Of books and bats and sealing wax

Hey Poofta! Don’t try to run again. You, me, 3 o’clock. Under the water tower. I’m gonna bash your f**king face in!

Hey Poofta! Don’t try to run again. You, me, 3 o’clock. Under the water tower. I’m gonna bash your f**king face in!

Ahhhh, memories. Poofta, faggot, gay boy, I’ve heard them all. Fists, elbows, boots, I’ve felt them all. School wasn’t my favourite time of life.

The late 70’s wasn’t a time when bullying was seen as a problem. In fact, if you were a bully you were worshipped.

Look at me. I wasn’t the rugged bloke who was into footy: I hung out with the girls and liked science fiction. As an outsider I deserved to be singled-out as the freak I obviously was; and the thugs who derided, mocked and physically abused me were perfectly justified in their actions.

Or so they believed.

Over time the abhorrent activity of bullying has rightly been identified as a mammoth negative affect on both individuals and society. Leading to the announcement by Clubs NSW that any applicants found to have been bullies at school will have this held against them when applying for a job.

Not only won’t they get the job, but to make sure they know the reason why they didn’t get it (so they can to fix the errors in their ways), they won’t be told that it was because they were a bully in their school years.

Wait - what?

Clubs NSW should be acknowledged for helping to bring a social blemish into the limelight, but this is just as bad as rubbing a dog’s nose in their pee.

A bully who hasn’t been confronted with their actions and helped to break the cycle will continue to ruin the lives of those around them. Denying a lout a job and not telling them it was because of their bad attitude won’t help anyone.

Bullies learn their behaviour by being bullied by family or friends, or seeing the activity in the school ground and emulating it. The way to stop it is to break the cycle in childhood, not at the job application phase when the activity is ingrained into the thug’s psyche.

Because you’ve got to remember that a bully, like a puppy, is for life.

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Read the coverage in the Daily Telegraph.

Some personal thoughts from my good friend Stephen. I too was ostracised at school. I loved reading, drama and playing soccer. Unfortunately I attended a Rugby League school where you, well played Rugby League pretty much. Soccer was a poofter’s game. Reading was for nerds. Drama, acting and singing was for fairies.

Don’t get me wrong - I didn’t suffer the levels of bullying that so many other people did. Most of it was vicious rumours and insults but I was reasonably insular even back then. It hurt, especially the parts about sexuality (I was painfully shy around girls but was definitely interested in them), but in retrospect I’m a little surprised at my level of resilience now I think back on it.

Sadly not all of my friends were as lucky as me and copped far worse. It’s simply not acceptable and the bullies don’t realise just how deep the words scar and the level of pain they’re really inflicting. I’d like to think some of them would stop if they realised but we all know a few of them would only be inspired further.

But, as Stephen says, this idea isn’t the answer. Mainly because we’re talking about kids here. Telling a child - even a teen - that bullying now will hurt their job prospects later is like telling the average person about health strategies for when they turn 90. It’s simply not something they/we think about. Young kids aren’t thinking about jobs and even if they are it’s what they want to be, not that they won’t be able to do it.

Adult perspective for a youth-oriented problem. Not the answer.