Statistics from the government say three or four young people in the past month either witnessed someone being bullied or were a victim themselves. The issue of children being bullied in Tennessee was in the national spotlight recently with a social media video. UT Extension and Tennessee 4-H offer help. Hello, I'm Charles Denny.
This is AgCast, brought to you by the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture. Why do they bully? What's the point of it? Why do they enjoy taking innocent people by the way they may do?
The viral video was hard to watch. Eleven-year-old Keaton Jones' message of despair captured the attention of the nation when he talked about being bullied at his Tennessee school. It sparked an avalanche of support from entertainers and athletes, as well as children his own age. I felt really upset.
I wanted to cry, actually. It's very terrible that his bully has been doing this to him, and he kind of, he said himself, why do these bullies have to pick me out of everybody? Nicole Hurtrider is involved in 4-H in Blount County, and well before the Keaton video, she was campaigning against bullying. The eighth grader at Carpenter's Middle School, home of the Cougars, planned several talks this spring to young people about this sensitive but important topic.
She created CAB, Cougars Against Bullying, and also passed out bracelets and created a poster board of information as part of a 4-H project. Basically just gave out information, why you shouldn't bully the effects, what could happen. Yeah, it is an important issue, and I really hope that one day in the world there will be peace. Nicole's help is needed, apparently.
The State Department of Education says there were more than 12,000 reported cases of bullying in Tennessee schools last year, and the actual number could be much higher. Blame in part the Internet. Family expert Dr. Matt Devereaux says cyberbullying through social media is common, and he leads UT Extension programs on Internet safety, which includes preventing online bullying.
What's new about bullying today, again, to talk about cyberbullying, is in the past bullying was about being bullied at school, and at least for a kid who was bullied, they would go home and feel safe. They were away from it all. There was a break. Nowadays, the form that bullying takes is 24-7 via the Internet.
There's more kids who bully because of the fact that they can remain anonymous online when they do bully. Devereaux recommends parents monitor their child's Internet activity and communicate openly with your child and their school. The goal is to encourage kids to come forward if they're bullied or if they witness bullying. UT Extension experts say boys are bullied more than girls, though bullying is on the rise with both groups.
There's a thing in the research called learned helplessness, and when we are victimized, whether we're a kid or an adult, and whatever the victimization act was, it creates an atmosphere within our minds that we're embarrassed to talk about it, that there's nobody really out there that will help us. But that doesn't have to be the case. We can get involved. We can also try to understand the problem a little better.
Devereaux says there's also helpful research into why kids bully others. In many instances, kids who bully were once bullied themselves, possibly by a parent or sibling. It's definitely a learned behavior. So a lot of bulliers have issues going on in their home where they're witnessing mom and dad not handle anger very well.
The relationship between certain members of families revolves around lots of anger, physical punishment, altercations, and those sorts of things. So that's one reason why a child will bully, because they don't have the skills to manage their own emotions, because it is a learned behavior. Bullying can take many forms, and it's not just a youth issue, but society's problem. If young people are threatened, adults and other kids can help.
Thanks for listening. I'm Charles Denny. For more real-life solutions provided by the UT Institute of Agriculture, go to our website at ag.tennessee.edu. Thank you.