“Enrichment beyond the classroom”
CALL US: 1-760-393-5400
Rumors: A Form of Bullying
Ugly. Weird. Dumb. Fat.
Nowadays, you can get bullied for any and every reason. Look around, every person near you has been bullied at least once. As a society, why are we used to this? Why are some of us getting tormented daily? And when others see these people getting hurt, why don’t they stop the bullies?
There are four main types of bullying: physical, verbal, covert, and cyber. Physical is the easiest to understand. It’s basically hitting, kicking, throwing things, and damaging property. Verbal includes name calling, insults, and slurs. Covert bullying is somewhat harder to identify. Examples of this are rumors, harmful jokes, mimicking, and encouraging others to socially exclude someone. The last form is cyberbullying. This one is not taken action upon as much as it should, but it is either verbal or covert bullying brought onto someone via social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, etc.
Bully victims are 2-9 times more likely to commit suicide than non-victims, with a statistic of 4,400 deaths and 440,000 attempts per year. What has the world come to where many feel that their only escape from the bullying is to end their lives?
What if day by day a student in your class was constantly getting bullied by the same people? No good reason, maybe it’s because of the way they dress, or the way they look. And every day they take it, never saying anything back. Then suddenly one day he’s not in his seat. One day turns into a week. A week turns into a month… How would you feel knowing that if you spoke up, stood up for him, you could’ve prevented it?
I’m sure the bullies don’t come out wanting to hurt others. Maybe they are stressing over problems of their own. They may even be getting bullied themselves by either family or someone of “higher rank”. What the bullies are doing to other people is right not necessarily, but instead of thinking they are doing it for fun think about what they’re going through as well. The bullies may just be doing this to make themselves feel like the big guy instead of the scared little boy they feel like when they are the ones being bullied.
If you’re being bullied, speak up, talk to someone. The worst thing you could do is to become the bully yourself.
Rumors are absurd, irrational, and powerful. Rumors are powerful enough to start a $624 billion company’s stock to plummet. It was all caused by a teenager, his keyboard, and a rumor. On October 3rd, 2008, this was posted on CNN’s iReport website minutes before Apple stock decreased, ‘’Steve Jobs [co-founder of Apple] was rushed to the ER just a few hours ago after suffering a major heart attack. I have an insider who tells me that paramedics were called after Steve claimed to be suffering from severe chest pains and shortness of breath. My source has opted to remain anonymous, but he is quite reliable. I haven’t seen anything about this anywhere else yet, and as of right now, I have no further information, so I thought this would be a good place to start. If anyone else has more information, please share it.’’ This statement was not true at all, yet it caused big problems for Apple. On October 3rd, at 4 o’clock pm ET, Apple’s stock dropped an outrageous 10% in only 10 minutes.
If a rumor can cause a company like Apple to lose millions of dollars in just minutes, imagine what it can do to someone’s life in just one school day. Rumors are being spread nonstop in every country across the world. One could be stirring up right now in the halls of your school. They’re almost like an unstoppable force that could really hurt people. Today rumors can easily be compared with wildfires. They aren’t that different as they consume lives in a flash and are almost impossible to stop.
California is number one among the top five states in which bullying behavior is reported the most, and rumors are a large part of that bullying statistic. In an average class of 24 students, the majority of the students have felt or been hurt due to rumors. Bullying through rumors and physical behavior has become such a big problem; that taking your life because of it has its own name, Bullycide. It is incredibly deplorable that bullying has come to have its own name for suicide. How could we let this happen in today’s society? Starting rumors is a domino effect that runs right into bullying. You cannot start a rumor and expect someone not to get caught in the fire.
Here at Shadow Hills, we should fight against bullying. If you see someone bullying another person, stand up for them or at the very least report it. Our school does an amazing job giving you options to fight rumors and bullying through the PSST program and Talk About It. So if you feel that it is too scary to confront a tormenter, or even to talk to a teacher, at the very least you can report it anonymously. Let us show the world what our school is capable of, because remember, Knights Do It Right!
The Love Rally with ADL
By Chrislyn Ancheta
The Anti-Defamation League is an organization that speaks to youth specifically dealing with anti-bullying. The awesome love rally that was held at SHHS addresses the issue of bullying at our school. The student panel discussed personal experiences with bullying, addressing whether they were the target, agressor, bystander, or ally. The Silver Shield hopes that the student of Shadow Hills takes the information provided by this rally to heart, making everyone aware of the elephant in the room.
Bullies⁴
By Angie Reatiga
By Issac Morales
"Knowing what's right doesn't mean much unless you do what's right."