Rebekah Donaldson (van Oostveen)

100235444
EDUC 5005
Allyson Eamer
Social & Cultural Contexts in Education


Girls being Girls?: A Story of Bullying Between Girls

The common mistake that bullies make is assuming that because someone is nice that
he or she is weak. Those traits have nothing to do with each other. In fact, it takes
considerable strength and character to be a good person (Williams, 2012).

Most people consider bullying to be a natural part of life, something that everyone has to
endure, get over, and hopefully grow because of it. Approximately 68% of adult
Canadian have reported being bullied in their past educational years, and despite the
high prevalence of bullying many consider bullying to be a common tolerable problem
(Molcho et al., 2009). Bullying is repeated aggression because of an imbalance of power
causing victimization of an individual due to teasing, gossip, being deliberately
excluded, physically threatened, or experiencing violence (Bond et al., 2001; Nansel et
al., 2001; Jansen et al, 2004).
I, unfortunately, was a victim of bullying, primarily between the ages of ten to
thirteen. This was at a time when bullying seemed to be barely even a term, not often
talked about and few policies were in place to protect victims of bullying. I lived in a very
small town near the GTA of Ontario, and my elementary school consisted of
approximately 600 students, made up from many smaller neighbouring towns. I had,
and have, a tight family based on strong family and religious values. My parents are not
divorced and both held well-respected jobs, as my father was a teacher and my mother
was a bank manager at a nearby bank. I have a younger sister (one year younger) and
brother (five years younger), both of which I am relatively close to and would protect
under any circumstance. We had a nice house close to my school that was very
comparable to my classmates, clothes on our backs, and never went hungry, however
there was also not a lot of extra money for some of the nicer things that my classmates
had available to them.
Around the end of grade five, with the life-changing event of puberty upon me, I
suddenly found myself the tallest and most developed student in my grade. This sudden
change made me feel awkward, uncoordinated, and like people were always looking at
me. This is also when I found that the relationship between my girl friends and myself
became much more difficult and strained. Before we seemed to have a happy go-lucky
attitude and would play our imaginative games at recess, laugh and talk during class,
have each other over for sleepovers and play-dates frequently, and share all of our silly
secrets. There were few of us in our grade, so all of the girls were friends with each
other, but somewhere along the line, something changed that made the friendship of our
youth a distant memory.
One girl in particular, named Carrie
*
, made life incredibly difficult for me. At the
beginning of grade five, Carrie had just moved to our town and was in my class. We, and
the rest of the girls in my class, became fast friends. Carrie was a beautiful girl, long
brown hair, big brown eyes and was fairly outgoing. Due to her leader-like personality,
she quickly became the locus of our group of friends and we all were happy to follow.
Because we lived close, Carrie and I were on the same bus, and would frequently
be over at each others houses. Carrie was from a broken household; her parents had
recently divorced and her mom, Carrie, and her younger sister had moved to our small
town because Carries mom was seeing and now living with a new man. I loved going
over to Carries house. There was a lot of land to run around on, a huge barn to play in,
and tons of stories to make up and play. Our younger sisters were close to the same age
as well, and because my mom was frequently working, we often went to Carries house
after school with my little brother in tow and played to our hearts content, or at least
until dinner time when my mom would pick us up. Needless to say, our families became
quite close over a short period of time, and they even came over for Christmas dinner
that year.
Near the end of grade five something between Carrie and I changed. She started
avoiding me and not talking to me as often, which made it even more difficult to go over
to her house when things seemed so awkward. Finally I confronted her about it, and she
sweetly said that nothing was wrong. A few days later a friend told me that she was
saying rude things about me to the other girls. I did not believe it, and I kept it to myself,
pretending that nothing was wrong. Eventually I heard that she was starting rumours
about me, that I smelled and that I was a bitch, and ironically a slut (had any of us done
anything more than kissing tag?). I again confronted her and she said she was sorry and
didnt mean it. Things got better for a few days or weeks, but then the rumours started
again and all of a sudden the girls were picking sides. Some days I had a couple friends
that swore that they would never trust Carrie again, but other days it was just me, all by
myself. Soon, it was more often myself and I found myself with fewer friends and more
loneliness.
At the beginning of grade six, I still did not have many friends, the rumours
continued and I frequently came home crying and upset about the situation. I didnt
know who to talk to besides my parents, and my parents supported me. They
understood why I didnt want to be friends with Carrie anymore and promised that
things would get better soon; it was just a trend.
In the winter of that school year, I remember having these horrible neon yellow
snow pants and big white boots. Both of which I had no choice but to wear because they
were all that fit me, and my parents were not going to purchase others due to fashion
trends. This became another thing to tease me about. One day, I went to put on my big
white winter boots and there were nasty things written all over them with neon yellow
highlighter. They wrote things like wicked bitch of the west, slut and nerd among
many things. I obviously had to tell my teacher and explain to my parents. My teacher,
calling my parents, recommended that we have a meeting between Carrie and myself
and our parents to finally settle the issue. There was no discussion between Carrie and
the teacher, or even myself and the teacher, although he could tell I was visibly upset.
We had the meeting between our families in my living room and that consisted of
our moms playing mediators. I tried my hardest not to cry and be strong, but eventually
