mean people are being to you, taking your life, is an unreasonable solution to a temporary problem.

Suicide is not a rational act or thought process.

The blame is justified as it pushes the victims to a place where they saw no nope or solution to the problem.

The only person to blame for a suicide is the is the person that murdered themselves, and permanently ruined the lives of their loved ones, who have to carry on, and subsequently blame themselves for thinking they could have done more. The person close to me who did just this, got their way out, and peace, but a year later, I still hate my life. All that person did was pass off their pain to me, and make my depression issues worse than they were. But you know what, I will suffer through it, make the most of what I have, and not take the easy way out and hurt the few people in my life the actually care.

With all due respect you can't blame someone for an irrational act. They didn't choose to hurt you or your family. Their mind wasn't thinking about the hurt they would cause or how it is cheating life. If you were to ask a suicide surviour they would tell you the same. Press even further they would tell you how horrified they are that it got to that point. Rational minded people don't wan to die anytime soon

Somehow you need to make peace with what has happen. I'm not saying it will be easy but you need to talk to someone about it. Clearly it's eating you up inside and that's not good for your own emotional health and well being. You life should be full of happiness and not depression

[missdpuck]

As you know all we have to do is look to nature to see that it's "normal" to pick on/kill the weak. We can't kill each other legally of course so we find other ways to make each other miserable . I recently read a great book on the science of victimology, where the people bullied as kids are often bullied as adults, unless they find some dramatic way to overcome it. As a kid I was bullied by my family, but found solace in being a good student. When we moved, I didn't have that support system any more, so life got tough. "Stand up for yourself" is easy to say, but some need to be taught how to do that. I never learned to cope with that and still often wonder if I have some target on my back. My wimpiness has landed me in all kinds of trouble . I am the idiot who would confess to what I didn't do just to get the acccusers off my back. Unfortunately most people still believe the one who has the biggest mouth. What's sad is when people start to accept this as their role in life: predators need prey, so here we are...

One of my favorite authors is Patricia Highsmith ( The Talented Mr. Ripley) as many of her main characters are sociopaths.

The important thing is not to ignore these kids. Most of the time they're not whining little crybabies.

To paraphrase a quote from a book I read recently (I think it was House of Cards which is kind of an expose on psychology, etc)- the main reason people go crazy is not some chemical imbalance-they go crazy because of other people.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

snip.

CC, I respect your opinion, but that it all it is. I think you are forgetting, I have just recently gone through a suicide in my family, and half of what you are preaching to me, is simply that.... your opinion. Unfortunately I wasn't so lucky, and my family member didn't screw it up, and very successfully completed the task. Until you are in the position to have soak up all that pain, regret, anger. Until you have to go to the Airport, and sign for a f'ing corpse at customs (yeah bodies have to clear customs), it is entirely different.

I loved my nephew more than anyone, and if it meant I had to blow my brains out, to save his, I would have done it in a second, he had that much promise, and that much going for him. But, if he was standing in front of me right now, I would smack that bugger right in the mouth for what he did to me, and my parents who raised him. He didn't just murder himself, he murdered my dad by shortening what years of life he has left as he looks to have aged 10 years in the last 12 months. He did the same to my mother, and I will never recover, knowing that I was the last person in my family to talk to him. How do you think his partner who recently broke up with him that caused all this feels? They will NEVER be the same. But I cannot blame him. He did this to himself. He was a rational person, that made an irrational snap decision. He murdered himself, And as much as I love him, I hate him for that act.

Had he asked any of us for help, any of us would have been on the first flight to New York to help him. The ONE person, he told exactly what he was going to do, sent him out of their office, and told him to come see her next Monday. By Saturday, he was gone.

Again I respect your opinion CC, but yours is not the only one, and the answers to this problem are not as simple as you are painting them to be, as much as we all love revenge justice.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Dion

Somehow you need to make peace with what has happen. I'm not saying it will be easy but you need to talk to someone about it. Clearly it's eating you up inside and that's not good for your own emotional health and well being. You life should be full of happiness and not depression

I will never make peace with it. Ever. I just hope to die before all my family members do, as I do not ever want to have no one.

[To Be Quite Honest]

Double Post

[Minnie]

Pylon, I didn't know about your nephew. I'm so sorry for that loss.

[To Be Quite Honest]

Originally Posted by pylon

CC, I respect your opinion, but that it all it is. I think you are forgetting, I have just recently gone through a suicide in my family, and half of what you are preaching to me, is simply that.... your opinion. Unfortunately I wasn't so lucky, and my family member didn't screw it up, and very successfully completed the task. Until you are in the position to have soak up all that pain, regret, anger. Until you have to go to the Airport, and sign for a f'ing corpse at customs (yeah bodies have to clear customs), it is entirely different.

