A Very Real Problem in America

           “Be Kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle,” a Greek Philosopher once said.  They had it right in 427 BC, for everyone you know is fighting a hard battle whether socially, economically, physically, or mentally.  Why make this battle harder than it has to be for a fellow human being?  That’s what 13 million kids ask them selves each year.   High school is hard enough for teens whom are required to balance academics, athletics, extra curricular activities, and friends.  Yet, when a teen is harassed on a day-to-day basis the dynamics change.  Their life is consumed by worry and fear for their own well-being.  The harassment strips the target of any confidence and in many tragic cases takes away their will to live.  Over half of teen suicides are linked to bullying.   And on this very day 160,000 students did not attend school due to their fear of attack or intimidation by other students.   These statistics should stop us in our tracks, and force us to identify that there is a very, very real problem going on: bullying. 

In America today weakness is often times viewed as failure; we do everything we can to build up the outside even if on the inside we are distraught.  Many teens associate being a victim of bullying to being weak.  Teens want to disguise any signs of weakness from close friends and family, so they keep their walls up and when they eventually cannot take the harassment any longer they crack. "Why don't you go home and shoot yourself, no one will miss you" this is what a classmate told Eric Mohat, and he indeed took it literally (ABC News' information specialist Melissa Lenderman).   Instead of enduring one more day of the name-calling, teasing and constant pushing and shoving Eric Mohat took his own life.  He put an end to everything he has ever known due to the words and actions of his classmates.  He not only destroyed his own life, but his parent’s lives as well; "When you lose a child like this it destroys you in ways you can't even describe".  Teens don’t realize how harmful their actions can really be; this single teen destroyed three lives in one breath. We often underestimate the power our words have.  Words received have the ability to hang in our heads and eventually turn into actions of destruction. Yet, a few simple words can even save a life.  We can fight the battle with a few powerful words.

                                             Eric Mohat