Bullying. Most individuals can stand up and say that they have never
been bullied before but there is a silent majority. These silent
individuals are scared to speak up because they are afraid of
“snitching”, which is telling a responsible adult about being abused
instead of seeking retaliation.

People see that as being weak and the bully uses that to manipulate
the victim to continue their work. These acts of bullying are usually
stereotyped as a bigger person ordering a significantly smaller person
for their lunch money and teasing them about being weaker than the
bully.Sometimes, bullying has taken on a form similar to these
stereotypes, especially in elementary school. However, as time
evolves, so do the methods of bullying. Now, teenagers have been
targets by other teens through Facebook and other social networks;
being called names pertaining to their sexual orientation, promiscuity
and rumors said about the victim that are not true. And instead of
these poor innocent teenagers feeling confident enough to tell a
responsible adult, the victims many times, self-mutilate or commit
suicide.
This is indeed a fact because in the 9th grade, there was a girl who
had a naked picture of her leaked to Myspace. She did not know it was
up on Myspace until she saw it after the fact and people at school
were teasing her so much that she could not take it. She moved her
locker to a different part of the building and she transferred out of
certain classes, all to avoid the embarrassment of bullying.


Since bullying, especially cyber bullying, has become an epidemic,
more parents and anti-bullying organizations have been speaking out
against this injustice. Even the government has started to take
action. There are laws in place and this is a start however, bullying
still has not ceased.

To prevent this, schools need to offer family counseling for those
who bully others. The reason why most people harass others is because
they have a deeper insecurity about themselves and feeds into their
incentive to bully others in order to cover up their lack of
self-confidence. To encounter the root of the problem, society needs
to deal with the bully’s past, instead of just suspending them from
school or sending them to jail and not directly evaluating the
problem. Part of their past contains an event that was the turning
point from high self esteem to low self esteem because they were
abused by someone they trusted such as a family member or a close
friend when they were little. Following this, the bully carried on the
burden of this abuse and feels the need to numb their feelings and
hurt others as they were hurt rather than going to the source of the
problem and repairing the problem. If they talk to a therapist about
their problems, they will feel more comfortable confronting their
deeper insecurities that have become the underlying foundation of
their bullying.