There I was, in the male changing room of High School, being beaten with the metal side of a tennis racket across my forearms.
The pain surged through me with every strike, but the physical damage wasn’t the worst part.
Each strike crushed my self-belief. My tormentor was emasculating me, making me feel worthless, ugly, and disgusting.
The most baffling part was why he was doing it. I had done and said nothing to him.
Back then, my abuse was endemic. Every day someone abused me verbally and physically.
My experiences of abuse as a teenage boy have flavored every experience in my life. This is the impact that bullying has on young men.
. . .
The various forms of bullying.
Bullying is unwanted aggressive behavior. It doesn’t have to occur at school, although this is where my experience lies.
For bullying to be successful, there has to be a perceived power imbalance, and the behavior needs to be repeated over time.
Many think of “bullying” as harmless japes in the playground — a rite of passage or “roughhousing.” I prefer “abuse,” which bullying would be called if it occurred at home.
There are three main types of bullying:
- Verbal bullying is the one that crushed me the most. It includes teasing, taunting, threats, and inappropriate sexual comments.
- Physical bullying is the most obvious, including hitting, kicking, spitting, pushing, breaking someone’s possessions, or any unwanted physical contact.
- Social bullying involves hurting someone’s reputation or relationships, such as telling other children not to be friends with someone, spreading rumors, or intentionally embarrassing someone in public.
. . .
The effects of bullying on a young person.
Bullying damages mental health and can lead to suicide. Indeed, many of my peers told me to kill myself, that no one loved me, and that the world would be better off without me. I used to hear this weekly.
Many victims suffer from Depression and anxiety. I used to dread going to school and could imagine what kind of abuse I would get that day.
Sometimes I would cry with rage when I got home at my inability to stand up for myself. I fantasized about causing my tormentors great harm but was terrified of confrontation.
Some children do poorly at school as a direct result of bullying. They miss, skip or drop out of school altogether.
Occasionally, an abused young man snaps and goes on a rampage. This is rare but shows what can happen when you push someone too far.
Most importantly, being bullied destroys your confidence. You risk going through life with no resilience or self-esteem. Many victims avoid conflict by withdrawing from society altogether.
. . .
Dealing with bullying.
1. Ignore where possible.
Initially, when it comes to verbal bullying, the best strategy is to ignore it. Verbal bullies act cruelly to get a reaction from you.
If you react angrily or in fear, you give the bully what they want, and you’ll likely be targeted further.
Do your best to walk away and contain your emotions. It’s tedious to pick on someone who doesn’t respond, and they may give up.
Ignoring is not a luxury when dealing with physical or even social bullying. You can’t stand by while your reputation is crushed and ignore being punched, kicked, or hit with a tennis racket.
. . .
2. Seek help from a trusted adult or authority figure.
You can’t do this alone, and you shouldn’t have to. If any forms of bullying get you down, you need to seek help.
Keeping your emotions bottled up is dangerous for your mental health.
Find someone you can trust who has authority. This could be your parents, a teacher, or another adult.
If your abuse is occurring online, you can report it through the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre.
I told my parents. My dad reacted with frustration that I wouldn’t stand up for myself. My mum was calmer in her reaction, but nothing positive occurred. They came to my school to talk to the head teacher, but it did no good.
By that stage, my bullying was on too vast of a scale, and my reputation was too damaged.
. . .
3. Build a support network of friends.
If you’re lucky enough to have a support network of friends, a bully (fundamentally a coward) won’t take you all on.
Think of it as a temporary shield to protect you while more long-lasting change occurs with the other steps.
At school, I hardly had any friends. There was no support network. But things changed when I went to College (between 16 and 18).
I took up Karate and started losing weight. I changed my hairstyle and dressed better. Some of my former bullies noticed and started talking to me.
I’m sad to say I lapped up the attention and began fraternizing with the enemy.
One guy even told me they had misjudged me at school and that I was “alright.”
In the early stages of College, some people still called me the occasional name, but my new friends stood up for me. They had a reputation for being tough, and soon, no one messed with me.
A strong network of friends and an emerging self-confidence are bully repellants.
. . .
4. Stand up for yourself.
Sometimes nothing else works, and a confrontation is inevitable. If you reach this stage and you’ve tried all the other steps, remember it’s not you that asked for this.
Your hand has been forced.
Start verbally. Tell them to leave you alone and that you aren’t going to stand for any more abuse. Let them know you’re involving other people — adults and peers — so staying away is in their best interest.
Do all you can to avoid a physical fight. Some bullies may back down.
Reacting violently sends the message that you’re upset, and that’s the bully’s aim.
Once you get violent, there’s no way of knowing how things will turn out. Maybe you’ll be hurt. Perhaps you will cause a lot of damage and get in big trouble.
However, self-defense may be the only way if you’re being physically assaulted. In that instance, your focus isn’t revenge but escape, and you’ll need to be able to justify your actions.
I remember a fellow student who kept punching me in the arm. He did this relentlessly all day whenever I walked past him. My arm was throbbing, and my heart was aching at the abuse I kept getting.
By the end of the day, I needed it to stop. As he came towards me to hit me again, I punched him in the mouth.
He threatened to kill me after school but shook my hand the next day and apologized.
I don’t know where his mind was when he felt it necessary to assault me — I was a stranger to him.
Notice here I used the minimum of force to stop a physical assault. Self-defense is the only situation where a physical response can be deemed acceptable.
. . .
The pain from being bullied has never left me.
Long after the physical wounds heal, the mental scars linger. My arm, legs, groin, and face have all recovered from the beatings I endured.
But my mental state has never been the same.
I’m 42 now. I have a black belt in Karate; I was an amateur boxer and used to lift weights six days a week.
I became a Police Officer and dealt with many violent encounters, including with people who wanted me dead. I’ve saved lives.
Yet inside part of me is still the scared young man I was at 16. And it colors everything.
- I get jealous of other people’s success because it brings up feelings of inadequacy.
- I push myself physically because I need to be the toughest in the room, so no one bullies me.
- I rarely asked girls on dates because I was told how ugly I was for years.
- I overreact to any perceived slight or disrespect so that people get the message not to mess with me.
- I dislike people in general and avoid most social situations because I don’t want the hassle of having some confrontation.
This is the legacy of bullying. The chances are my abusers have long forgotten about me. But I remember them vividly.
Being held down and beaten with a bat and having a teacher join in the verbal abuse can affect your brain chemistry.
Most of the time, I use these things as fuel to push me further and harder and help me achieve my dreams.
But when I’m lying in bed in the early morning hours, I sometimes still feel the pain of that teenage boy crying out for someone to save him.
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This post was previously published on Publishous.
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