Bullying is Never Okay

It was a mistake. ........... Maybe calling it a mistake is a tad strong. Call what happened as unforeseen, unpredicted; just something I found while looking for something else.

It matters little how I got here. It wasn't the trip, it's where I ended up. But I guess I need to share. 

This is a backwards post today. My normal blogging process, flipped upside down. First, I found  the tune. Next, I am creating a post that might only work as a background or sidekick, or maybe just end up something I added for no apparent or coherent reason.

I really fucked with my process. Before I had written a word, I found a selfie I considered pertinent and messed with it, giving that image a point, a focus, a reason for being included.

To top it all off, I apparently decided to make little sense with as many words as I could muster. I'm over fifty words into today's nonsense, and the words have not offered even a small clue what this post is about. 

The images might help. They might even do the job I came to do without any need to punish anyone with words.  So, I am debating if I should just let the images and the tune make my point; use the words as background decorations, black and white noise that can be read with no need to be understood. Or do I toss them out completely?

......................

Bullying is, or should I say, was a complex issue for me as a youngster. Depending on the new environment I constantly found myself in, bullying was either a top comcern out of the gate or it wasn't. The more insular communities I moved to always had the worst bullies; bullies who often ruled the playground or the walk home with real force, not just mamby - pamby push and shove contests.

I developed many defensive tactics against the bullying and the struggle to fit in as fast as possible. Being athletic opened the doors sooner. Standing up to the biggest bully in school often worked. But being smart and a library nerd was not the path to acceptance without taunts. I hated running into classmates at the libraries I often spent time in. News of my fall from grace always made it to the one asshole I didn't want to deal with. I even wrote a fictional piece about my run ins at libraries. It is called "My Oubliette". It was a flash fiction piece written as part of a weekly writing challenge.

For a very brief period I decided that being a bully was the way to find popularity. I was never a good bully. I just didn't have the nasty temperament needed to pull it off. I felt more comfortable fighting the bullies, embarrassing them and sometimes, when confronted by more than one, running. 

It wasn't until I went to Charlotte Hall Military Academy that I embraced the bully life style. Hazing (the PC name for Bullying)... 

Bullying was an integral part of the life at the school. Everyone was bullied at some point, usually in their first year. Those K-dets who didn't smarten up and join in the fun often became targets as long as they were there. 

I put up with it my first year. I had no choice. My junior year though was a different matter. I occasionally joined in on the Hazing/Bullying, but more often than not I stepped around it and concentrated on defending myself from the residual taunting from my first year. A few fights and I had moved up the Apex ladder. I was mostly left alone from then on. But I would be lying if I claimed I never bullied anyone. And I won't argue the point that because hazing was everywhere, it was okay.

Bullying is never okay.

Keep it tween the ditches .................................

__________________________

Like I mentioned at the start of this post, I found the song for it before I had even considered what to write. I felt this song deserved my attention. I had never heard of Gaz Brookfield. "Be a Bigger Man", a song about bullying is excellent. I experienced both sides of Bullying. I have no shame, just regrets that for that short period I became that which I detested.