Bullying Punishment

Makayla McFarland

Travis Poling

English 111

8 December 2014

Bullying Punishment

        In today’s society, in this generation, bullying has never been more impactful. Even though, bullying has been around for ages, today we take it very seriously. The one thing that separates bullying today from back then is suicide. Kid’s today take it too far and end up having emotional influences on some who end up taking their own lives away. 34% of children in the U.S suffer from bullying (Connell.) Social media and networking have all made bullying a lot easier as well. It makes it easier for the bullies to sit behind a computer and bully someone. It is with out a doubt that something needs to be changed about bullying, but what do we do? Do we punish the bullies? Is that even working? From what I have witnessed and seen, bullies should definitely be held responsible for their actions.

        According to Thomas, “…punishment does not solve bullying behavior.” Throughout this article we read about some kids who have suffered from bullying. They tell their teachers, but nothing ever happens to them. They feel like they actually get punished for it more than they do. Thomas believes that the reason behind bullying is lack of empathy. Someone without empathy will not care about you or your feelings. They simply do not understand what you are going through nor do they really care. Empathy can very well be taught to someone. Mostly children by their parents and this is why some lack it, because they just do not know what it is. Thomas is against my opinion on this subject, but after reading this article, I still see no problem with punishing the bully. Just because someone was not “taught” something while they are a child definitely does not give them the right to go around bullying other kids. How can we even know for sure that they were not taught it and they just do not care? We don’t, and that’s why there should be consequences for children like this.

There are different types of bullying. Direct could be verbally or physically bullying someone. Indirect is more well, indirect. Examples are: threats, name calling, insults, or even spreading rumors about one to another. Another type of bullying could be racial bullying. Kids make fun of other kids because the color they are, or their culture. Sexual bullying, or sexual harassment, I would say, is another type of bullying that is very common in today’s society. Saying inappropriate things to someone, sending pictures to someone who clearly does not want it, or we could even go the route of saying that this could be someone who starts rumors about someone’s sexual nature.  Sexual bullying goes beyond just words, though. Touching someone in their private parts or forcing someone into doing sexual things with you also is sexual bullying (Whitted.)