Tag Archives: coping

Re-Share: Bullying in the Supermarket

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Under the Green Desk Lamp…

Green DesklampI was reviewing old articles recently, and believe this is one of the first I wrote for this blog. I think it still holds a lot of truth, and I hope that you enjoy it. Let us know what you think in the comments below!

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‘If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.’ It’s an adage we’ve all heard. Whether from animated rabbits, or our own dear parents, the majority of children are taught explicitly that being unkind is not the way to act in our society.

I was at a conference a while back discussing bullying in middle school, with a particular focus on cyber-bullying. The attendees were often shocked at the examples of childhood cruelty being perpetrated by and against youth these days.

Photos—often explicit—are shared around, and entire websites are dedicated to insulting one another, spreading rumours, and generally making life miserable. There’s no doubt about it, it’s a hard world for a child to grow up in.

This is especially true when we are constantly telling them that the expectations of life are otherwise—that adult society functions on the basis of good social graces, of respecting your fellow man and avoiding hurtful language. If this is how people are expected to act, it comes as a special shock to find that your peers are so steadfastly determined to undermine such ideals.

It was these thoughts which weighed on my mind as I stood in line at the supermarket after the conference ended. How can children be so cruel, and how can we teach them to act better?

The question didn’t linger very long. It was rather rudely chased from my tired brain by the glossy magazine covers flanking me on both sides as I worked my way slowly toward the register.

‘Guess whose cellulite this is’, a headline would read, and a zoomed in box drawn from a woman on the beach would reveal the unsightly lumps on her bikini-clad ass. Some celebrity had the audacity to appear in public, without the assistance of airbrushes and digital photo editing to help her. The nerve!

A man was accused of cheating. A context free photo of him hand in hand with a woman rested above a headline bemoaning his lack of values, and lamenting the inevitable ruin of his marriage.

The headlines were legion, each one attacking some vice or speculating on some perceived flaw. Entire front page spreads were dedicated to the attempted outing of supposedly gay singers, surgeries gone awry, and teens who could not afford to have yet another child.

It’s no wonder, I thought, placing my items on the scarred rubber conveyor belt. How can we tell children to be nice to each other when the clear and undeniable truth is that we cannot manage it ourselves?

It’s a savage hypocrisy. A society so feral and filled with hatred that even political debates eschew all relevant discourse in favour of painting one another as sexual deviants and money-grubbing lechers.

So what are we left to glean from the broad disconnect between expectations and practice? Do we assume that our children are stupid? That they will somehow fail to notice the overt double standard? Will they just ignore that swindling and deceit are the clear pathways to success in the job market, and that even our leaders have no qualms about saying mean things if their PR managers tell them it will get their ratings up?

Perhaps it’s not the kids who are to blame. In a society that worships the rich, adores the callous, fetishizes fallen idols and encourages its people to hack their way through friends and neighbours to climb a rung higher on the ladder, maybe such horrid indecency in children isn’t the aberration we treat it as. If these are the values we truly hold, perhaps such kids are just prototypes of the new age.

It’s a necessary survival strategy—a natural evolution.

But if our hope is for such cruelty to cease—for kids to go to school and enjoy the company of their peers, to feel safe and supported by those around them—we may consider starting the change with ourselves.

-Brad OH Inc.

A New Year

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Lost my father.

Lost my dog.

I probably lost more of myself in that mix than I’ve yet begun to process.

Also lost a relationship, but not all losses are loss alone.

Still, the house is lonely, the halls all too quiet.

Perhaps most dangerous of all, I am left entirely to my own devices. That last bit has likely gone on long enough now, and I’d best seek safe harbour lest I be carried away in this self-made torrent.

Not tonight though. It’s the eve of a New Year, and tonight I am well into my cups, trying to reflect on a year best left in the distant rear-view.

We’ll see how far I make it.

Truth is, it’s not an endeavour I relish. I’d burn this year to the ground if given the chance, even if no other was promised.

Still, the next is assured. Fated. Unavoidable.

Will it be better?

Who can say?

But surely now, if faced with similar or worse, I have at least the freedom to react accordingly. To tear my beard and gnash my teeth. To shed my clothes and my name, flee the country, and start anew—distant, dissociated, detached, and terrible.

Yet worse is a hard thing to imagine, and there is still some far-flung hope for better times ahead.

No new me, mind you. The world would be lacking for it. A new world rather—or at least a new way of moving through the old one.

It’s not an impossible dream. There have been some small bits of hope…

My new job is satisfying. Gratifying even, and fun. It’s an opportunity to find new and exciting ways to make a difference, and it’s something I am happy.

‘Meaning Less’ was published this year—even if I took little joy from that accomplishment—and ‘Project: FearNaught’ draws closer to completion each day. These are both points of pride, to be sure.

Could there be a bit more encouragement on the way? I don’t know. Time will tell on that bit.

But it would not suffice to brush over the losses. They each need their time, and with the Jägermeister flowing now, I cannot imagine a time more fitting.

I can only start with Bogney. My dog. My little boy.

I’m not nearly drunk enough yet to touch on the loss of my father. I’m not sure my poor liver could take it.

Bogney was my best friend. My pride and joy. My furry little ball of comfort. He welcomed me home every day, and more often than not roused me with kisses to greet the sun together. He led me on adventures, walks, jogs, and chases. He taught me patience and he kept me honest.

He was a constant source of love, pride, happiness, and spontaneity in a life that was otherwise—by design—rather distant and predictable during that period.

He brought me surprises, affection, and a warm sense of companionship that I miss dearly every day.

I never tried to own a dog…

I wasn’t born with a dog, and I certainly didn’t achieve a dog in any real sense.

Nevertheless, a dog was thrust upon me. I took Bogney in at the end of a failing relationship. I resented the notion at first, but in no time, I loved the dog.

As a puppy, he destroyed two pairs of glasses, and a pair of decent headphones. He also managed to put a fang through my eyelid once when I yanked a bone away from him in jest. He was always the spirited type, and we made for fast friends.

I claimed him in the following breakup, and for 15 years, we were inseparable.

Then, we were separated. But it never started to feel like that, and it still hasn’t. I still reach for him when I wake, and my ears still search for the frantic patter of his paws charging to greet me when I come home from a long day.

They do not come.

They won’t again, and it fucking breaks me. There’s no drink strong enough, no vacation long enough. No amount of time that will suffice to bring back the peace of a single moment with that furry fellow. But I cannot turn back time, and it passes still, and with every second I realize more fully the extent of my losses.

The trend continues.

Another drink.

Another.

One more time if you’d be so kind, good sir.

This bar will be empty before I’m ever ready to finish this essay.

To finish it would be to face that things are finished.

I don’t have that strength.

Maybe next year.

Time will tell…

-Brad OH Inc.