Carrie admitted that she didnt like me and then her mom forced her to say that she was
sorry. I recall feeling unsatisfied after the meeting, but everyone else seemed happy that
it happened. After the meeting things seemed a little be better, but she kept pulling the
other girls away with her and I was still lonely. Finally Carrie convinced almost everyone
in the grade to say WBW to me randomly throughout the day, then the week, then the
month. They would say it and then giggle, laugh or smirk and wait for my response. I
had no idea what that meant, and it took me forever to figure it out. Finally I realized
what that stood for: Wicked Bitch of the West. It was horrible. I cried and cried. I
realized that things were never going to get better, and I had no idea what to do, how to
make things better. I couldnt move to a new school, I couldnt stay home from school
every day, I couldnt change my looks (I had limited resources, I was in grade six!),
people didnt give me the chance to be a good person. It seemed fairly hopeless, but I did
survive.
As melodramatic as it sounds, things continued as generally awful until the
middle of grade seven when a new girl moved into our class, and she was shunned right
away too for being a little overweight and new. We became good friends (and still are)
right away mostly due to necessity, but it stuck. I was no longer alone, and I realized that
she was a much better friend than Carrie ever was in the past. The teasing didnt stop
until much later, but we had each other and that made things a lot better. The good
friends from before eventually came back and I did have a very happy high school life.
My situation is not unique. There are many other girls who have gone through a
similar experience. Girls often bully in an indirect manner using rumours and exclusion
to make their point (Fekkes, Pijper, Verhoove-Vanhorick, 2005). It happens frequently
because the bully wants to strengthen their power over the victim with repeated
attempts at making the victim vulnerable (Janssen et al., 2004). Although I do not
entirely know the reasons why Carrie felt the need to bully me, a lot of bullies do so
because of low self-esteem, a high number of insecurities, and unhappiness (Nansel et
al., 2001). Carrie may have felt jealous about my home life being that hers was not
perfect, she may have felt insecure about her social status, her body image at the time,
or was unhappy with something I had unintentionally done.
I wouldnt necessarily say that the bullying didnt have any long-term effects. I
know that my self-esteem was considerably lower; it definitely caused me to change my
personality as I became more introverted, and it caused me to have some trust issues
with many of my friends. These are not uncommon results of bullying. Bullying victims
tend to experience mental and physical health issues, depression, have lower self-
esteem, less assertive and higher levels of anxiety (Fekkes, Pijper, Verhoove-Vanhorick,
2005). I did not experience all of the previous symptoms, however, I was depressed
during the situation but I had a strong family support and a well-balanced home life,
which could have made the difference between continuing to strive through the
difficulties and becoming a bullying statistic. The experience caused lower self-esteem
about my body image and abilities. Also, to this day I am still incredibly anxious when
going into large group activities and get-togethers (even with close friends). With some
of my close friends I have a difficult time trusting that they are going to be there for me
and not switch sides. Trust has also affected my marriage where I think that he will
eventually decide that there is someone better than me, or that he just does not like me
any more (much like Carrie did). Again this is not unique, individuals who have been
bullied have self-reported many of these traits up until the age of 23 or 24 (Nansel et al.,
2001).
It is scary to think about how my situation would have been different because in
todays world bullying behaviours start in the school yard, but are carried to the cyber
world as well (Cassidy, Jackson, Brown, 2009). This is terrifying because at least my
home was safe from the trials I faced at school, but kids today have little hope of
escaping if cyber-bullying continues through social networking sites and cell phones. In
accordance with Cassidy et al. (2009), I agree with some of the suggestions of needed
change in educational policy in terms of how bullying is presented to students and dealt
with by school personnel. They suggest that in order to reduce the prevalence of bullying
students need to be educated about bullying and the effects of bullying, but also
implementing an anonymous phone-in line for reporting bullying. Educators are
recommended to foster a school culture that lifts students self-esteem and to frequently
talk about bullying issues and develop solutions specific to the incidents.
In Ontario, the Safe Schools Act which was put into place in 2000, helps to
protect students by implementing a code of conduct for all students and does address
problems with bullying and respect issues (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2012). In a
Safe Schools Action Team Report (Ontario Ministry of Education, 2009), it
recommends action for schools to put in place for individuals experiencing gender-
based violence, sexual harassment, inappropriate sexual behaviour and homophobic
issues. I believe had both of these reports been implemented and used in my situation,
there may have been much more support from my teacher, and my parents. In a 2005
study, approximately 53% of students reported bullying to their teachers, and of those
only 49% of teachers were successful in stopping or preventing the bullying (Fekkes,
Pijper, Verhoove-Vanhorick, 2005). If more teachers knew about the bullying, and tried
to intervene, there is a chance that fewer students would continue to be bullied to the
point where they are significantly depressed and think of ending their life.
I am eternally grateful for the intervention, while small, that my teacher made
and the intervention of my parents. Without those three people caring about me, I
probably would have entered a different lifestyle and may have had a much different
ending. The bigger concern is for those students that do not report bullying and the
suffering that continues in silence; for those students I know your voice and I know
some of what life may hold for you and I pray that it does get better.


