First of all, here’s the link and here’s the quote:
The topic is The Effects of High School Gossip.
As I said in my reply in GD, my childhood best friend and I were the victims of high school gossip and bullying at its worst. She because she was small, weak, handicapped and had a speech impediment; me because I was English in an American high school during America’s Bicentennial, lousy at conforming, but mostly, I think because I refused to end my friendship with her. She was a nice, warm, interesting person, and there was much more to her than the braces on her legs and on her teeth. The gossip and bullying which SnoopyFan so trivializes led to her having a nervous breakdown the summber between our sophomore and junior years. That left me at the bottom of the social pack and, in addition, dealing with having felt like I’d failed my best friend. I was a 14 year old girl.
Let me tell you about those years. As I said in GD, if I wasn’t careful, I would eat lunch or ride the bus home because no one would let me sit next to them. I could see empty seats, but if I sat in them, books etc. would mysteriously appear on them. I learned not to press the issue. My books would be hit out of my hands while I was walking down the hallway in school, sometimes by people I knew, sometimes by people I didn’t. I could not walk down a hallway without being insulted. In my senior year, I was routinely insulted by freshmen, kids I didn’t even know. My belongings were vandalized; in winter, I was a regular target of snow and ice balls, and then things got really nasty. Not content with making my life a living hell, some group of kids started making obscene phone calls to my family.
Before my friend had her nervous breakdown, kids would come to me and tell me they’d seen her crying because for them to show any kindness or friendship to her was very likely to result in them being insulted and harrassed. I had already learned not to cry in public, and my friend was worth the taunts. Staying her friend was, if you will, the Christian thing to do.
I do not recall everything I was called, and if I did, it’d be a long thread even by my standards. Among the things which I do were “F’ugly” or “Fucking ugly” and “Too ugly to live.” I’ve met some Dopers face-to-face; Iampunha, Guinastasia, or, since this is the third name, Opal Cat, would you be willing to testify to the truth of those insults? (I’m not forgetting you, Polycarp.)
During my junior year, two particularly telling things happened. I’m afraid I don’t remember what order they happened in, so they’re in order of magnitude. One, while I was waiting for one of the few people who did consider me a friend, someone pulled a knife on me and pointed it at me. I don’t know who it was; I didn’t look at his face. I just remember the knife. Two, during a social studies class, we were asked what we expected of high school. I was desperate and possibly a bit stupid. Mostly, I was desperate. That’s why I answered that, while I didn’t know what I did expect, I had not expected to be driven to the point of suicide. That made things worse.
I’ve made no secret of my struggle with depression here. I also admit that, as if the circumstances at school weren’t bad enough, I had exacerbating circumstances at home, including a family who were emotionally abusive. I got punished, not treated after that confession I mentioned. That is why this sentence got to me: “. Yes, people dole out a LOT of BS to people but ultimately if someone decides they can’t take it, that’s their decision. Many, many people have gone through hell (sheesh, just look at high school) and managed not to kill themselves.”
SnoopyFan, as a result of those experiences, it’s only in the past 5 years that I’ve actually started to grasp that I won’t be insulted and disliked on-sight or realized that I’m not actually so ugly my looks are frightening. I am one of the strongest, toughest individuals you will meet, especially when oppressed, yet kindness still confuses me, as one of our lurkers can attest. Take a human being, and tell them day in and day out how worthless, useless, hopeless they are. Tell them they are unworthy of any kindness, and that for them to be attracted to any human being is an insult, something which was done to me. Tell them they are unlikable, unlovable, less than human, and it will do severe, quite possibly even fatal damage.
I accept the responsibility for my part in what happened to me and my actions, which included 3 suicide attempts my junior year. I could quite literally see no way out of a lifetime of pain and, besides, everyone in my life told me I didn’t deserve to live anyway. If I had betrayed my best friend, things probably would have gone better. Would you have me betray my faith?
SnoopyFan, my beliefs and my understanding of Christ’s teachings do not allow me to tell you to go to hell. I do wish you could have an understanding of what it was like during those years and in the years afterwords not because I would like to hurt you, although I did when I started this post, but so you could see what it is you’re really talking about. I gather you live near a friend of mine and her husband. There was a time when I looked forward to the prospect of meeting you. Not right now.
I was, in effect, told I deserved to die, for being different, for being ugly, for not being like everybody else. I survived. I made a decision back in grade school not to return evil with evil, and to defend those who were on the receiving end of evil. That decision, that choice was one of the direct causes of what I went through in high school, and I have no doubt I would have led a much happier, possibly even more conventional life if I had chosen otherwise. I do not regret that choice. Despite all that damage, despite thinking for years that a chunk of my soul had been destroyed, I do not regret that choice and I will continue to defend those who are the victims of “gossip, malice, and slander” not to mention cruelty in general, and that includes the awful passive cruelty of those who stand by and allow such things to happen.
Respectfully,
CJ
