Bullying

A time where I was a bystander in a bullying situation was about  6 years ago. I was with a group of fiends it was four of us. We were all pretty much bored and just hanging out at a park called Lillian Bryant. One of my friends said she felt like fighting and another friend agreed with her. On the other side of the play ground was this girl who wasn’t that pretty to look at. And my two friend decided that they were going to tag team her because she was ugly. All four of us began to walk towards the girl. Me and my one friend who hadn’t said anything stood a little back while the other two began to attempt to get the girl upset.
Eventually the first friend hit her and slung her on the ground , then after noticing she wasn’t a match, my friend tagged the other friend in to finish it. That friend got a few hits in but eventually just left her alone because she wasn’t putting up a challenge. The all four of us left. This is one of the things I regret in my life... I coulda said something, I coulda stopped it ,but selfishly it wasn’t me so I didn’t care.

Bullying

I never was really into any sports related activities until high school, and even then I was never really into them I was just good at it and plus it kept me active. When I did do a sport I usually had someone or multiple people who I knew and eventually I was the one to be in a group that is considered to be well known not only in that sport, but in the school as well. I can't say I was one to ever be bullied simply because I was "short" and so "tiny" that everyone thought that it was cute and it was liked by many. Moreover, going into cheerleading my Junior year there are females coming from all walks of life and may not have had such an easy transition to high school as I did. Though going into cheerleading, we built a sisterhood, so regardless of your upbringing if you made the team we were basically family. Of course, you have those who aren't really aware of everything that a female should know to do when it comes to personal upkeep. Meaning some didn't have the necessary toiletries to be able to keep their hygiene up for various reasons. Some can say it is due to lack of family support to be able to afford them, so they may not have had access to them or just the lack of knowledge of knowing what things are right to use if and when they are on their cycle or even what to do with the items. So there was a particular day during practice when one of the three head coaches made a public announcement to all of us that someone had an odor. The thing is everyone knew who it was that she was referring to because it happened often. Keeping in mind there were still immature people on the team, so people were laughing and whispering as if the young lady wasn't in the room. The coach went on expressing how we all are old enough to know how to clean ourselves etc. What she failed to realize is maybe the young lady didn't know the proper way and for her being a coach and a parent after hours she should've chose a different way of voicing her concern on the topic. For example, since she already knew the person she should've pulled her to the side and gave her some pointers and if she was feeling really generous, she could've bought her a few items to help her get a visual of what things she should use and how to use it. Then if she wanted to make an announcement about it she could let everyone know that it's okay to come to her if we needed anything and found a better way of easing or hinting at what she was referring to without pinpointing anyone. Looking back to the situation now, I think I could've became closer to the young lady, get to know her situation if she allowed it, and just offer all the knowledge I had and have based on what my mom taught me about personal hygiene in a way that she would've understood in hopes that she use it in the future.

Bullying

I have been in sports for most of my life and for this reason I have seen bullying in multiple ways both on the field and in the locker room. It is obvious when you look at a young team of athletes that not every member is there because they are talented or because they even want to be. Many kids are urged or even forced into it by their parents to get out and be apart of something. For this reason these kids tend to not fit the mold of the atypical kid and risk being ostracized and picked on. I can remember my freshman year of high school as being the year I witnessed some of the worst of this bullying. A tradition had began that after practice everyday a wrestling tournament would take place in the open area of the locker room. Being fourteen and fifteen year old boys there was a large discrepancy in both body size and body maturity. The players that had a leg up on the others were a lot quicker to join in on the action while the smaller ones made sure to stay out of it. I was somewhere in the middle at the age because I didn't have much muscle but I was tall and sarcastic so I could talk my way out of most trouble. For one of the smallest players, though, he didn't have this  ability. The biggest on the team, a starter on the defensive line was the ring leader of the wresting matches and decided one day to get the smaller kid involved. The kid was clearly scared and not wanting to participate, but the other one didn't care and proceeded to antagonize and provoke him. I wasn't secure enough with myself at the time and didn't feel like I had the power to stop what was going on as I just wanted to fit in too. I was smaller than the antagonizer and figured I would be included in the situation if I intervened. Everyone else seemed to have thought the same as nobody else spoke up and some even joined in by provoking and shoving the kid around too. The largest kid had all the power in the room and once others joined in there wasn't anything to stop them. The shoving and verbal abuse intensified until finally the victim attempted to throw a punch at the antagonizer. This sealed his fate as the kid dodged and body slammed him to the ground. The poor kid grabbed what he could of his things and got out of the locker room as fast as he could with tears in his eyes, and quit the team the next day. I had never talked to the kid, so I didn't know if he had loved football or just did it to make friends, but either way he was robbed of both. I still feel bad about not intervening, but the power dynamic of the locker room would have made it hard for anybody to during that confusing time of adolescents.

