‘Bully’ film examines harassment in schools

‘Bully’ film examines harassment in schools

he High Library, in collaboration with Elizabethtown College’s Departments of Women and Gender Studies and Education, presented the movie “Bully” to students in Gibble Auditorium on Tuesday night. The movie, which was produced in 2009 by Lee Hirsch, examines the bullying of several K-12 students whose lives were either severely damaged or tragically ended in suicide.

The event featured two local educators, one of whom is Assistant Professor of Special Education Dr. Shannon Haley-Mize. Ms. Yvonne Rothstein, who also has an extensive background in education, joined as a guest commentator from the Annville-Cleona School District. After the film was shown, they answered questions from an audience of majors ranging from education to international business.

Before the movie actually began however, Haley-Mize and Rothstein identified several facts regarding bullying that were listed on the projector screen. While the least surprising fact on the screen may have been that “40 to 75 percent of bullying incidents occur in school,” a less familiar fact was that “teachers only intervene in approximately one out of every 25 bullying instances.”

Those realities, although alarming in themselves, could not have prepared the viewers for the level of agitation and emotional stimulation contained in the movie; “Bully” uses raw footage of victimization in schools, exposing the dread that each featured child, whether a survivor of abuse or an irretrievable victim of suicide, experienced every day.

As the lights in the auditorium were dimmed, the movie started with a home video of a young boy making silly faces to his parents in front of their camera.  He had an enormous smile; the audience was charmed and, despite its respectful solemnity, everyone chuckled and cooed at the boy’s charm. After a while though, the students remembered the purpose of the movie and what it was documenting. They perceived what was coming next, because the giggling ceased, leaving a void of silence that permeated the room. Instead of enjoying that gentle boy’s facial expressions, the audience shared intimate moments with his parents, their own faces choked-up in tearful agony.

The audience learned each family’s story, which contrasted young and happy kids in home videos with the tearful moms and dads who lost them. Each moment that the movie flashed back to home videos of innocent, carefree children, the horror of each child’s victimization at school was amplified to the audience.

Many of the children whose stories were included in “Bully” committed suicide, leaving parents, siblings and young friends to react with nearly unspeakable grief. Several students in the audience, too, burst forth in tears at the tragedy of each child’s lost life, knowing that those suicides might have been prevented by even one caring teacher. The film held a distinct emotional force over an audience of many education majors, future teachers whose desire is to transform schools into places of nurturing for their students.

Once the documentary ended, the panel elaborated on the film’s themes of student-teacher interaction, inclusion versus exclusion and the consequences of words as well as actions in relationships with other students. Rothstein, who has worked with students in urban areas such as New York City and Philadelphia, reminded the audience that “bullying is a problem that’s everywhere.”

On the other hand, though, in including mainly small-town Midwest and Southern occurrences of school-related bullying, the movie underscores the concept that rural education systems may be less welcoming than would a more diverse urban community.

Rothstein also discussed how urban students may be more understanding and welcoming of atypical kids, particularly because cities surround children with different personalities, cultures, identities and ideas on a daily basis.  In fact, when responding to students’ questions after the movie’s showing, she frequently referenced one of the family’s stories, which documents the refusal of a rural community to treat a lesbian student with kindness and respect.

Rothstein knew that bullying in schools “happens when teachers aren’t paying attention,” but also understood that the young adult’s situation revealed an unprofessional attitude, not ignorance, towards the lonely student.  Haley-Mize also responded, highlighting to the audience that “realizing that the type of culture we create really matters.” Although the film solely illustrated K-12 abuse, Haley-Mize further reminded the audience that it can overcome and seek to stop bullying “even with our own Etown community.”

When one student inquired about how a teacher can help a child, Rothstein answered that it’s imperative to “ask questions.” Mentioning that districts and teachers cannot be penalized for complicity in peer-to-peer abuse of which they are unaware. Rothstein said, “Someone’s got to notice.”  In the case that teachers are aware of bullying, Haley-Mize asserted that the familiar excuses that “boys will be boys” and “it’s just middle school girl drama” discredit the honor and responsibility of teachers towards their vulnerable students. Without a doubt, in several of the film’s portrayed cases, the advocacy of one teacher would have prevented a child’s desperation and taking of his or her life. The speakers recognized the power of an adult’s intervention, especially when the abused student is regularly viewed by peers as an outcast. Both Rothstein and Haley-Mize agreed that, as a teacher, it is “really important to let kids know you’re a safe person.”

As the event concluded and the Blue Jay crowd departed into the night, a hope was raised that each tear the audience cried might be transformed into a determination to facilitate kindness at every opportunity.