Essay about Bullying: Self-esteem and Significant Social Issue

Submitted By SydneyJayy
Words: 520
Pages: 3

Bullying Strong, influential and cruel are just some of the words that come to mind when you hear the word bully. In American culture, bullying among children and teenagers has often seemed dismissed as a normal part of growing up. Not a lot of attention gets noticed at how devastating effects of bullying , or to the connection between bullying and other forms of violence. Bullying in the American educational system seems to be a significant social issue that steadily increases. According to the ‘Facts about Bullying’, “one in seven students either gets bullied or becomes a victim. About 56% of students have personally witnessed some type of bullying at school, 15% of all school absences directly relate to fears of being bullied at school, 71% of students report incidents of bullying as a problem at their school. One out of 20 students has seen a student with a gun at school”. Majority of us have had to deal with a schoolyard bully at some point in our lives. Whether the more direct type ( physical) or more along the lines of subtle in their bullying ( called you names, incited peers to gang up on you, made people stop hanging around you) the fact remains that bullies has existed as an obstacle for children and teens alike since olden times, and while schools try to stop bullying, the behavior has not stopped just yet. So what to do about it? Currently there are 28 states that follow a "three-strikes law", like the baseball rule it refers to, it means that if a person commits three crimes, they are considered by the law to be a habitual offender and have a extremely harsh sentence, such as life imprisonment without parole. Not suggesting that children or teens should get thrown in jail for bullying their peers, I would say that implementing a similar yet less severe method within the schools might not be such a bad idea. In other words, if a student has been proven in three separate instances to be a persistent bully,