Bullying: An Epidemic

Like most epidemics, bullying has spread pain, death, and misery in America to children and also to some extent to grownups. The euphemism about a piece of paper that after being crumpled cannot regain its original smoothness best defines the long-term effects of bullying (Ramirez, 2013). Short-term effects are equally damaging, mainly affecting the children themselves and also their families. Physical pain as a result of bullying that involves physical contact such as hitting is among the immediate effects. Another effect is psychological pain as a consequence of the physical hurt, feeling hated or word-based bullying such as spreading malicious rumors or gossip and cyberbullying. Bullying has also been known to cause death, either through guns and other weapons that victims of bullies use to protect themselves or through the suicide of victims (Englander, 2012). It is these adverse effects of bullying that make it important to understand the subject and also find ways of mitigating and ending it. In most cases, bullying is a power game that involves a stronger or more powerful child persecuting a child who has a weakness or less power to the pleasure or enjoyment of the powerful child (Juvonen & Graham, 2014). An element of weakness of diminished power thus defines the character of a bully victim. Physical weakness, ailment or disability can be the weakness involved so can being unpopular in school or different in terms of race, religion or ethnicity. It is the weakness or power difference than makes bullying possible and denies the victim a fair chance to fight back. A person who experiences verbal abuse, violence, coercion, and intimidation on a regular occasion is undergoing bullying. Bullying usually occur in schools whereby students are vulnerable away from home. The research paper aims at determining the impacts. 

Factors Affecting Bullying 

One of the primary reasons why bullying occurs and has been escalating is diminished and in some cases warped understanding of the epidemic and the factors bearing upon it. Among the most warped impression of bullying is the popular culture presentation of the vice in popular media, books, and televisions (Rettew & Pawlowski, 2016). The said presentation is very kind to the bullies, has a benign approach to bullying itself and emphasizes on the resilience of victims and also happy endings where the victim overcomes the bully or where the victim and the bully end up as friends. TV and popular media have a great impact on the general mentality of the populace about most subjects. The presentation that bullying gets in the media makes the general populace including the children to have a casual approach towards the subject, further exacerbating the problem. Most importantly, according to Rettew & Pawlowski, (2016), the said popular media presentation is wrong at several levels. Bullying is not an almost normal form of interaction among children but is rather an extreme and offensive form of harassment. 

Secondly, victims of bullying are not always resilient and strong thus overcome by the bullies. In many cases, the victims will succumb to the bullying thus developing lifelong scars. Some victims will also lose hope in life or in an effort to escape, develop suicide ideation and even suicide attempts, some of which are successful. Finally, according to Englander, E. (2012), some students will carry guns and other weapons to school with a view to protecting themselves leading to violent encounters with bullies and even death. Bullying is not a benign or a kind practice and bullies are not ordinary kids with a funny sense of humor. Instead, bullying is an ugly practice that is destroying countless lives and the failure to accurately portray it is one of the reasons why it has been getting worse over the years. 

Lack of proper legal provisions for the definition and punishment of bullying is another factor that has been affecting the bullying pandemic. In America, bullying begins at a very tender age when children are ordinarily considered as too young to have criminal intent. Much of the bullying activity will thus be handled as disciplinary problems in school. Bullying will then peak in the latter years on elementary school then suddenly plummet among high school students, save for the modern cyber-bullying. The age-trends of bullying has enabled many to mostly abide by the radar of law enforcement and the criminal justice system. It is only after the high prevalence of cyber-bullying among older students that law enforcement has taken notice and laws have begun to be passed relating to the subject (Freeman, Thompson & Jaques, 2012). It is possible that in the near future, bullying will be handled more by police and the children’s department than it is handled by school administrators. In the interim, the menace is handled like any other disciplinary problem in school while outside school it is almost not handled at all, and this has been causing the problem to gradually escalate. 

The bullying in schools is also to some extent a reflection of a culture of bullying manifested in the American community at many levels. Indeed, to some extent, the grounds upon which bullying is based is reflective of the culture of violence, intimidation, and harassment that is highly prevalent specifically in the American society (Swearer & Hymel, 2015). A good example will be the culture of entertainment sports led by wrestling where bullies are worshipped as heroes and bullying is seen as fun. Similarly, one of the most celebrating sporting activities in the USA is football and ice hockey, both of which engender a high level of bullying and harassment. Most importantly, the rules of these games allow for impunity for bullying and violence while the fans adore those who excel in this ugly practice. In many cases, however, the players and actors in these sporting activities have no ill will or malevolence as it is just a game. However, nobody ever explains that fact to the kids who consider the acrimony and real and act it out in school. Even in the event where the children are made to understand that the violence is only for show, they develop the misconception that violence, intimidation, and harassment care positive character traits (Swearer & Hymel, 2015). Further, bullying and harassment on the basis religion, culture, race and ethnicity are also common in America and can be emulated by children. Culturally embracing violence, intimidation, and harassment is another bearing factor for the exacerbation of the bullying epidemic. 

