Banning Bullying

Introduction

Bullying adversely impacts many human societies beginning in school environments, neighborhoods and gradually transcending into the larger communities as full blown criminal behaviors. Educators in collaboration with school administrators and parents have for years remained at the fore of developing a lasting solution to the mutating human society issue (Takizawa, Maughan, & Arseneault, 2014). Researchers highlight bullying as a significant contributor to suicide rate increases amongst schooling children. Astonishingly, some people say bullying should not be banned but this paper strongly advocates for a ban against bullying as it causes health issues, violence, and bystanders.

Bullying and Health Issues

There are a number of significant health concerns associated with bullying impacting both the bully and the victim (Annerbäck, Sahlqvist, & Wingren, 2014). A serious development relative to the bullying issue is the emerging fact that technology enables harassment to persist even outside school environments. Schooling children experiencing bullying either as victims or propagators of the vice suffer a diversity of health problems like backaches, dizziness depression, stomach aches, anxiety, irritability, headaches, sleeping difficulties,  suicidal tendencies and even suicide (Takizawa et al., 2014).

Bullying ought to be banned as it affects not only the physical well being of those associated in it but also their mental health statuses. Its impacts occur in the short term and have been proven to progress into the longer term (Iyer et al., 2013). It leads to physical injuries, emotional instability, social challenges, and in extreme instances, death. Bullied children are at heightened risks of mental health issues which negatively impact adjusting to learning environments.

Bullying and Depression

Researchers have uncovered a strong interconnectedness between bullying and occurrences of depression in children and teenagers (Iyer, Dougall, & Jensen-Campbell, 2013). Depression as an illness is yet to be comprehensively understood implying that it stems from a variety of sources. However, it is quite clear that an undeniable association exists between the condition and bullying. Bullying ought to be totally banned as it affects victims and their bullies to the effect that adults diagnosed with depression recall an involvement in the vice. Depression presents notable impacts that compromise a person’s quality of life. Depression and its association to bullying extends to other related health concerns like anxiety, high absenteeism rates, low self esteem and physical illness (Iyer et al., 2013). A good indicator of the strong link between the two is that teens or children known to have committed suicide are known to have undergone sorrowful experiences of depression.

Bullying and Health Complaints

Numerous scholars underscore bullying as a critical risk factor in the prevalence of poor psychological health amongst children as well as teenagers (Annerbäck, et al., 2014). Children within a bullying enabling environment are presented with greater risks in comparison to non-bullied counterparts to exhibit compromised physical health. Children in settings allowing for the propagation of bullying experience twice as many psychosomatic issues as children in low victimization environments.  Victimized children populations exhibit such psychosomatic problems as vomiting, headaches, poor appetite, dizziness, sleeping problems, skin problems, stomachaches, and bed wetting (Annerbäck, et al., 2014). It is critical to note that these notable problems in affected children and teens predict heightened rates of anxiety as well as depression in teenagers and young adults.

Decreased Academic Achievement

According to Crist, young learners who experience peer victimization and bullying not only suffer compromised physical and emotional outcomes as well as social lives but also go through experiences hindering progress in classroom engagements and schoolwork (2017). As a result, a number of school districts in the US are advocating for the full implementation of effective bully prevention initiatives. The author cites an American study conducted over an extended period which showed that children who experienced bullying while in kindergarten through to their final years in high school (Crist, 2017). Such learners manifested diminished academic self perception, low school engagement and dismal academic achievement especially in math. In most instances, bullying which begins in lower grades gradually declined in middle school as well as high school. Such learners generally showed consistent improvements in academic attainment thus, supporting for the ban on bullying towards ensuring optimized academic development in children.

Bullying and Violence

            The contemporary school environment experiences violence in diverse forms. These include discrimination, bullying, homophobia, cyber bullying, sexual and physical assault, taxing, criminal actions instigated by gangs and indirect aggression (Goodenow, Watson, Adjei, Homma, & Saewyc, 2016).  In an effort to take comprehensive action against bullying and by extension, violence in schools, it is critical that stakeholders in school systems continue raising awareness. Violence and bullying are close intertwined. Violence may be psychological, verbal, in written formats, material and sexual. Bullying manifests in similar ways in virtually all the different environments in a school setup. It also takes on indirect forms like isolation by peers, revelation of intimate secrets, exclusion, and through graffiti.

Bullying and Property Vandalism  

Economic crisis coupled with school climate challenges like violence, vandalism and bullying become considerably intense and regular when family as well as economic stressors increase (Fergusson, Boden, & Horwood, 2014). It is during such periods that budget constraints result in lesser counselors, teachers, administrators and resource officers. Children who instigate bullying are in most instances from homes harboring high stressors that lead to indiscipline and low respect for others. Similarly, victims faces family borne stressors which manifest in feelings if despair, fear, anger, or powerlessness due to social status or prior school experiences (Fergusson et al., 2014). Therefore, victims as well as the bullies are greatly predisposed to vandalism of institutional property. In most instances, this happens when bullying results in the generation of clear intent to result in suffering. Bullies may target a victim’s property while in sheer frustration; the victim may instigate vandalism against the school environment enabling such actions.

