(opinion article)

Recently, I got concerned about cases of school bullying that took place in our society. School Bullying is a type of bullying, that occurs in any educational establishment. School bullying campaign is systematic harassment with anger, humiliation, which is often distributed in educational institutions. Usually, this term means persecution among students. School bullying  can be: physical and psychological. Physical bullying is any unwanted physical contact between the bully and the victim. This is one of the most easily identifiable forms of bullying. Psychological bullying is any form of bullying that causes damage to a victim’s psyche and emotional well-being.

Unfortunately, according to my observations, such cases occur more and more often. On the Internet, I read that Ukraine ranks fourth in the world in terms of adolescent aggression. According to a study conducted by UNICEF in Ukraine in 2017, 67% of schoolchildren encountered this phenomenon.

In Ukraine, sometimes, bullying, mobbing, and emo-bashing gets the criminal blackmail traits, “Don`t you want to be badmouthed and chased? Give us money! You don`t have money? Your parents should pay!” Off-the-record, the people say that the newly born companies appeared in Kyiv. Officially they work as advertising firms, and unofficially they are engaged in daily bullying psych games, targeting not only school children but also adults, including businessmen, sportsmen, politicians, and even common people whose well-being is just a bit higher than average. “Would you like to earn from $1-to $5, boy, you are to badmouth this person two times! He or she should hear it!” And what is the goal of such daily psycho-games? The typical one – ‘they’ dream about expensive cars, solid bank accounts, and Kyiv apartments. However, ‘they’ forget about the rule of law, not speaking about high moral principles.       

In my opinion, it is necessary to immediately solve the problem of school and not-school bullying. It’s terrible when a teenage company is beating or mocking another person. I suppose we have to counteract all variants of school and not-school bullying. Ukraine has already passed a law on bullying, which provides penalties in the form of fines. But, I believe that this is not enough. For brutal acts and aggression, moral or physical violence criminal proceedings should be filed and the immoral (and sometimes cheap) teenagers and not only teenagers are to be punished.

I reckon, fines are not sufficiently effective in the fight against various types of bullying. After all, if the violence was committed by a teenager under the age of 16, then the parents pay a fine. And how about the offenders?  There is no serious punishment for them. And how about ‘those’ who dream about extorted Kyiv apartments and pay $1-5 salary to easily-influenced youth engaged in dirty psycho bulling games?   

I guess, to overcome the school bullying,  in the first place, it is necessary to seriously punish the offenders, and not simply to write down fines. Secondly, in school psychologists and teachers need to conduct conversations against any kind of intimidation and badmouthing. The third moment, parents must be friends for their children and communicate with them on a daily basis. After all, it was recorded that more than 40% of the victims did not tell anyone about it, even to parents. And if you suddenly became a victim of  bullying, be sure to contact your parents, teachers and even police officers. The main thing is not to be silent!!! As they say, “Better safe than sorry.” Due to social and mass media, this problem should become public. We are to stop psycho terror! We are to share the European values: the rule of law, democracy and freedom! We are to be spiritually strong and not afraid to solve this problem! All types of bullying are to stopped and uprooted. As they say, “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”