The downside of my being home all day with the baby is that I've been watching way too much TV. The upside for being a stay-at-home spouse in 2009 versus the 70s or 80s is that daytime TV has more options than those horrendous soap operas. So I've ended up watching a lot of House, M.D.
I only bring this up because an episode the other day made me think about something. It was one about a young fat girl who was teased by her classmates and didn't have any friends (Don't worry, the genius Dr. House cured her by the end). It got me to thinking about when my daughter gets to be a pre-teen and a teenager. See, I was a brooding, geeky, New Wave boy who got bullied on a daily basis from basically 6th grade until high school graduation. And my wife was one of the really smart people in high school (something like 2nd highest GPA in her class) so our daughter being one of the cool popular kids in school is probably not in the cards. Which I am so OK with. The cool kids suck and are usually the ones that get arrested or pregnant on prom night.
But with non-coolness also comes the potential of being bullied. And I won't be able to handle that very well, my kid going through that.
When I was being bullied in school, every adult in my life let me down. From the principals to the teachers to my parents to the bullies parents, not a single one would step up to make it stop. There is some sort of sick attitude that bullying is some sort of natural order of things in adolescence. "Kids will be kids" or some other dumbshit way of looking at it without considering the emotional toll it takes on the victims. I imagine there is a good chance that this way of looking at it is still fairly pervasive.
If my daughter is bullied in school there is no way I will let it slide. I'll go through all the proper channels, of course - principal, teachers, cops, etc. - and if no one will do anything about it I'll have to take it to the bully's parents. Now one thing I know about bullies' parents is that they almost never have any interest in ending their kids' bullying. They are either the type that openly encourage it (see Emilio Estevez's character's father in The Breakfast Club) or are at least OK with since there little brat is giving it out instead of receiving.
So basically, this means that I'll probably have to take matters into my own hands if some little prissy bitch decides to give my daughter a hard time in school.
So it is not outside the realm of possibility that I could end up as a guy in his early- to mid-fifties going to jail for beating the snot out of some 16-year-old blond bimbo cheerleader and her mother and/or father.
And I guess I'm OK with that. Really, who's going to fuck with the convict's daughter after that?
{imagine: 3}
1 month ago
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2 comments:
I think about this all the time, Deni. I'm in the process of cultivating relationships with men named Frankie "Juice" Bafangul, and Vinnie "The Eyelid" Boombatz (both living in the Bronx currently), in order that--after I go through the proper channels and I am thoroughly let down---I can appeal to alternative channels and get the job done.
But seriously, in this day and age of kids bringing semi-automatic weapons and taking out entire classes, I'd think twice about bullying someone. You WILL get seised. If not by the bullied, then by her father, for sure.
Uh...did I say that outloud?
Hey, Deni. I was one of those girls in high school who was bullied. Plus I was called dog, scag, and bitch, because I was shy and didn't smile a whole lot. And it was the popular girls that teased me. I vented to two of them years later by telling them what I thought of their behavior.
I'm glad you want to get involved with your daughter's school situation when she's older. My father ignored my attempts to communicate with him, my parents were going through a divorce, Mom walked around preaching,and Dad beat my brother and I enough to do some emotional damage. I had an intense anger problem, retreated into my room and read, watched TV and isolated myself for another 5 yrs. Your involvement in your child's life is so important.Encouragement and support is paramount to her development, I'm sure you already know that though. Your blog hit a nerve because I thought of MY teen years.
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