Bullying fails to honor human dignity, but there are ways to overcome it. Bullying can directly hurt the victim, affecting them in many aspects of life, such as their different types of health.
Bullying completely fails to honour the dignity of the victim. Bullying occurs when the bully feels like they have more power over the victim. When a person is bullied it occurs constantly and deliberately. According to the Australian Human Rights Commission, there are 2 main types of bullying, face to face bullying and covert bullying. Face to Face bullying, also known as direct bullying, mostly involves punching, kicking or any other physical actions.
Face to face bullying can also include verbal abuse or sending rude things online to a person through social media, email, online forum and many more. The Second major type of bullying is covert bullying. This type of bullying is done indirectly and in a way which it is unseen by most people. For example not letting people into groups or spreading rumors would be covert bullying.
127 our experts are availableright now
Covert bullying usually happens behind someone’s back and done in a secretive way. When the person finds out it makes them feel horrible about themselves. As Genesis 1:27 said, “God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” This tells us that it wrong to bully, that doing these things against a person can deeply affect their personal life and health.
Face to face bullying for example directly affects their physical health, this can then affect other healths such as their emotional and spiritual. Their emotional is affected by the words they say to the person and this can make the victim feel like they don’t have a purpose. Making them more likely to lose faith in god and fall into a depression. Covert bullying can have similar influences, but it does not directly affect their physical health. So it obvious bullying fails to honour the dignity of the victim.
When a person engages in bullying behavior he fails to honor his own dignity. In John 13:34 it said, “Love one another as I have loved you”. Bullying not only gives the bully a bad reputation but it makes the bully fail the purpose which God gave them. If God was to come on this earth he would be caring, loving, helpful and do whatever he could to help a person in need. Bullying does the opposite of this, being unhelpful, hurting them, and embarrassing them in public, is not what God wants of humans.
In John 3:16 it said “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” This states that God gave up his one and only son to save the humans of this world, but these bullies continue to intentionally cause harm against people. What is bully doing? The bully is failing to honour his own dignity, failing to realise the harm which he caused to his victim. A bully’s actions against another person shows that they are truly failing to honour the dignity of humans.
The perspective of the victim is totally different from others. For the victim, the bully is the worst person on earth. Constantly abusing them with the intent of hurting their feelings and not knowing why. Unfortunately in this day and age bullying can occur anywhere, including the victims own home, with the use of technology. With the help of technology and seeing the person in public, the bully exposes victims deepest insecurities, making the victim build up a sense of sadness and embarrassment.
This is proven when the University of Oxford conducted an experiment and discovered the sad truth that “ with nine out of ten teenagers who are bullied online are also facing traditional bullying”. This can cause the person to go home to suffer from trauma or depression. But the victim can recover from this. According to stopbullying.com, telling the bully “stop” in a firm and confident voice can help.
This makes the bully feel like he has less power over the victim. Telling a parent or counselor is also a good option, this can help comfort, support and give advice to the victim. And sometimes just ignoring it and not reacting can help as well. It is clear that bullying fails to honor the dignity of humans, but doing certain things can help the victim feel better.
The way the bully sees and feels in the situation is not the same as the victims. For the victim, the bully is a horrible person and everything he does is bad. But the bully themselves may have gone through a hard time in their lives, causing them to not realize what they have done or even feel like they did nothing is wrong.
An article conducted by The Guardian says, “The majority of bullies (74%) are boys and have gone through a traumatic in their own life” Most bullies have gone through a traumatic or sad experience, for example, their parents divorcing or the death of a family member which they had a strong connection to.
References
- Australian Human Rights Commission – Bullying, violence, harassment and discrimination
- StopBullying.gov – Bullying Definition
- KidsHealth – Dealing With Bullying
- National Institute on Drug Abuse – Nearly 4 Out of 10 City High Schoolers Report Being Bullied Last Year
- Parents.com – Signs Your Child Is Being Bullied
