Bullying crackdown needed

Bullying is hardly a new phenomenon. Chances are most readers can recall an incident or two from their youth during which they were a victim of such behaviour or, perhaps, even the antagonist.

But in the past 16 days, on our neighbouring island of Cape Breton, tales of bullying have become alarmingly commonplace.

The trend started on June 8 when Amanda MacDonald, whose nine-year-old daughter attends Harbourside Elementary, started an online petition asking the Cape Breton-Victoria Regional School Board to change or enforce its policies regarding bullying.

The petition was prompted by news that two local middle school students had committed suicide in the past six months. Parents were quick to respond and stories of children being moved to other area schools and even, in one case, to another province in an attempt to protect them from being bullied, were shocking.

And that was just for openers.

Before long, stories appeared about a young woman named Tuma White who has been bullied for years since moving to Sydney Mines at the age of 10, and about a group of Whitney Pier youths, all previous victims of bullying, who offered advice to others on how to cope.

Then came an uplifting take of hundreds of motorcyclists who came together to escort a Grade 4 student named Xander Rose who was being bullied constantly to school.

But this was followed by a Sydney woman who is worried about the effects of bullying on her 16-yearold son who has been bullied since Grade 1 and worst of all came news that 13-year-old Madison Wilson of North Sydney took her own life on Father’s Day; the cause of which her parents told The Canadian Press was verbal abuse at school and through social media.

Chris Royal, Madison’s father, said more should be done to encourage students to come forward to seek help within the school setting.

“They say zero tolerance in the schools and we are told that, but yet it’s not zero tolerance,” he said. “That’s why the kids don’t trust going to the teachers because the next day they are going to face their enemy, anyway.”

In response, the Nova Scotia government sent a youth mental health expert to Cape Breton on Monday and promised new anti-cyberbullying legislation this fall. Dalhousie University psychiatry professor Dr. Stan Kutcher will talk to families, schools and the community about mental health concerns and what supports they need. He is expected to report back to the province in the coming weeks.

Though Kutcher’s visit certainly can’t hurt, will these efforts make much of a difference for youth who are facing various forms of bullying in the privacy of their own home let alone local school yards? For them, there are no safe havens anymore unless they completely disconnect from the world.

Fact is the government can send 10 mental health experts to Cape Breton, or to Prince Edward Island or anywhere else, but bullying is not going to disappear anytime soon unless help is also directed toward the bullies and the root causes behind their actions.

In the meantime, the “enemy” awaits and the number of victims is only likely to grow.