The Bullying Virus
The Bullying Virus Every day, a sinister virus plagues our schools, striking fear into the hearts of innocent children. This lethal disease is identified by the common term – bullying. Studies show that 1 in every 4 students is bullied on a day-to-day basis. Another study reports that 9 out of every 10 LGBT students face harassment at school and online. Bullying contributes to a variety of concerns afflicting the student body today, including but not limited to a higher suicide rate for teens, increased amount of absences from school, and less motivation to achieve. It is time to start preventing and eliminating the bullying virus. Teens that are singled out by their peers and bullied are more likely to attempt to take their lives. A study by the center for Disease Control and Prevention shows that nearly 1 in 6 high school students has seriously considered suicide, and another 1 in 12 has seriously attempted it. In fact, the suicide rate among teens has climbed from 6.3% to 7.8% in just two years; that’s a whole 1.5% of the teenaged population! With just one spiteful word or insult, a child can unknowingly end another’s life. The bullying virus uses verbal abuse to its advantage, and words could surely bring death as easily as they could create. Some children are in such fear of their tormentors, that they’d rather skip a school day than have to face them. As many as 160,000 students stay home on any given day because they are afraid of being bullied. Some may find that an adolescent staying home for this reason is very “childish”, however, it is actually a very logical fear considering that 80% of the time, arguments with bullies evolve into physical attacks! Surely it is unfair for a kid to miss out on their opportunities for proper education because of some common bullies. We as a society should be dismantling the bully craze, as it only damages us as a whole by inducing fear in our students.