Another Dead Boy

My heart is broken. Another dead boy. On the heels of Carl Walker-Hoover's suicide, another boy has killed himself rather than endure the daily taunting.

Jaheem Herrera was eleven. He hung himself in his closet. His mother complained repeatedly to the school that he was being bullied. Nothing happened. What will it take to create massive, systematic change?

Jaheem was harassed physically and verbally. They called him gay. He spoke with an accent.

A number of parents also complained about their children being bullied, too.

Nothing happened.

Nothing happened again.

There is something deeply wrong. We must demand change. We must enable teachers to do the right thing. We must teach our children tolerance. All the crazy talk about storms and the horrible fear that maybe LGBT people might be treated as equals has to stop. We need to all come together to help these kids. Whatever our religious beliefs our, it has to stop.

Kids too young to identify as any sexuality are being brought to levels of pain that leave them feeling they have no choice.

The right wing rhetoric has to stop. Bullies like Dobson, Perkins, Warren, stand on their pulpits and spew hate. Save the family, they say. Unless you don't fit their narrow definition of family.

From everything I've read, I'm fairly certain Jesus would not be on the side of hateful words.

Where is President Obama? We need his leadership on this issue and we need it now. I fear these stories will continue and they can be prevented.

I fear we will become numb to the senseless deaths.

Comments

[chrisahx]

Sara, so you are going over to Bilereco? I like that sight as it has many more serious posts than that on say Queerty. HOWEVER, there is rarely good debating in the comments area on very few posts. Today alone, there were only 30 discussion replies to 11 posts on Bilerico. If you like to post and then get a good debate going on with the comments, I don't think you'll find that on Bilerico.

[yosoyeldecider]

Tolerance for school bullying is just as enlightened as saying that of course husbands beat their wives, it's just part of being human, and that the woman who goes on a date should expect that she could be raped--after all, she got in a car with the guy.

To me, to dismiss school bullying by saying "get over it" and the like is just another form of ignorance and hate. We are talking about children here. Why should be tolerate or even implicitly celebrate (it builds character, right?) brutality by one child against another?

[StillIRise]

I have two concerns about your post.

1. As much as I disagree with bully behavior, bullying is probably as American as apple pie. I am 60 years old, and I can still vividly remember my first encounter with a bully. The problem, IMO is not the bullying, but the inability of our children to cope. As parents, as communities and as a society, we are not teaching our children adequate coping skills. So we end up with Columbines or suicides, because our children do not know how to treat rejection or teasing except to strike out at others or at themselves. I'm not at all condoning the bad behavior of bullies, but I think we need to ask ourselves why our children today are less able to cope with bullies or teasing than in generations past.

2. As much as I grieve the deaths of our children who're committing suicide (for any reason), when I read articles like this, I wonder where is the concern for the hundreds of black children who're dying each day, not by suicide, but by gun violence. Why have you and others not been calling upon our leaders for the last 25 years, both at the local and federal levels, to stand up and do something about these children? All of our children - whether victims of bullying or victims of guns - have one thing in common: They're all just children and each of their lives are precious.

[smithshaw08]

Consider this...........we are allowing our children to be intolerant of someone because they are different. We I was in school, kids focused on the weaker child, and then picked on them. It was wrong then & it's wrong to continue now. When the right wing screams about teaching tolerance for gays or any other perceived difference for that matter in schools, we continue to enable the taunting. The first child in this article was black, I don't know about the second. I don't think we can compare suicide from taunting to random gun violence. You must ask yourself why we have so much gun violence. We know the answer to why these suicides are happening & it can be changed. When we try to have gun restrictions, the NRA & the right wing come unglued. What is reason so many young people are joining gangs? In California the gang violence seems to be epidemic.

[chrisahx]

Disagree with bully behavior, are you crazy?? I'm 44 and I was bullied all throughout school, and nothing was done, I can tell you for a fact, it left SCARES that I still deal with today. Maybe you didn't deal with it personally and therefore as such in my opinion you should keep your mouth shut. Bullying is going on even MORE today than it was when I was in school, and it is relentless against LGBT students or any student who even is suspected of being gay, whether they are or not. There should be a NO BULLYING RULE in ALL schools across this country IMO as that behavior only causes undue pain for those on the end who are catching it.....you should be ashamed of yourself.

