As a child, I was bullied because I was the goodie-goodie who thought if I asked nicely, the sentiment would be returned. I would return from school with a tear-streaked face and a heaving chest.

Mommy would hug me and make an angry call to the school, but one day all that stopped.
Instead of hugging me up, Mommy said, “You need to hit those raggedy-ass kids back one good time and they’ll leave you alone — and tell those teachers I said so.” I took my mother’s advice and ended up in trouble at school. After that, the bullying was minimal.

Others were not so lucky.

In Oklahoma, Ty Smalley, an 11-year-old, committed suicide after being suspended for fighting the bullies who ridiculed him everyday at school over the course of two years. In Anoka, Minn., Justin Aaberg, a 15-year-old, hung himself after being teased at school about his sexual orientation.
Rutgers University freshman Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old, committed suicide by jumping off a bridge.

This came after his roommate, Dharun Ravi, broadcast his sexual encounters with a male over the Internet. Bullying can’t be outgrown, either. It has no preferences concerning race, gender, class or age.

In Chicago, on the city’s Southeast side, 68-year-old Margaret Matthews was continuously harassed by a group of young boys who broke her windows, destroyed items in her shed and even set her garage on fire. Matthews reached her breaking point and shot two of the boys — both aged 13 — after the group threw bricks at her home and through her windows.

Matthews was released from police custody with no charges, but the boys who were shot were cited with juvenile delinquency petitions and one count each of misdemeanor aggravated assault on a senior citizen.

Matthews did call the police after the first time the boys began to throw bricks at her home, but they returned and Matthews felt she had to protect herself. Is it too much to shoot a child for throwing bricks or can it bee seen as self-defense for an older woman?

Bullying, whether cyber, verbal, physical, in the work place, at school or wherever, needs to be properly addressed.

These deaths, like many, could have been avoided. It’s clear some type of action needs to take place to address the injustices done to these people and those who didn’t get story in the paper.

The perpetrators of the Columbine High School massacre claimed that harsh bullying was partly the cause of their actions. More factors are to blame for their behavior than bullying, but it is a factor nonetheless.

How many more incidents need to occur before a governing body takes notice? Well, I take that back. Michigan did have proposed anti-bullying legislation in 2007. Known as “Matt’s Safe School Law,” named after Matthew Epling, a young East Lansing student who took his life after being bullied by other students, the bill never was passed.

The Michigan House passed a bill requiring every public school to adopt a policy prohibiting harassment or bullying at school on in 2007, but the Michigan Senate failed to do the same.

It was given recent attention in May of this year, after Gov. Jennifer Granholm addressed it on the radio.

I fear, however, like many other bills that need to be passed across the governor’s desk for a signature, that it will lie forgotten in the mass grave of bills.

Ashley Brown is the State News opinion writer. Reach her at_ brownas8@msu.edu.