This month I will be hosting a variety of people to help me educate, advise, and encourage people to not only be aware of the bullying that occurs around them but to hopefully find positive ways to discourage it. Bullying comes in an endless variety of forms born of limitless circumstances. We all need the village to stand up and be present.
Speaking of village, I am very excited to announce that the #1000Speak community will be joining me. If you haven’t heard of the #1000Speak initiative, you can read the article that inspired the initiative HERE. This month, on March 20th, a community of over 1000 bloggers will be posting under the topic of “Building from Bullying.” If you are a blogger who would like to join the initiative you can join their facebook group HERE . Or you can show your support on twitter by using the hashtag #1000speak.
When I decided I wanted to talk about bullying here, I specifically wanted to highlight cyber-bullying. It is truly a new beast on an already vicious, multiple-headed monster. Yesterday I came across this article, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/teenager-arrested-encouraging-friend-commit-suicide-n314736 about a young girl who had encouraged her boyfriend to commit suicide. This specific case really bothered me because she was an honor student who, in the public view, was a loving and caring person. I immediately found myself wanting to hear her parents point of view about the incident. Why? Did anyone suspect?
If you go to YouTube and search “bully” you will be inundated with videos being posted by people of all ages who are trying to be heard. Where are their parents, their friends, their village?
Don’t get me wrong, I know many parents who are continually engaging their children in dialog who are suddenly in shock to find their child was reaching out to someone else. Good parents who couldn’t figure out why their child didn’t feel comfortable enough to talk to them. Many times, children don’t want to disappoint a parent and sometimes they fear their parent wouldn’t understand. In other cases, a child has a secret they are worried will be exposed. I have been that kid, the one who doesn’t want to disappoint anyone… so I get it. This is where the village comes in.
Children need us, parents need us, the community needs us ALL to be village heroes.
.
HASTYWORDS 
Thank you!
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AMEN!!! This series will be SO important, and I hope and pray it makes a difference and takes a bit of power out of such atrocities… any kind of bullying sickens me to my core. That story? Awful. I can only pray I stay plugged in to my kids’ hearts and lives, so I am aware of any such things that may sting and bite at their spirits. God help me understand if they are ever on the other side of bullying. I pray I never have to deal with such a thing.
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I have been reading submissions and I am feeling overwhelmed. I pray the confidence I am trying to instill in my own daughter and our open communication continues. We have already had to deal with bullying several times and each time she has made me proud.
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That story is disturbing on so many levels. I would like to hear from the boy’s parents as well. Was he exhibiting any signs of depression? Did they know the girl? As the parent of a 10 year old daughter, stories like this scare the living daylights out of me. I’m glad you are taking this month to shine a spotlight on bullying – it’s so important to raise awareness. I’m already thinking of ideas for my #1000Speak post on bullying for this month.
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I believe there is an actual interview with the boys mom. I haven’t watched it yet though. I just wish we could plainly see where the breakdown in communication occurred but it is never as easy as one conversation.
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I have a very strong desire to beat up bullies… but this might be construed as counterproductive…
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yea lol I have the strong desire sometimes too
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Used to get me in trouble…
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Looking forward to contributing to this!!
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Reblogged this on georgeforfun.
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I will contribute. I already have some stories on the blog publishes last year as well. Will there be some way to link up all the stories or show we just use the hash tag.
If someone does not have a blog, I am ready to publish their post at mine.
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I am so happy you are going to contribute. If you want me to post one of your stories here this month email me at hastywords@gmail.com. Also, yes we will all tweet the stories with the #1000speak and also the fb group announces a place you can put your posts on a link up when the time comes. Another thing they do is put them in an online journal. Also, they have a blog for those who aren’t bloggers called https://1000speak.wordpress.com/ .
The group welcomes everyone to do what they can and how they can…
So happy to have you join 🙂
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This is important for so many reasons, Hasty. I’m looking forward to being a part o this!
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And that video story link – unbelievable. There is definitely more to that story. So sad for all involved.
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I know… that saddest part is if you search there are literally hundreds of accounts…. it is overwhelming.
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Great topic. I have repeatedly written on bullying. Where can I submit my older posts?
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Hastywords@gmail.com
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