By Foluke Falayi
Most of us, at one time or the other, have been victims of bullying. You either might have been bullied in the school or in the neighbourhood. I remember how I was bullied about the age of eight by a primary school mate, a girl. I was playing on the school field when she grabbed me from behind and gave me the beating of my life. I cried as my head and body ached. What was more painful was that I didn’t remember offending her.
Then I recall my first secondary school, a boarding house, where I suffered untold hardship from seniors as I had to fetch many buckets of water, stay awake and be on my knees for many hours due to flimsy excuses from seniors. The most hurting of them all was when a senior asked me to lick the bottom of her slippers. She did that just because I didn’t cover her food from the dining hall. It was a relief when I was taken out of the school to another. As young as I was, I promised myself that my child will never attend a boarding school.
Concerning Sylvester Oromoni, what he was likely to have passed through at Dowen College. The 12-year-old died after he was allegedly bullied by some seniors in the school. One feels a bit relieved that investigation has begun on the cause of his death, while some of the pupils indicted have been arrested by the police.
Bullying, sometimes, lowers a child’s esteem. The child feels sort of inferior to those maltreating him or her. She thinks they are better than her. It denies the child her right and dignity. Besides, it sticks to the victim’s memory.
Many years after leaving my first secondary school, for instance, I thought about the senior students who punished me unjustly as I met a few of them at the university I attended although they didn’t recognise me. You can imagine a senior with four classes ahead of you, being at the same level with you at the university. They missed it when they dropped the primary thing and began pursuing the needless.
No form of bullying is good. It’s underserved and has no advantage whatsoever. Every life is precious. Why would a student be beaten to the point that it leads to his death? Lately, I have asked myself several questions: why would I pay a lot on a child and the child under the care of a school would still not be protected and secured? Is a school not supposed to be an institution where learning, morals, good principles and values should be inculcated? Then, what is the essence of paying much and at the end, losing all?
Ironically, most of the practices start from home. When a child learns bullying from home then he or she takes it to society. The child who overpowered and beat me mercilessly in primary school must have been from home where her parents constantly engaged in boxing. No wonder she was skillful at it.
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Parents are admonished to put their children and wards to check. Go back to the basis. Evoke the saying: remember the child of whom you are, though it seems no longer in use for today’s parents. That’s why we see children behaving badly in various places.
Child’s training starts from zero age. In public, sometimes, you see little children, using bad words, pinching, beating the adults and other kids around. The parents, sometimes, the mothers, keep mute. When they eventually threaten to beat the child, they say it softly.
Children are products of their parents. When bullying and other vices are not corrected in children, such children become hoodlums. Disturbing the peace of people and turning society upside down. The Bible admonishes us to train up a child the way he should go, and when he grows, he won’t depart from it. A word is enough for the wise.
Schools, on the other hand, must give proper orientation to their students. Its sheer foolishness, when a student abandons his primary purpose and turns to a tyrant. No student is more special than another. No child is above the other child. Everyone is equal. No one should bully the other.
