Evaluate a significant experience, achievement, risk you have taken, or ethical dilemma you have faced and its impact on you.
Bullying is an interesting dilemma, on one hand there are the
psychologists and behavior therapists trying to find the root of the
issue, trying to find someone to blame. On the other hand there are the
administrators desperately trying to convince parents it's fine to send
their children to school, as the problem is under control. And on no
hand in particular there was eleven-year-old me, and a bully was my
problem. His name was Jim, a smooth talking 2nd-generation Korean with a
history of soccer and non-competitive gymnastics. He had four inches on
me and a mean streak a quarter mile long. His methods were by no means
unorthodox, a dumped out backpack here, a shove and a name called there.
I knew the three rules for dealing with bullies; they had been taught
to my entire graduating third grade class:
1. Tell a yard duty,
2. stay with a friend,
3.
never egg them on. This miracle cure did little to fix my predicament.
California school budgets were on a steady landslide and the yard duties
weren't the most motivated arbiters. I was the new kid in town, that
meant people avoided me like a plague doctor in Western Europe, and the
fact that the resident bully had turned his eye on me meant that I was
going to hold that title for quite some time. The mere idea that a bully
is egged on is completely contrary to the idea of a bully: one who
pushes, not because he has found a response, but because he is seeking a
response. To this day, I am not sure who these rules were written for,
but it is clear that they were not written for me.
“Just bust his head open,” my fourteen year old brother suggested
nonchalantly, as my mother drove us to Boyscouts one evening. Now I was a
very scrawny child growing up: the doctors said that I was underweight,
undertall, and none too athletic. The idea that I could bust anyone's
head open was outright preposterous. My dear mother chimed in, almost on
cue, with the ever-so cooing motherly response that fighting was never
the answer and that I should try working things out with him. Now it was
true that I had no inclination to fight him, and while the advice
certainly would make sense
a priori, I was finding out very quickly that talking to a bully only shows them that they are getting through.
My mother was forced to begin work early so that she could get off
in time to pick me and my brother up from school, so I spent countless
mornings over the years sitting in the office waiting for school to
begin. Now the day prior my bully felt it was time to kick his bullying
up a notch with new complex insults and fake out jabs meant to induce
flinching, and my anxiety was mounting. I was no Hercules, yet there I
sat in the waiting room of Hades, watching the moments tick by until my
oppressor would arrive, with naught but the steady clack of the
receptionist's acrylic nails upon a keyboard to calm my nerves. Flimsy
advice from the previous night buzzed in my head. After what felt like
an eternity, the school bell rang, and I shuffled to my home room. We
met in the hallway, his knowing smile to my grimace told me he knew
exactly what I was thinking. “I'll see you at lunch time,” and that was
all he needed to say. By this time my fear had manifested itself into
sheer panic, and my brain was mentally check-listing all of my options.
My last attempt at being sent to the nurse's office had been
unsuccessful. The first break came and went with no sign of my
tormentor. Lunch passed quickly until a wrong turn in an empty hallway
brought me face to face with my villain. “Hello Scotty the potty,” he
said intimidatingly, employing the latest of his nicknames. I did not
run, I could not run, but I could fall, and fall I did. I stumbled over
my feet as I turned to escape and landed flat on my face. This, my bully
seemed to find quite hilarious, and he could not contain his laughter.
It was not the cruel mocking laughter I had grown accustomed to hearing
from him, it was a genuinely funny chuckle. I immediately recognized my
impossible chance and fell again, this time on purpose, topping it off
with a somersault and a funny face. “Better not touch me,” I said, “I'm a
potty and I stink!” My impromptu tactic seemed to be working, and
before long my antagonist and I were in hysterics, hopelessly late for
class. We would grow to be good friends, and the differences we had
assumed in each other turned out to be nothing more than assumptions. So
I defeated my bully, or at least befriended him, which upon reflection
was a great deal more rewarding than what conventional wisdom teaches
would have been the solution.
But what did I learn? My bully was not the only one who was guilty
of wrongs against his fellow man. I learned that his hostility towards
me was due, in part, to my shyness upon our first meeting, which he
interpreted as animosity. I subconsciously categorized him as a fool and
an intimidator, in less polite terms, and considered him someone to be
avoided at all costs. I adhered to my judgment in every one of our
subsequent meetings; he did not start out as a bully, I made him into
one through my disdain. My reluctance to listen to the advice of my
mother was, until that point, a recurring theme despite my Christian
upbringing. This blatant flaw in my own personal understanding was made
painfully clear to me through the undeniable outcome of my ordeal. I
also discovered within myself the latent ability to make milk come out
the noses of young children, a skill that has garnered me a great deal
of popularity among the cub scouts that I preside over on Wednesday
evenings. Here I am today: smarter, more outgoing, slower to judge, and
far more blessed, both in friendship and family than I could have ever
been without my bully and dear friend.
*P&P