Bullying and Sexual Violence

Many contemporary scholars acknowledge that bullying is indeed a grave issue presenting negative consequences not only to the victim but to the perpetrator too. Research studies into the correlation between sexual violence and bullying have been conducted (Goodenow et al., 2016). Available literature on the issue considers sexual violence to appertain to sexual harassment as opposed to actions like rape.

According to Vivolo-Kantor and Basile (2013), a survey involving youth in middle school indicate that 12% of both genders bullied peers. 34% of boys and about 20% of girls regularly teased others calling them such names as lesbo, homo, dyke, fag or gay which implied homophobic teasing. 34% of boys and approximately 28% of girls sexually commented to other learners while 5% of boys and 7% of girls propagated sexual rumors concerning other students (Vivolo-Kantor & Basile, 2013). The researchers concluded that learners who experienced sexual harassment in lower classes tended to harass others after progressing to higher grades. This implies that banning bullying could result in learning and other community environments which do not allow sexual harassment and homophobic teasing.

Bullying and Abusive Conduct toward their Romantic Partners, Spouses, or Children as Adults

As Craig & McDowell (2013) provide, adults who engaged in bullying in adolescence tend to manifest behaviors like substance abuse, early sexual activity as well as abusive tendencies and aggression against romantic partners, spouses and even own children. This implies that teenage bullying presents grim and lasting effects (Devries, Grundlingh, & Knight, 2016). As much as the above issues may stem from other aspects as opposed to bullying, it essentially presents a notable influence not only on the bullied but to witnesses and others involved in it.

Bullying and Bystanders

Bullying instances also involve third party individuals referred to as bystanders. These individuals hear about bullying or watch it unfold. A crucial strategy against bullying involves placing greater emphasis on the powerful purpose the bystander has in prevention of this vice (Salmivalli, 2014). Bystanders can either be a solution or contribute to bullying prevalence. Researchers provide that bystanders are prone to adopt negative behaviors like substance abuse and tobacco use. These individuals’ ambivalent tendencies expose them to mental health related conditions with a high likelihood of missing schools (Salmivalli, 2014). A failure to take positive action against bullying results in a compromised school environment where students increasingly feel overpowered by a sense of insecurity, a dislike of the learning environment and by extension, suffer considerable learning difficulties.

Conclusion

            As this paper has presented, bullying negatively impacts on perpetrators, victims and by extension, by standers. It is astonishing that some people say bullying should not be banned but this paper has strongly advocated for a ban against bullying as it causes health issues, violence, and bystanders. Bullying begins as a relatively miniscule issue but progresses on as previously bully environment individuals continue propagating it through higher grades. The long term effects include substance abuse as well as sexual violence against spouses and own children. A ban on bullying is therefore, critical towards retrogressive social behaviors which result in poor quality of life to all affected.

References

Annerbäck, E. M., Sahlqvist, L., & Wingren, G. (2014). A cross-sectional study of victimisation of bullying among schoolchildren in Sweden: Background factors and self-reported health complaints. Scandinavian Journal of Social Medicine, 42(3), 270-277.

Craig, A., & McDowell, C. L. (2013). Serving at-risk teens: proven strategies and programs for bridging the gap. American Library Association.

Crist, C. (2017). School bullying linked to poorer academic achievement. Reuters. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-bullying-school-performance-idUSKBN15H2E4

Devries, K., Grundlingh, H., & Knight, L. (2016). 22. Cycles of violence in gendered social contexts: why does child maltreatment lead to increased risk of intimate partner violence in adulthood?. Handbook on Gender and Health, 375.

Fergusson, D. M., Boden, J. M., & Horwood, L. J. (2014). Bullying in childhood, externalizing behaviors, and adult offending: Evidence from a 30-year study. Journal of school violence, 13(1), 146-164.

Goodenow, C., Watson, R. J., Adjei, J., Homma, Y., & Saewyc, E. (2016). Sexual orientation trends and disparities in school bullying and violence-related experiences, 1999–2013. Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity, 3(4), 386.

Iyer, P. A., Dougall, A. L., & Jensen-Campbell, L. A. (2013). Are some adolescents differentially susceptible to the influence of bullying on depression?. Journal of Research in Personality, 47(4), 272-281.

Salmivalli, C. (2014). Participant roles in bullying: How can peer bystanders be utilized in interventions?. Theory Into Practice, 53(4), 286-292.

Takizawa, R., Maughan, B., & Arseneault, L. (2014). Adult health outcomes of childhood bullying victimization: evidence from a five-decade longitudinal British birth cohort. American journal of psychiatry, 171(7), 777-784.

Vivolo-Kantor, A. & Basile, K. (2013). Understanding the link between childhood bullying and sexual violence. stopbullying.gov. Retrieved from https://www.stopbullying.gov/blog/2013/03/19/understanding-link-between-childhood-bullying-and-sexual-violence