Bullies and Victims : It’s Not That Simple

Yesterday one of the girls in the junior youth group looked slightly sad and downtrodden. She told me she was being bullied by some of the other girls. I told her :

You know, when I was your age I was bullied too. It sucks I know. I got my stuff stolen everyday, spit sandwiches and everything in between. It was lonely. But you know what I wish someone had told me then that I want to tell you now?? You need to keep your head up and don’t let that make you lose your confidence. You need to understand that what they are doing has nothing to do with you. Don’t lose sense of who you are. And here’s an important lesson : Love them, love them because they are created by God but that doesn’t mean don’t be just to yourself. You have to learn to keep a distance and don’t let what they do affect you.

The problem with how we deal with bullying today is that we tend to pigeonhole people into the victim and the abuser. A typical response towards a bully is to reprimand him and tell him that his behavior is bad. If this worked, then we wouldn’t have an insane amount of bullying. If anything , bullying has increased as social media is accessible to everyone.
No, the problem is moral relativism, the fragmentation of our lives and what kids are learning from the society as a whole . IF we foster competitive environments why are we surprised when they pick on the ” weak”? If we have families who are violent and abusive why are we surprised that this pours out in their behavior? If we teach intolerance and are over indulgent why are we thinking it won’t result in abuse?
There are so many factors to sum up in each individual case, that it is seemingly impossible to deal with. But, the teacher is already overworked with little support from the system. Counselors are rarely available. The parents typically will blame the teacher for not ” controlling” the class. The victims will demand justice…
I’ve seen where these ” bullies” end up and frankly, it’s pretty sad. I have seen all kinds of ” bullies” Poor Bullies, gypsy bullies, rich Salvadoran bullies, spanish bullies, Etc, etc, etc. It seems like everyone discarded them and decided they are No Good. They have a tough tie believing that anyone cares about them. All they understand is violence. They perpetuate the worst facets of society to the t. They are known as A Bully and they begin to perpetuate this identity.
On the same coin, the ” victim” is taught that they are a victim and cannot possibly empower themselves. If they do, they are taught to stand up for themselves, or seek revenge. Think of all those movies where the former victim gets revenge. Isn’t that becoming the very thing they were running away from? That’s because we seem to have a notion of power which means forced strength. It also typically shows the person now rich and better off. In no way does the person in these movies show that they are in any way helping others , they just perpetuate the temple of self interest.
No, I believe that working together and trying to find ways to erase those labels might be the answer. In understanding where people are coming from. In working with prevention of these labels by redefining them.

My Country, Your Country , Their Country

 

The biggest question I get asked is ” Where are you from?” Which always harbors an annoying debate of whether that means that by default where you are born is where you are from ( even if you only spent six years of your life there) or where you grew up.

My problem is not that I have any qualms to say where I am from, but that mot people have some qualms on telling me that  I am NOT from this place or that or I AM from this place or that.

When I grew up, I was forced to recite the salvadorean anthem, but was told I could not put my hand on my heart because it was not my country.  When I went to college,  most people could not believe I did not know the american anthem or that I did not know the names of the American states, even though I went to a British school in a salvadorean country and was brought up by my Scottish mother.  In England, I was asked constantly why I had an American accent.

The constant questioning gets tiresome, but I only jot it down to people being curious.  I never understood patriotism, and instilling exteme love for our country vs other countries. My American relatives would someties tell me ” America is the best country in the world, it has the most freedom, opportunities, etc”.

Some people express that certain countries are barbaric, or are ” third world” and therefore poor and violent.

We grow up in a world that constantly erects fences between countries, between our homes, between races and cultures.  Our educational system teaches us half truths which do not give us the whole story,  and this makes us paranoid about some unknown ” other”.

Around the world, certain countries are ” ideal” whereas others are not so idyllic. When I say, I live in Europe, people light up and want to know more, but when I say a third world country I get some looks of confusion.

We seem to think that marks of land somehow makes us who we are, and in some ways it might. But it also blinds us to knowing that behind those barriers are other ways of doing things, other lives, but they are all human. Somewhere along the line, we lose this sense by marking what passport we have.

I wonder why we have to  think , at the cost of other nations, that somehow we are better than others , we are more beautiful, we are more ideal.

Extreme love of one’s own country I don’t believe leads to anything but blinding ourselves to what other places have to offer. It gives us a distinct sense of self inflicted isolation.

In El Salvador, the opposite happens.  Most people I know , when asked , do not have much of an answer to say about what there is to love about El Salvador. This notion has also bled into the high level of pollution, violence and other sociological problems. It’s a self fulfilling prophecy, if we believe that a place is no good, then we treat it as such.

I think that there has to be a balance between all this extreme nationalism and the extreme self loathing of a place. It comes from trying to celebrate the uniqueness that each place has to offer, and trying for everyone to succeed together.

But I guess if we cannot achieve even a neighborhood to become united in a common purpose, it is even hard to envision a world without barriers between countries.

There is beauty everywhere, and there is laughter, and also pain and suffering too. But if we choose to turn our eyes away from it we will never see it for what it is.