[RightWingMarine]

maybe if we hadn't turned our children into such sissies this wouldn't be as large of a problem as it is today. We put more focus on making sure children feel good about themselves even when they are miserable failures rather than making them face up to losing or failing or being weaker or finishing last. Teachers don't grade with red ink because it might hurt some kids feelings, sporting events don't keep score so that no one can lose and everyone gets a meaningless ribbon. Then the kids grow up and find out that their bosses and customers don't care about their feelings and there is such a thing as failure.

[StillIRise]

As a LeftWingFo­rmerTeache­r ... I agree 100% with your post.

[SelenicMagick]

AMEN!

The entire idea that our children must never feel any emotion other than "good" is almost as ridiculous as the idea that failing is a "bad" thing.

[TryToBeFlexible]

Bullying is a form of terrorism. Those that practice is are criminals. They should be in jail. Period.

[rjmiller]

Kids bully. That's just what they do, and you're not going to stop it. However, you can talk to your depressed, bullied child and explain that in a couple years no one will even remember the bullying, that they'll grow up and move on.

[alenaspoppa]

I don't think you comprehend the level of bullying today. When I was young, a bully might threaten, might even get in a fight, and there might be whispers and gossip behind the picked-on kids' backs, but that's nothing compared to what kids can do today. Technology has allowed bullies to become ever-present, even when kids aren't in the classroom. Bullying is 24-7 oppression for some kids, and can you imagine trying to deal with that as a youngster? I agree, communication with your child is the best thing you can do to combat this, but more needs to be done in the schools as well.

[lwaxanatroi]

"no one will remember"? Trust me, the bullied child will remember. Forever.

[Hayme Estien]

I am very sorry and mean no disrespect but this attitude is exactly what leads kids to believe that noone cares.
you're right when you say "kids bully" and you're absolutely right that you should talk to your bully vitimized kid BUT telling them that in a couple of years noone remembers the bullying and that they'll grow up and move on is wrong.

A person that's been bullied when they're young grows up and still remembers the torment.

Kids don't want to hear, you'll grow out of it. That only makes them feel like noone understands or cares. It makes them feel alone. Like noone is there to help them now. This is their life in the now and they, being children don't have the mental vision to think about their adult life. We as adults who have gone through bullying can understand NOW that who cares about what others said then absoultely but you can't see it when you are a child being bullied.

By the way, Jaheem did talk to his mother about the abuse and she did everything she could to seek him for him. I know because she is my husbands cousin. We as a family are distraught at what has happened. Please keep us in your prayers as we too keep other victimized children and thier parents in prayer.

Maybe it will never stop but back then it was only name calling now in todays world it has grown to a more severe situation.

[dessertsfirst]

The truth is, kids bully because they can. If they can't do it at school, they'll do it coming or going from school, or wherever and whenever and however they can get away w/ it. It is similar to barnyard pecking order... other chickens pick on the smallest, scrawniest ones.
And the other truth is, nobody quite knows how to put a stop to it. And so it goes on, and it has gone on since the beginning of time. Remember Cain and Abel? the only two kids on the planet? and Cain ridiculed Abel before he killed him.
It was tragic then, and it is tragic now. And we all hope somebody, someday soon, can come up with the magic bullet that will put a stop to it all.

[saltyseas]

I think requesting some presence on the part of the President is a bit much. As tragic as the situation is, there is very little the sitting President can do to keep kids from being cruel. That is the nature of children, as they learn to sort out the world and their place in it.

I think most young boys experience some cruelty, some more than others. It's very sad this little boy felt the need to end his life, but truth be told I thought about it myself many times in my early teens. Thankfully I'm still here today.

[Skepticat]

Schools unfortunately are stuck with what the community throw at them. School boards embracing zero tolerance of violence often quickly abandoned the policy as soon as parents complained when their little hoodlums were being expelled. Right wing rhetoric didn't create the problem - I saw school bullies when I was teaching junior high kids more than 25 years ago. However there are far too many enablers of bad behavior today that give it support instead of discouragement. Some of the rabid right wing talk radio is pretty vile and some of the current pandering repubs don't help either. If a kid is encouraged in bullying by his families acceptance of bad behavior - the school faces an uphill struggle.

