Bullies

I see posts often about the need for kids to stop bullying each other, to be nice. I wholeheartedly agree with this, no and’s, if’s or but’s. That is not the focus of this writing, I just wanted to get that said up front.

I am looking for the outcry about adults bullying. I don’t see much. I don’t see the same “lecturing” of adults to be nicer. I don’t understand how can we be calling for kids to stop without being just as appalled by adults that bully.

I get that we all will never completely agree with each other, there is gun control, the #metoo movement, working moms, stay at home moms, the list could go on and on. There are so many different views on so many topics.

No matter where you stand on any given topic, no matter how passionate you are about your view, it is never, NEVER okay to use something personal about another human to put their point down. Some of the comments I have seen recently: Are you @#%$& stupid? You are so ugly, no one would side with you. You can’t even spell, you can’t have an intelligent opinion. You are from ____, no wonder you are such an idiot. Your heritage makes your opinion invalid. These are not word for word, but the sentiment of the comments is. These are the essence of bullying.

I see so much name calling, so many insults thrown around. It makes me cringe, it makes me ashamed. I don’t know how we call for less bullying in schools while we have leaders (both sides of the aisle) bullying opponents.

I see it from the highest leader in our country. Here are a few names the President of the United States has called his staff, foreign leaders and people that don’t agree with him:

McMuffin    Little Rocket Man    Sloppy Steve     Sloppy Michael     Crazy Megyn
Sleepy Eyes     Mad Alex     Goofy Elizabeth     Mr. Magoo     Low Energy Jeb      Pocahontas

I see it from people in powerful positions. These are things that people have called President Trump:

Freshly sandpapered reality star     Two-bit wall salesman     Agent Orange
Melting hunk of uninformed apricot Jell-O      Erratic rage quasar
Bigoted See ’n Say    Fat Elvis     Large-mouthed ass     America’s first appendix

None of it is okay. None of it is right. To use the excuse “he/she does it” or “he/she did it first” is astounding to me. If a person does something wrong this does not give another person the okay to also do wrong.

Here is an example of one, word for word, comment I stumbled across; “There is nothing about this skinhead lesbian that impresses me and there is nothing that she has to say unless you’re a frothing at the mouth moonbat.”. This not only insults the speaker but anyone who listens to her, just listens. We should be listening to each other, having civil discussions, we don’t have to agree. We should, however, be respectful of each other. One of the most appalling thing about this comment is that it was spoken by an adult leader toward a teen.

I don’t want this to be about whether I support one party or another, one cause or another. This is about adults modeling good communication behavior to our youth. Are we confronting the bully to let them know that we won’t tolerate that behavior? After confronting, are we blocking the bully from our social media, if they don’t change? I hope we adults are having the hard conversations with our kids about bullying, however, that is not the end of our responsibility. We need to stand up against bullying in kids and adults.

My hope is that the reader does not take away that school bullying doesn’t matter, it does. It matters a lot. There are many conversations right now about kids being kinder to classmates, that is a good thing. However, don’t stop there, be brave, stand up to the adult bullies where ever you encounter them.

My take a way is to do better, stand up when I should, be more aware that words can wound deeper than fists.

I will do better, stand with me?