11% or students report incidents of bullying being a problem at their school. Children who are bullied are often singled out because of a perceived difference between them and others, whether because of appearance, intellect, ethnic or religious affiliation and sexual orientation. Kids shouldn’t be bullied just because of their size, weight or clothes. No kid should be bullied no matter what. Bullying should be stopped because many people are bullied, it has a lot of negative effects and it could lead to suicide.
There are many different statistics bout bullying. Make Beats Not Beat Downs says that 56% of students have personally witnessed some type of bullying. If more than half the kids see bullying, how many kids are actually getting bullied? The same website, Make Beats Not Beat Downs says that 282,000 students are physically attacked in secondary school each month. Being physically bullied is only one type of bullying and this is only in secondary school. Looking at this statistic imagine how many kids are victims to the other types of bullying such as cyber bullying and verbal abuse. Imagine how many kids are bullied in every grade at every school in the nation. It is really sad to know that Make Beats Not Beat Downs says “the numbers continue to rise each month.” A lot of other statistics show that many kids who are bullied miss school or link being bullied with many other things.
“Bullying is linked to many negative outcomes” says the US Department of Health and Human Services. There isn’t one story about bullying where something positive comes out of it. Bullying affects everyone, not just the person getting bullied. People who witness or actually do the bullying get affected by it in the long run. Kids who are bullied are affected by depression and anxiety. Have increased feelings of sadness and loneliness, change in sleep and eating patterns. Loss of interest in activities, health complaints and decreased academic achievements. Kids who bully abuse alcohol and other drugs. Get into fights and participate in early sexual activity. Bystanders, the people who witness bullying are surprisingly affected by bullying too. Bystanders have increases use of drugs, increased mental health problems and even miss or skip school. The most common effect people link with bullying is suicide.
Stop Bullying.org says that “Children and youth who are involved in bullying are more likely than those who aren’t involved in bullying to be depressed, have high levels of suicidal thoughts, and have attempted suicide.” Bully victims are between 2-9 times more likely to consider suicide than non-bully victims, according to studies by Yale University. Every statistic about suicide and bullying being linked together is startling. It is so sad and scary to even think that the way someone makes another person feel can lead to them wanting to kill themselves. No one wants or should have to even think about committing suicide. For the people that do feel like suicide is the answer and actually do commit suicide, you can only hope that people learn from their stories and realize that suicide should never be the answer.
Bullying should be stopped because bullying happens to everyone, it affects people in many negative ways and people often commit suicide after being bullied. If you were to ask any random person on the street if they had either witnessed or actually been bullied in any way, the answer would most likely be yes. No kid, teenager or adult deserves to be put down and no kid, teenager or adult has the right to put down another human being. Bullying is wrong in every way and we need to do everything we can to stop it.