[WinterParkMom]

Sara,
I read your first story on this and I cried. I'm doing so again, Yes teachers bear some responsibility because they can usually spot bad behaviour in their classrooms and report it, but further from that is that instead of just reporting it, the teacher must speak to all the other kids privately to inquire if they are being bullied and the circumstances. Then he/she has ammunition to go to the principal to have action taken.

Parents are also responsible. Parents are responsible for teaching their children tolerance and acceptance. They can also make sure they go to the principal and ask for his anti bullying policy. The principal will say: we don't need one, we don't have that kind of problem here. It is then up to parents and the rest of the community to bombard every school board meeting and demand an anti bullying policy. Demand that that policy be enforced with serious consequences for the bully as well as the school administration. If someone is not in fear of losing their job, they will have no incentive to follow the rules.

[jhamm1]

It's not fair to fault teachers for failing to take measures which they are clearly not authorized to do. Occasionally, in the event that bullying becomes persistant, teacher's try to organize the students and encourage tolerance and restrained behavior, but it never works. It's been tried before.

The only solution is to refine administration policies which permit for more stern disciplinary measures and a zero-tolerance policy toward violence either from or between students. Only when bullies face the possibility of actual consequences for their actions, such as suspension and the like, might the administration and teachers alike be able to curb the extremities of bullying.

[demfriend]

When the people being allowed to teach have passed a test to teach and have not gone to the correct classes and have been taught how to teach how can we expect any better than this? When we have teachers that is is only love for their job that keeps them in it there is something wrong because they are underpaid and live with the expectation that a slice of that pay will have to be used for the classroom so the kids have some of what the are required to have to teach the kids. I know teachers who could not afford to stay teachers because there is no money coming from the district enough to cover the books and materials they are required to have to teach. The aides the districts used to pay for don't come from magical sources. Even the special needs classes cannot function without money outlaid by the teachers. So our expectations of these teachers to do more to stop those who will bully which are not taught at home to respect others by their parents might be asking one more thing of people who don't have the ability to give it.

[Charles Pavlack]

While the death of any child, especially by suicide, is tragic, I think the jump to blame right-wing rhetoric is a bit too much of a stretch. I'm guessing neither the kids who took their own lives or those who drove them to it had heard of Dobson, Perkins, or Warren, nor have many of their parents.

I am 44 years old, and was bullied as a child, long before cable television brought these types widespread exposure. I was called gay. It wasn't because the kids who beat the cr*p out of me on the way to or from school thought I was a threat to their family structure. It was because it was, to kids, a hateful, hurtful phrase.

I am not in any way saying that bullying is acceptable, or is not a problem. But I think it's too easy to tie every derogatory use of the word "gay" back to the preachers of intolerance, but the simple fact is that it's been used as a pejorative for far longer than the mega churches have been around.

[CuriousInSeattle]

Thank you for a well written opinion. This stuff has been going on since the beginning of time.

[plebeianswillrevolt]

Schools are a hell-hole. Except for jocks and cheerleaders. Look at Thomas Friedman's story in the NYT's today. American kids are 23 out of 25 tested nations in reading amd math. Right up there with Portugal and Cuba. Teachers follow the don't ask - don't tell - don't confrin - don't correct or interveine. Why should they? Start a drama with a high school celebrity - --- they can be ostracised more quickly than Jaheem Herrera --- and these so-called educators are on as much of a popularity trip as the school bullies. Messed up rodent infested system. The fall of the Emipre.

[joyf1]

We test every student in America, other countries do not. It doesn't matter what the child's I.Q. is or their handicap, we have to test them. America's brightest students are equal to other country's bright students. That's why the rest of the world sends their children to our colleges. You have bought the myth like many other Americans and we, as educators, do little to correct the record. If you have a foreign exchange student in your community, please ask them about the testing procedures in their country. Also, the right wing would love to see schools fail because then they can say, "See? We told you our schools are bad, now here's your voucher." That's the plan.

[WinterParkMom]

I wouldm't set too much store by Thomas Friedman. I think he's been debunked as not a total truth teller and kind of fabricates some of his info