Bullying in Sport

Bullying is something that can happen anywhere, and to anyone. Some people are blind to how much this can happen, and how bad it can get. I have been bullied, seen bullying, and even bullied. It is a huge problem in our society, especially with the internet now being used to bully. I am going to talk about a situation I was a bystander of bullying.

At my high school, there was about 2,500 kids. Most people knew of each other in each person's class, but it was big enough not everyone knew everything about everyone. Most of the athletes, male or female, were considered to be "popular" and were more well-known than other kids were. I played many sports throughout high school, but my favorite was volleyball. We had a girl on my volleyball team with a secret. She was also one of our star players. She had come out as gay to a few of the girls on the volleyball team, including me. Although I was accepting, many people were not. Some of the girls on our team told others, and it became gossip. Basically the entire school had found out, and people had a lot to say about it.
At my school, many people were openly gay. This was a bigger deal than anyone else, however. Maybe because she was the star player in three different varsity sports, or because she did not fit people's "stereotype" of what a gay girl would be like. She is very feminine. People bullied her, including girls on the volleyball team. I said I was a bystander, because I did not do anything about it. I thought I should stay out of it, but that was wrong of me. She needed someone to stand up for her. Thankfully, our coach found out about this situation. He made it a point to individually talk to each player separately and ask them to be respectful of this girl.
Even with the help of an adult, she still had a very hard time. She ended up quitting her sports. Watching this happen and knowing I could've helped her makes me feel guilty. I realized being a bystander to bullying is just as bad as doing the bullying yourself.
In my eyes, someone's sexuality shouldn't be judged by anyone.
Bullying happens in a lot of settings, but it seems that it happens a lot in sports settings as well. More people should pay attention to this, and stop the stigma.

Bullying

Playing football, basketball, and baseball growing up I felt like I saw almost every type of bullying from coaches, players, and fans. But I feel like playing football growing up in junior and high school around me they did not ever cut kids from the teams, so everyone was allowed to play if they followed the schools and teams’ rules. I remember kids would be on the team to obviously get in some extra activates so they could be more of an active kid and didn’t play because they loved football, but rather to just be there and have some fun. In high school I remember the locker rooms for football the freshman kids that were so little would get hazed to the point of embarrassment. This kid was really brutally verbally and physically abused because he always had something to say back to kids that would say very mean things to him and once we were on the field he would play with the running backs and safeties he would get targeted and hit really hard just for the fun of it. The power was the upper class man, because whenever I lined up with the varsity and the sophomore team would come over the varsity would find this kid and just go right for him with no regard. The kids’ power was taken away from him because he played all the way from grade school and never quit, because of his dad would push him and push him to keep coming. By the time our sophomore year was up he was mentally and physically done with football. It wasn’t just football he dropped out of high school, moved out of his parents’ house and Peoria, IL, and moved to some small town in Illinois to get away from everything that he grew up around. I felt so bad because even though I wasn’t the cause I knew that I was there and did nothing to stop coaches or other players to stop or lay back on him. The imbalance of this is that growing up I didn’t know how messed up this was to do to kids and seeing it I always kept my mouth shut because I was a shy kid and wanted to play football and learn. It existed because coaches want to get the weakness out of a team, coaching in football is a mental game some coaches believe if they can break a kid than those fans and the game will break him. So, most coaches enjoy to just yell at kids till they are satisfied with the effort, either if it’s a play, conditioning, etc. This existed because no one was able to step up not even his parents, I believe his dad said one thing over about 8 years of football and those were all different coaches for him not one being the same. This cycle continued and still continues today with how coaches want to treat their players. Like I said I probably could have done something about it definitely in high school, but I was always in a tough spot when I wasn’t as shy. I was always really close to starting on varsity and never wanted to jeopardize that by standing up to the coaches, because of how mean they were to kids and single handily that kid alone. I feel bad to this day, because I haven’t heard from the kid when he left high school sophomore year, I could have put myself in a leadership role to stand up but was set on my own goals that I wanted to make happen in my life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8kYsGUIVMY

Bullying in Sport

Bullying is something that happens everyday.  Now that I am in college I feel as if I don't see as much bullying face to face or in public.  Bullying now can happen through the internet and social media. This is called cyberbullying and I feel this is more common at the college level.  

