Posted by hyperfocus on September 28, 2011, at 22:55:03
It's bad enough that this happens:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2039801/Bullied-gay-teen-Jamey-Rodemeyer-commits-suicide-Thanks-Lady-Gaga-post.htmlbut then:
Bullies are continuing to plague a grief-stricken family even after the suicide of their 14-year-old gay son. New York student Jamey Rodemeyer killed himself after repeatedly complaining about bullies at his school and after making a heart-breaking YouTube video where he talked of his hopes for a better future. Now those same bullies chanted "we're glad he's dead" when Jamey's 16-year-old sister, Alyssa, attended a homecoming dance. "She was having a great time, and all of a sudden a Lady Gaga song came on, and they all started chanting for Jamey, all of his friends," Jamey's mom, Tracy, said on the Today Show. "Then the bullies that put him into this situation started chanting, 'You're better off dead!' and 'We're glad you're dead!'"Alyssa "came home in tears," said her mom. "It turned into bullying even after he's gone." Her dad added: "I cant grasp it. I dont know why anyone would do that. They have no heart."
http://www.newser.com/story/129689/bullies-taunt-gay-suicides-sis-were-glad-hes-dead.htmlIn my first year at a new school one of the students died in a boating accident a few weeks after the start of the term. I didn't know him very well except for a few times when he sat next to me. But his death affected me. I wasn't really sad or in grief - what I felt was like 3 parts sadness and 7 parts wonder. I thought that, wow, A. sat next to me, he talked and breathed and laughed and lent me a pencil...and now he's dead, under the sea on the bottom maybe. I mean I _felt_ his death as a profound thing even though I wasn't grieved by it. It took me a while to get over those feelings. So then how is it that these kids can see this poor boy's death - which occurred at their own hands - as an opportunity for more ridicule and abuse? Is it that they're too young to understand what they did?
One rationale for bullying I can accept is that the kids don't know or understand what they're doing or the damage they're inflicting on another human being. It's like their capacity for empathy and compassion hasn't developed yet - the same kids who enjoy kicking dogs or setting fire to cats will develop eventually into rational adults. When you read about killings or shootings in schools like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.O._Green_School_shooting you can rationalize that ok these kids had a lot of hate in them for sure, but still the whole incident to them was like a video game or a scene from a bad action movie. At some level they don't really understand the consequences of their actions. But taunting a grieving family over the suicide of their son? It seems inhuman. So why does this happen? Why does this kind of sadism occur in kids so young?
I mean it can't be than 10-15 kids out of 100 in that year are sociopaths - the rate of incidence isn't that high. Is there some sort of group-effect that enables any large group of people, regardless of age, to act in the most callous way possible - to the point that death itself isn't enough to satisfy their need to hurt someone? Is bullying some sort of precursor to Nazism or genocide?
C-PTSD: social phobia, major depression, dissociation.
Currently: 300mg amitriptyline single dose at night.
Also: Allegra, 1000mg Vitamin C.
Improving.
poster:hyperfocus
thread:998204
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20110910/msgs/998204.html