I loved my nephew more than anyone, and if it meant I had to blow my brains out, to save his, I would have done it in a second, he had that much promise, and that much going for him. But, if he was standing in front of me right now, I would smack that bugger right in the mouth for what he did to me, and my parents who raised him. He didn't just murder himself, he murdered my dad by shortening what years of life he has left as he looks to have aged 10 years in the last 12 months. He did the same to my mother, and I will never recover, knowing that I was the last person in my family to talk to him. How do you think his partner who recently broke up with him that caused all this feels? They will NEVER be the same. But I cannot blame him. He did this to himself. He was a rational person, that made an irrational snap decision. He murdered himself, And as much as I love him, I hate him for that act.

Had he asked any of us for help, any of us would have been on the first flight to New York to help him. The ONE person, he told exactly what he was going to do, sent him out of their office, and told him to come see her next Monday. By Saturday, he was gone.

Again I respect your opinion CC, but yours is not the only one, and the answers to this problem are not as simple as you are painting them to be, as much as we all love revenge justice.

I'm no Doctor, but it clearly sounds like you are in the anger stage of grief.
Grief can last a long time. Especially for Men as we hold everything in and unjustly take responsibility for things we should have done or didn't do.

I'm sorry for your loss. I remember you talking about it and it is a very difficult life experience to recover whole from.

[Minnie]

One of my kids was bullied. In school, out of school, online - many threats of severe physical violence, and they even managed to inflict a bit of minor physical violence - hard shoves into lockers or walls, etc. A ton of vile verbal abuse. This kid was not being a wimp, was not doing anything to cause it. And we tried everything - 'oh just ignore it' to start with. I mean, we tried it all. The school's no tolerance policy was a joke and never enforced.

We took every measure we had available to us and to our child, and nothing changed. It didn't change until the little turdbots showed up at our front door, to try and intimidate my child in their own home, harass them at our front door.

They knew I worked full time and thought they'd have a little fun. My kid got to the door first, opened it, they started in immediately with some nasty verbal crap and my child slammed the door in their faces. What they didn't know was that the day they chose to 'drop by', I ended up staying home from work with a migraine, and I scared the #### out of them.

I was very calm and spoke quietly and evenly and with measure but they knew they were in really deep poop by the time I was done. I didn't threaten them in any way (verbally or with physical violence anyway) but I made sure they knew what the consequences of their actions were going to be. They tried to tell me that they had stopped by to 'apologize' but I told them I'd heard what they said to my child and if that was an apology, they needed to utilize a dictionary to find out the definition of apology.

Once they left the property, I took my child with me to the police station. We only wanted to inquire what our options were because we just didn't know what else to do, where else to turn, what else to try, but the police were very serious about it. They talked to both my child and I, took our statements, got the names of the kids who were harassing, and home visits were made to those kids' homes, and they were told that another visit, another word, any contact whatsoever, could open them up to charges under the criminal code, for harassment and stalking and so on. They were instructed to act as though my child didn't even exist on this planet. Told not to walk down our street. Don't talk to my child at school. No electronic contact. Visits were made to my child's school and the staff was told that there was a file open and that they were to report anything that violated any of the steps they laid out to the bullies.

That ended it for the most part - that and switching our child to a different school a couple of months later. One of the little turdburglers contacted my kid online and we just took a screen shot and forwarded it to the constable on my child's case file. Another home visit was made and the kid got in major poo from the cops and parents. That was the last of it. Finally. Took 2 years though.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by To Be Quite Honest

I'm no Doctor, but it clearly sounds like you are in the anger stage of grief.
Grief can last a long time. Especially for Men as we hold everything in and unjustly take responsibility for things we should have done or didn't do.

I'm sorry for your loss. I remember you talking about it and it is a very difficult life experience to recover whole from.

I think sometimes you take so much, you simply do not recover, nor can you, nor do you want to. Like concussions I guess. Eventually you take enough blows to the head, you have permanent brain damage from them. Losing my sister when I was 21, then her son, a brother to me, at 37, both under horrible circumstances, and being the last person in the family that talks to both of them........ it's not easy. But it isn't anger. It is more like apathetic acceptance. You accept being happy just isn't in the cards for you, by some cosmic force, by coincidence... whatever it is.

The last year of my life has been difficult. I go to work, I come home, and I rot away on frozen dinners. I have completely shut myself in, and at this point, it is all I want. Pay the bills, and just exist. You start to envy those who get to go out naturally. I am not suicidal, but I don't care if I die.... does that make sense? Eventually you lose so much of yourself when you lose 2 people so close to you, so young, enough of yourself dies, that you become a shell of who you once were. It took me almost 10 years to truly accept what happened with my sister. In all honesty, I was grew closer to him, than her, the little bro I always wanted. Her son was that bright ray of hope for me. Redemption that our family did everything right for her to carry on her legacy. Then, well, it's all gone. Vaporized.

You don't pick yourself up off the mat from that, and go off whistling the Chitty-Chitty bang bang theme into the sunset, and if you do... there is something wrong with you. The pain is what it is, and you learn to manage it no differently than physical pain.

I know I am not the only person out there to go through these types of losses. If I could stop one person though, from making the same irrational decision, by them reading these words, then this post, and peek into my irreversibly damaged psyche is worth it. As survivors of suicide, have to endure a lifetime of pain.