Finally, lack of proper extenuation by school administration and responsible professionals is also another negative bearing factor on the epidemic. Most bullying happens at school where children are vulnerable due to lack of parental protection. The children rely fully on protection from the school’s administration, which protection is often insufficient. According to Lund, Blake, Ewing, & Banks (2013), the professionals who are supposed to be assisting in the management and control of bullying such as counselors and school psychologists have little-specialized training on the subject. The lack of specialized training diminishes the capability of these professionals to properly manage the problem of bullying leading to its exacerbation. Further, many schools have adopted the approach of zero tolerance to bullying which in itself does not properly handle the problem based on available research (Johnston, 2015). The zero tolerance which is reactional in nature only kicks in when bullying is discovered. In many cases, bullying is only discovered when it has gone out of hand, such as when a bully has been shot at in school, a victim has been hospitalized or even committed suicide. Proactive approaches, which have been known to be more effective have not been properly applied thus contributing to the worsening of the problem. 

Consequences of Bullying 

Physical Bullying 

Physical bullying is the oldest, most common and least canvassed form of bullying in American schools and also one of the most damaging from a psychological perspective. Indeed, the traditional concept of bullying specifically made reference to this kind of bullying. Under physical bullying, the stronger students or a group of students beat up, harass or intimidate students they consider to be weaker or incapable of defending themselves. Over 50% of all elementary school students report having experienced some form of physical bullying within school hours, mostly in break time. Stronger children will often harass the physically weaker students. Minorities in racial, cultural or ethnic divides are also more susceptible to this attacks because they are different and perhaps also because they have a smaller chance of getting a champion to defend them. In most cases, bullies are careful not to cause bruises or leave marks, hence the reason for this kind of bullying not getting a lot of attention. In extreme cases, however, physical bullying will lead to actual injuries and even hospitalization. In all cases, physical bullying leaves a long-lasting psychological impact (Ramirez, 2013). The anger and resentment that comes with being a victim is part of the psychological impact so is the feeling of helplessness that comes with the inability to fight back. The victims may end up developing acute fear or becoming inordinately aggressive. Another physical consequence of physical bullying is injuries and even fatalities when the victims decide to fight back. A group of victims may gang up or attack the bully leading to injuries to all parties involved. Further, research has shown that much of the gun violence in American schools results from guns brought to school by victims of bullying to protect themselves from bullies (Englander, 2012). 

Cyber-bullying and Rumor-based Bullying 

Online and rumor-based bullying is relatively recent, has a lower physiological impact but creates a lasting and highly damaging psychological impact on a student. Cyber-bullying takes many forms and can either be an extension of rumor-based bullying or a breach or privacy or character-assassination. The current high proliferation of the internet, more so social media is among the drivers of cyber-bullying. From a very tender age, sometimes before the age of 10, children already have smartphones and social media accounts. Bullying happens when the children use these social media accounts to maliciously attack other children by posting falsehoods of highly exaggerated true stories. The multimedia capabilities of smartphones exacerbate the problem as bullies can post voice and picture content to attack their victims. Among the most psychologically damaging examples is when a former lover posts actual photos, mostly nudes, of victims while disparaging them. Psychologically, the victim will feel violated, betrayed and helpless all at once (Juvonen & Graham, 2014). Currently, gender and sexual affiliation issues are a course of acrimonious debates even among adults with minorities such as the bisexuals, transsexuals, and homosexuals being inordinately targeted. These issues have also become an integral part of cyber-bullying and rumor-based bullying. The sensitivity of this gender-based issues, more so to pubescent and adolescents who are undergoing reproductive development exacerbates the impact of the bullying on the victims. Many of the cyber-bullying victims who have committed suicide in America have been victims of gender and sexual affiliation-based attacks. Rumors and gossip can also happen offline in schools or other gatherings where the bully will maliciously spread lies about the victim in a manner that is designed to hurt the victim. Physical damage from both online and offline attacks include fights between the bully and the victim or in extreme cases, suicide or self-harm by the victims. The latter has become pronounced in America and is among the reason why bullying as a subject has become common in popular discourse. Psychologically, cyber and rumor-based bullying results in stress, depressions, substance abuse, and in extreme case, suicides. 

