Beating Bullying

Last Friday, Northpark had an overnight campout for their youth, which I got to help out with. The youth group is, as the youth pastor described, "bottom-heavy", with a lot of junior high kids and fewer high school students. One of the lingering feeling after spending ~9 hours with them (from around 6 at night to 3 in the morning), is "Wow. Kids can be so mean!"

There's one kid in particular who seemed to be picked on and laughed at the most. He was the kid that everyone else particularly liked to see lose games and the kid who was told to stop talking in conversation. It probably had a lot to do with his youth (he was in 6th grade), general empty-headedness, and tendancy to talk non-stop about random, irrelevant things. While I don't think that most of the remarks, laughs, or snickers directed at him were malicious or particularly hurtful, I couldn't help but feel sorry for him.

I got a chance to talk to him a little sitting out at the campfire, and after I asked him what school he was attending, he told me that he was going to a new school this year. I asked him why he switched schools, and he said something to the effect of "I was tired of being shoved into lockers and being called names." Man, stuff like this breaks my heart. The mild teasing and mostly-innocent remarks tossed his way at his youth group are probably nothing compared to what he went through at school, but the church family should a haven of safety and love, as cheesy as that sounds.

The topic of bullying actually came up during the campfire conversation, and one of the kids told us a story of a bully getting beat up at his school. Apparently, a kid was picking on a mentally handicapped kid, when a football player came and told him to cut it out and beat him up. After he told the story, there was this general gladness that justice had been served, but I wish the kids could see that they could also make a difference in the life of the kid being made fun of right in front them.

I'm not sure how many people I've shared this with, but I was bullied as an elementary school kid to the point that my mom came to school to talk to the kids and my teachers. (Some of you may be thinking "Hah! I knew it! No wonder he can be such a jerk sometimes.") I wouldn't say that the bullying was especially malicious or hurtful compared to some of the stuff we hear on the news or see other people going through, and I certainly wasn't the "most-bullied" kid in school, but I still know that hurt and loneliness and fear of being bullied.

Through my awkward pre-teen years, when I often hated everyone around me at school, there was the rare person who whose kindness made the biggest difference ever. I always had my own group of friends, but there's really something about a more "popular" kid being nice to me even when he had nothing to gain, and probably more to lose, that made a huge difference.

In fourth grade, it was Matt Sullivan. "Sullie" was the funny, athletic kid that everyone liked. In that era of constantly being unncessarily football-tackled while playing goalie during reccess soccer, he was the one guy that was kind to me. I won't pretend to remember what exactly he did for me, but to this day, I can clearly remember his face, and the sadness I had when I found out that he moved away the year after.

In sixth grade, when we were in trailers at Asher Holmes, it was Mike Canetta. He was the nice, seemingly rich Jewish (or Catholic?) kid, as all the popular kids seemed to be. Despite my complete uncoolness which I will readily admit, he was kind to me. In that point of childhood when clothes and other material possessions all of a sudden mattered, I remember very clearly him spending the time to teach me the cultural must-knows, like what zip-off pants and Abercrombie and Fitch were.

I could probably count on one finger the other people I remember from my fourth and sixth grade classes, and I certainly don't remember what any of those kids looked like, but the impact these two young kids made on another young, awkward kid will never be forgotten. Here's to you, Matt Sullivan and Mike Canetta. Your small acts of kindness turned out to make a huge difference in my life. Thank you.