Bullying-- A way of showing prejudice?
Saturday, 22 January 2011
It was 2005. I was only but Primary two. I knew little if not nothing, but it seemed funny to me how people could be so fat, while i was a lot more natural. Weighing 35 kilograms, about 1.3 meters tall. Wei Long, however, also at 1.3 meters tall, was a startling 45 kilograms heavy.He was fat, undeniably. Wei Long was also constantly red and sweaty and smelly. The class despised him. It was only to be worse, as the year grew on, our taunts grew worse. This was especially so during physical education lesson (PE). He would never fail to tire, 10 minutes into the PE lessons. As one of the "cool" people, who plays soccer everyday, it seemed only to motivate that urge to laugh and taunt at his size. But, when a person is to be pushed to his limits, he WILL fight back. At the end of primary 2, i can vividly remember a incident...
It was the end of a period at the end of the school day. As a form of fun, we denied him exit from the class as the teacher already left. But things got very violent from the moment. Going 'insane', he took his trolley bag, pulled up the handle and starting swinging and swinging. He was like a man possessed. Swinging his bag as hard as he could, he ran towards various individuals in our class. The class fled. The girls screamed in fear. The guys disappeared.
Looking back now, we were indeed very childish, it was about accepting someone for who he was. We pushed him to the edge and that's what we got. Not fighting back did not mean he was unable to. Not saying anything, did not mean he was prepared to take it.
Being special did not mean he was any different.