When it comes to an experience that I've had with bullying it is one that I will remember for a long time.  It probably has to do with the fact that I was bullied for most of my 6th grade year. I came into junior high very nervous, but very excited.  It was a new chapter for me and with a new chapter meant new people, older people. The bullying that I experienced was the most common type of bullying.  Now that I was in junior high, I had to get changed for PE in the locker room with the rest of the students. Going into 6th grade I was a bit overweight. I'm a big guy now, but in 6th grade I still had a lot of baby fat and some of the chubbiest cheeks in America, but I could keep up with anyone in any sport at anytime.  I loved to compete and sports gave me a way to fulfill that desire. It started in the locker room, where we changed before class. They would make fun of my body appearance and sometimes my personal hygiene. Not that I wasn't hygienic, but I think they would use anything to try and get under my skin. They did a pretty good job of it and it took a toll on me for most of the first semester my 6th grade year.  I went to the PE coach to tell them about the constant verbal abuse, but nothing changed. I got use to it. I would just take it and it wore me out every single day. I no longer enjoyed going to PE class anymore. I didn't even want to compete in the games we played, because even if I was one of the better players they wouldn't give me the credit and instead would try to shoot me down with words like fat, four eyes, faggot, and other derogatory terms.  

I want to take a step back and talk about who has the power in this situation.  You would think that the PE teacher of the class would own authority, but the teacher was just their to make a paycheck.  It was the high school baseball coach and a lot of the 8th graders that were picking on me were going to be playing on the high school team the next year, so they felt like they could get away with a lot in front of him.  The teacher didn't have the power, it was the four 8th grade assholes that not only bullied me, but some of the other 6th graders as well. I feel like this is the circumstance when it comes to bullying a lot of the time. The students just rule over the teachers and can behave however they feel.  

It didn't turn physical until around the end of my first semester.  It was a day where we played kickball and the team I was on included mostly 6th graders.  The team we were playing against was mainly 8th graders and specifically the four that were consistently bullying me.  Somehow we had won the kick ball game which didn't sit well with the 8th graders. I knew walking back into that locker room I was going to have to deal with them.  I stood in front of my locker and changed out of my uniform and into my street clothes. Before I could put my regular shirt back on, I was shoved in the back and slammed into my locker.  One of the boys said the only reason that my team won was because I was the same weight as two people and that we had an extra person on the field.

When it got physical is when I asked my dad what to do.  I didn't tell my parents about any of the prior bullying, but when it got physical I felt like I had to.  Now, I'm not saying that violence is ever the answer, but my dad told me that I have a right to protect myself and that he would stand behind me if I had to protect myself.  

So, I did.  It was during a badminton tournament in class.  I always had an advantage at this game, because I was taller. In the first round I beat one of the 8th graders that had picked on me all year.  After scoring the game point, the student paced to the net, went under the net (racket raised still in hand). He looked like he had one thing on his mind and I wasn't going to find out what that was.  I did what I had to do to protect myself and ever since that day not another kid picked on me or any of my classmates. I had stood up not only for myself, but for the rest of that 6th grade class. It is a day that I will never forget.  

References:
https://www.google.com/search?q=bullying+in+sports&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjr88fh657lAhVQqZ4KHVAJApYQ_AUIEygC&biw=697&bih=676#imgrc=1YKY6sCQ9Jh4YM:

Bullying

Back in grade school my mom was a kindergarten teacher in the west side of Chicago where it was not a safe school or area to be in. There was another school down the block and sometimes during recess kids from that school would come to the school that my mom would teach at and pick on small kids who were on the playground. The kids at my mom’s school knew not to mess with us because we were Mrs. Shannon kids and they knew what the consequences would be if they heard that we were being bullied. One day I decided to stay in my mom’s classroom to play video game on here computer while everyone else including my sister went out on the playground for recess. Some kids came in and told me that my sister was about to get into a fight with some kids from the other school down the block, I jumped up and ran outside looking for my sister and I see her pushing these 2 guys and they were about to hit her back until I stepped in and told them not to do it. My sister ran inside to get my mom and she left me 2 against 1 and people were forming a circle chanting fight, and at the time I didn’t care what would happen to me because I wanted to defend my sister. So, me and the other guys started to fight, and I was actually winning until I felt someone grab me from behind and split all of us up. My mom was cursing out the kids who tried to start a fight with my sister and then dragged me back into her classroom and told me never to get in a fight out here in the west side because you don’t know who’s carrying a gun and you don’t know who they’ll bring up to the school to kill me. At the time I thought my mom was just saying nonsense, but when I grew older and experience some of my friends getting shot not to far from the school then I knew she was looking out for me and telling me the truth. After my mom had the talk with me a few days went by and I saw the same kids who started the fight with my sister again and I went up to them and apologized even though it was my sister who started the fight, but thankfully they accepted my apology and then we all went our separated ways. That was the only time I experienced bullying since the other schools I went to made sure bullying wasn’t happening among the students. At my high school they were really strict about bullying and if they found out someone was being bullied then that person would be expelled so some people didn’t bully people in school, but they instead were cyber bullying a few students who I know, but didn’t tell teachers or anyone, I pretty much stayed out of it and did my own thing. Bullying is still happening in this generation and young people are killing themselves because they believe that is the best option for them because people like me don’t speak up and defend them. If my kids or anyone I know see someone getting bullied I hope they’ll intervene and stop it from happening.