Why is bullying such a big deal now? What has changed so much to make it a topic of national news? Is it the internet? The fact that people can just say something to someone they don't even know without having to deal with the consequences?
No matter what we say or do, bullying is not going to stop; it's something that has gone on since the dawn of time and will continue to go on until the world's end. It is something that has, until now, gone on virtually un-noticed. It was something that until very recently no one gave a crap about; something that if you told your parents or a teacher about, they'd tell you that everyone goes through it at some point, "you're just being too sensitive", it's just kids being kids, or probably the most common, it builds character.
When I was in school I was bullied from Kindergarten all the way up to 12th grade. I didn't go and just start shooting up my schools, nor did I go and try to commit suicide. Now I will admit that while I didn't physically harm myself, I did cause myself emotional harm. For the longest time I believed what everyone told me, after awhile I'd start telling myself the same things; after awhile I became my own worst enemy. People would make fun of me because I was quiet and extremely shy, they continued to harass me because I wouldn't stick up for myself.
Then something inside of me changed, and slowly but surely, I just stopped caring what people thought of me. I'm not sure what made me change, but I guess something inside of me just snapped. I guess I realized that as long as I had real friends who truly cared about me, then who cared what the rest of the world thought of me.
Why did I and millions of others have to go through this "character building" for our entire school career before the media decided to make a big deal out of it. Is it because people are now making fun of gay and lesbian people? Now I don't care what your sexual orientation is, a person is a person no matter what, and no-one deserves that kind of treatment, but why is it that people seem to take gay and lesbian bullying more seriously than any other type of bullying? Because it's a "hate crime"? Isn't that what bullying is in a nutshell?