References:
Bond, L. (2001). Does bullying cause emotional problems? A prospective study of
young teenagers. BMJ, 323, 480-483.

Cassidy, W., Jackson, M., & Brown, K. (2009). Sticks and stones may break my
bones, but how can pixels hurt me?: Students experiences with cyber-bullying.
School Psychology International, 30(4), 383-402. doi:
10.1177/0143034309106948

Fekkes, M., Pijpers, F., & Verhoove-Vanhorick, S. (2005). Bullying: who does what,
when and where? involvement of children, teachers and parents in bullying
behaviour. Health Education Research, 20(1), 81-91.

Janssen, I. et al. (2004). Associations between overweight and obesity with bullying
behaviours in school-aged children. Pediatrics, 113(5), 1187-1194.

Molcho, M. et al. (2009). Cross-national time trends in bullying behaviour 1994-
2006 findings from Europe and North America. International Journal of Public Health,
54, S1-S10.

Nansel, T. et al. (2001). Bullying behaviours among us: Prevalence and association
with psychosocial adjustment. Journal of American Medical Association,
285(16), 2094-2100.

Ontario Ministry of Education. (2009). Shaping a culture of respect in our schools:
promoting safe and healthy relationships (ISBN 1-4249-8558-6). Toronto:
Queens Printer For Ontario.

Ontario Ministry of Education. (2012). Making our schools safer: Improving learning
& teaching environments. Retrieved on Nov. 30, 2012 from
HYPERLINK "http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/safeschl/eng/student.html" http://
www.edu.gov.on.ca/safeschl/eng/student.html

Williams, M. E. (2012). Goodreads mary elizabeth williams. Retrieved on Nov.30
from HYPERLINK "http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/
2750319.Mary_Elizabeth_Williams" http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/
2750319.Mary_Elizabeth_Williams