NEWS

The threats and taunts of the week come rolling back like a horror movie. The name-calling, the humiliation in front of other classmates. And worst of all, the dread of what the next week may bring.

When you’re a kid who is bullied there is no safe place in your week.

We adults are not very good at understanding how widespread bullying is, or the toll it takes on a child. To them, it is an endless, hopeless trap from which they can never escape.

In the past, we passed it off with platitudes. Ignore it. It’s a phase of childhood. This too shall pass.

But today, the stakes are too high. Desperate victims are turning to violence to deal with their harassers. Others, felling permanently imprisoned, consider suicide. Certainly there are no statistics to show the number of children who simply retreat into themselves, resigning their childhood to quiet, hopeless misery.

Into this dark scenario comes the Academy of Medicine Alliance, a group of physicians’ spouses long concerned with issues of domestic violence and physical and emotional health.

It is sponsoring a new program on bullying that offers local children real hope, and may help prevent childhood violence.

The program, Bullies and Victims;Talking it out Together, delivers options. It offers explanations. It reaches out, not only to targets, but to witnesses of bullying and even to bullies themselves.

Too often we forget that this cruelty, which has never been a necessary phase of childhood, makes every child its victim.

Suddenly the notion of children being slapped, kicked, taunted and threatened by their parents or siblings gives the behavior its rightful name. Abuse.

That startles victims, who realize the harassment is not really about them at all. It awakens teachers, who see bulling students in a new and more compassionate light, and also realize the severity of the behavior.

Perhaps most importantly, it opens the door for the bullies to discuss their own situations, and, perhaps, their own desperation.

Then real work can begin.

Victims learn they do have options, and power. They leave with a list of things to try, which range from using humor, involving a peer mediator, knowing when and how to involve a teacher, and perhaps even trying techniques to make a bully into a friend.

Bullies are forced to own up to their behavior, and to confront the pain they have inflicted. They are challenged to face their own anger, and to find healthy ways to relieve it. Before they leave the session they are given the chance to apologize to their victims. At Bramble and Loveland schools, a number of children did just that.

Finally, that other key group of children - the witnesses - are held up to acceptability. These children learn they have been condoning abuse by smiling and laughing at bullying behavior. They find out their responsibility includes making adults aware of the abuse, and finding ways to support the victim in private and, perhaps eventually, in public.