To Whom It May Concern

My Kid Beat Up Your Honor Student

My dad used to comment on how he should have had that as a bumper sticker on his car. Honestly though that would have been more in tune with my little brother than myself, although he never started fights, Paul would finish them with a vengeance, every so often taking on more than one and kicking a lot of ass in the process. I may have been able to do that too but I never really got the opportunity, I was more of a 'flee' type of person, that is probably how I became such a good runner in track and cross country.

But even so I got picked on a lot, especially before I got into high school. I can remember times when riding the school bus as a 4th grader, two 8th graders would sit behind me and punch me in the back of the head so hard that I would have welts on my head later on that night when I would run my fingers over where they had been hitting me. And they thought it was so funny to do. This sort of thing can really get to a person. There were times when I would get off the bus crying at night after the bus route. Complaining to the bus driver did nothing, either I would be told to sit down or it would be even worse because they would see me complain, but she never did anything to stop them. If anything, that was even more encouraging to them because they never felt the need to hide it any longer and it got even worse.

I would have to say that those two, along with probably half a dozen other kids I went to school with, would fall into a small category of "People I'd Like To Get In A Small Room With A Locked Door Today". Me as an 8th grader = 5'3, 110 lbs. Me now = 6' tall, 185 lbs. Don't think though that I sit here and constantly dream of beating the crap out of people like Shane White or fat Corey Parriot, I could care less about them really. But one time a friend of mine at a guard drill asked me a poignant question about whether or not I had anyone that I would flat out haymaker punch to the face if I saw them today, without a word being spoken, and to that I answered an honest yes, but with some thought after that, I think I would probably antagonize the person in question to try and hit me first, then put them down and wail on them.

If you sit there shocked that I would even think that way, consider being me my 8th grade year, being chased as I would try and get to the cafeteria to simply eat lunch, so they could beat on me, or having a milk shake dumped on my head while I sat in the cafeteria, or being depantsed in front of the entire 7th and 8th grade volleyball teams (although this was actually funny later on, because the guy that did that was actually a pretty decent guy later on). After awhile, the idea of beating the crap out of them becomes really secondary to some very dark and horrible dreams of what I'd really like to do to them.

This is why I see things like Columbine and I shake my head, and I cannot entirely fault the two boys who did the crimes. WHAT??? you may say, and be horribly shocked that I would even think this way, but honestly, if I would have had a gun in my hand at times during junior high, I would have shot the people that made my life a living hell for YEARS and not even blinked. I would not targeted innocent people based on groups though, as the Columbine duo did, but God help me, after torture and torment day after day after week after month, without any help from anyone to stop it from happening, something starts to snap in your mind. I wouldn't have ever gone home and taken a gun to school however, so don't think that I was actually ever planning something like that, I just merely want to state that I cannot sit back and blame events that occur entirely on kids like those two from Columbine, because I think your bullying jocks and preppies and others have to take a large chunk of responsibility for thier actions when it comes to teasing and beating on someone incessantly to the point where something snaps and they go crazy like that.

Then when these things do happen, you see the media all over it, with every channel talking about the kids doing the shooting, it's the biggest attention rush ever, this is the other reason kids do something like this, for the attention, that is why I don't think the media should cover it at all, they shouldn't ever use the kids name, and never ever do this day after day live continual coverage like Columbine, that is why we have copy cat style school shootings, kids who crave attention know they are going to get a nationwide hit of it if they start shooting at school.

Back to the bullying part, I guess you have to ask how you would stop something like that from happening? For my part, I just wish I would have had a teacher or someone who would have recommended that I kick one of them in the balls or just punch them as hard as I could, just once, because looking back, that would have been the best thing, in fact, that's what I recommended my brother do, and he did, and that got him a long ways. Don't sit there shocked at that attitude, if I could change one thing it would be to have fought back, at every opportunity, when someone was going overboard and beating on me, because all I ever got for advice from teachers and administrators was to ignore it, and pretend it doesn't happen. Hmm, that's pretty interesting, that's what they did, and it seemed to work out for them just fine, unfortunately, it never worked out so fine for me.

Did it affect me now, yes, in a good way actually, because I will never EVER let my kids treat anyone with the blatant disrespect that a lot of those jackasses treated me with, and I will also instill within them to not only fight back for themselves, but also to fight back if they see someone else being mistreated also. Pretending things arent' happening doesn't make them go away, no matter how many times some fat useless school administrator tells you that.