I’m no pansy, but I was mercilessly bullied by a couple of classmates who were bigger and more popular than me.
I don’t whine, take psych drugs nor did I hide in my room.
But to this day, if I ever come face to face with either of them, I’d probably beat them to within an inch of their life.
I won’t forget and still haven’t been able to achieve the forgiveness part of “forgive and forget”.
They essentially ruined some years of my childhood due to apprehension, fear, embarrassment and loathing because I wasn’t able to take them on one on one until a few years later. I decked one of them with a roundhouse punch and that was that with him. The other managed to avoid his “reward”.
But make no mistake, I don’t support any “program” that “criminalizes” the behavior, but do support some means for the victim to be able to get even without repercussions.
Many kids today lack appropriate coping skills and when tired of it, resort to violence of the worst kind. I believe that a simple a$$ kicking of epic proportions, either by the victim or an advocate is in order.
The biggest contribution to bullying today is the kid being bullied is not allowed to defend himself. If some punk is pushing some kid around and the kid decks him, guess who’s in trouble.
“But to this day, if I ever come face to face with either of them, I’d probably beat them to within an inch of their life.”
Ran into one of those at my High School reunion a few years ago. After about 90 minutes, he reverted to type, to which I replied, “How about I just rip out your f-in throat, instead?”
He never said a word to me, the rest of the night.
Don’t get me wrong. I was bullied too. And if I ran into Wayne Ortenburger today I’d punch his teeth in. But the article is talking about creating a whole new class of people who will not-surprisingly require all the features of a new bureaucracy and billions of more dollars of Federal intrusion. And (also not surprisingly) more govt jobs for the article writer and her Therapeutic State cronies.