Solutions to the Epidemic 

As most bullying either happens at school or is related to schooling, the principal point of seeking solutions must be school-based. Change of approach by the school administration about how to go about handling bullying should be among the cardinal solutions. Zero-tolerance on bullying is a good concept but it is not enough as it is reactionary in nature (Johnston, 2015). The best approach is the one that arrests the bullying before it happens and also eliminates the basis for the bullying. The best way to go about this is to investigate and establish the grounds for bullying in a particular setting. In some places, bullying happens because of racial or cultural differences. In other instances, bullying could be happening because older pupils are harassing the younger ones. The two situations have to be managed differently. Having school administrations and leaders take a proactive approach to bullying can enable the mitigation of both physical, cyber, and rumor-based bullying (Johnston, 2015). 

The training of all professionals who hold positions that can enable them to intervene in preventing, ending and managing the effects of bullying is also critical. As per research, many of the professionals who are actively handling vulnerable students such as counselors and school psychologists have limited specialized training on the problem of bullying in schools (Lund et al, 2013). If the specialists themselves have limited training, it means that the other parties such as teachers and administrators are worse off. Training on how to detect an environment that encourages bullying can go a long way in enabling the proactive approach to bullying (Wölfer & Scheithauer, 2014). Further, the professionals should be able to detect potential bullies so that they can take measures to ensure that these children do not end up bullying others (Hensley, 2013). Being able to detect bully victims will enable the commencement of intervention to mitigate psychological damage caused. Finally, training should be given on how to correct bullies and also how to manage victims so as to reduce short and long-term physiological impact of the vice (Ramirez, 2013; Jung, 2018). 

Cyber-bullying is relatively new but has a very damaging psychological impact of the victim and in most cases is beyond the purview of school administrators, hence the need of a legal solution to the problem. This does not mean that academic professionals should not do their best, assisted by the training indicated above to mitigate cyberbullying by stopping perpetrators and assisting victims. The intervention of academic professionals alone is, however, not enough. Issues relating to the First Amendment that guarantee freedom of speech and the 14 th amendment that guarantees the right to fair procedure inordinately limit the capacity of school leadership in handling cyber-bullying. The solution should begin with a legislation, which should develop laws that are capable of limiting and eventually eliminating cyber-bullying among minors (Freeman, Thompson & Jaques, 2012). The criminal justice systems should also be empowered through the good law to punish perpetrators in extreme cases of bullying. The laws should then be followed by coordinated efforts between law enforcement, school administration and children services to arrest cyberbullying before it escalates further. Any fundamental right that enables the destruction of a child’s entire life through bullying is a fundamental right that is worth losing, hence the need to change the laws. 

Finally, the perception and behavior of children are derived inter alia from their cognitively developed perception of the environment they live in, thus a chance of the environment as necessary. The penchant for violence and intimidation in the American popular culture needs to be reduced and also properly explained to the children to avoid them developing the belief that it is in order or even ideal for the strong to prey on the weak. The tradition of embracing violence and violent games may not be easy to change but caution should be taken so that children who are exposed to it learn that it is not appropriate to behave as such against other children. Similarly, bullying needs to be properly presented in popular media and TV programming (Rettew & Pawlowski, 2016). The idea of bullying as a normal rite of passage is outdated and wrong. The argument that bullying does not lead to permanent psychological damage should no longer be incorporated in books and TV programs. Bullies should be actively castigated and victims presented as reality reflects. The social changes suggested above would also go a long way in assisting in reducing bullying in schools. 

Conclusion 

School is indispensable in the modern age due to its value in molding the future of children but it also takes children away from parental protection. Being away from parental protection exposes the children to many vagaries including physical, online and rumor-based bullying. Bullying can be said to have taken place when a stronger or seemingly more powerful student attacks, harasses or persecutes a weaker or less powerful student for pleasure (Juvonen & Graham, 2014). Based on the research above, the problem of bullying in America is highly prevalent and also escalating, having adopted another dimension through the use of the internet. Bullying not only affects the parties involved physically but also leads grave psychological effects that may last a lifetime. It is, therefore, important for all stakeholders to undertake active measures to mitigate the problem. These measures include taking a proactive approach to bullying, developing laws to punish extreme bullies, training professionals on managing the epidemic and seeking to psychologically mitigate the damage caused by bullying. The levels and extent of bullying in American schools are already out of hand, hence being termed as an epidemic hence the need for urgent extenuation measures. 

References  

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