Anti-Bullying Laws: It Is Enough To Protect Our Children
By: Sheila L. Jackson
Remember the days when all the teacher or school bus driver had to say, when they caught us or was told that we were bullying or teasing a fellow student, “Shake hands and make-up and let by gones be by gones.” And there was peace once again on our school playgrounds and buses. Well,
According to 20/20 and ABC News, “Over 160,000 children stay home from school out of fear of being bullied. One parent from Florida felt the need to protect his handicap daughter from bullies when he entered a school bus to confront her attackers. One might ask where the bus driver was. Why didn’t he put an end to the constant spitting and teasing of the young child?
There are many states that are enforcing “The Anti-Bulling Laws,” and schools have “No Bullying School Zone,” signs on the school property, but is it working? For those kids that are forced to go to school each day to be tormented without the school officials stepping in to stop what message are we sending our children? Parents around the United States have complained to teachers’ and principles’ concerning their children being attacked by bullies. But it fell on death ears, and as a result, those students’ commented suicide, because they couldn’t cope with the stress and rejection from their peers.
Bullying doesn’t stop at our schools. Because of technology, it continues around the clock, through cyber bullying (internet), texting (cell phones), and many times the bully will follow the child home. How do we expect our kids to cope and concentrate on their education when they are in constant fear for their lives? New Jersey Legislative says, “Bullying, like other disruptive or violent behaviors… disrupts both a student’s ability to learn and a school’s ability to educate its students in a safe environment.” Louisiana Directives says, “Each city, parish, or other local public school board shall adopt and incorporate into the student code conduct… a policy prohibiting the harassment, intimidation, and bullying of a student by another student.”
If there are policies and codes put into place against bullying, why are they not enforced as soon as an incident occurs? Children are being beaten and their classmates are standing by to videotape the crime, instead of running to get help. No one at the schools seems to know what’s going on until it’s too late. Are they afraid themselves? It’s sad when we live in a society where we believe that it’s easier to look the other way when it doesn’t involve us. Because many school officials’ and students’ have looked the other way: 17-year-old Tyler Long and 11-year-old Paul Hoover hanged themselves. Meagan Meier-13 and Cassidy Andel-16 all died because authorities acted too late.
It seems as though no one is paying attention to the problem until it’s too late. After these kids take the schools under siege, everyone wants to know what went wrong. The problem is that we did not pay attention to the warning signs. We saw the behavioral changes in our children but never stopped to investigate until it was too late. We never asked why they were afraid to go to school. We did not know that they were being bullied until that fateful day the child decided to take a gun to school for protection.
Fear is dangerous when help is not sought for problems. If a person is made to feel inferior and is picked on incessantly, fear will cause that person to do unthinkable things that he or she has never considered before. Our children are not mature enough to handle tough situations as these. That’s why they are making deadly choices. Being laughed at and stepped on are not only destructive to our children, but also to others that cross their paths. Take heed to the warning signings, our kids are dropping them like breadcrumbs. Will we notice them before it’s too late?
