Born to Not Get Bullied by Nicholas Kristof

“Born to Not Get Bullied” by Nicholas
This article focuses on the vice of bullying which happens to most teenagers during their time in school. An excellent example of a famous person who faced this unfortunate experience is the Songstress Lady Gaga. She had her share of bullying when she was in school and disclosed this during an interview. The cruelty which she was subjected to was so severe that it affected her studies at some point in her school life.
In a quest to help other adolescents who might be going through what she went through, she was part of the launch of a program to contribute to motivate children and have a conducive environment for them when they are in school.
This led to more stakeholders joining because bullying is a menace in the education system, and might lead to kids taking their own lives. Research shows that schools with bullying cases do not perform well because the kids will always look for reasons to skip school or even indulge in alcohol. For the victims of bullying including Lady Gaga herself, the self-doubt that comes with it is something that they battle with for a long while in their lives.
The launching of the event at Harvard attracted more public figures including Oprah Winfrey and Kathleen Sebelius. According to Lady Gaga, the foundation which she started at Harvard is at the top of her priority now, and she wants to use her followers to spread the message of being kind to others. Her teenage life must have been difficult as described by her mother, who is the president of the foundation.

The foundation will not only focus on bullying but also, to create a conducive environment where everyone loves each other. Through her foundation, Lady Gaga seeks to find social justice to people and encourage the young people to change their attitude towards each other.
Bullying affects the victim in a short-term and also long-term ways. Some of the short-term effects include Low self-esteem and a drastic drop in school performance. In my personal experience, I had a hard time in my 5th grade in trying to catch up with my school work. Being the only girl in my computer class, the boys did not give me an easy time. They would continuously bully me by making negative comments questioning my intelligence and ability to be in the same class as them while my fellow lady friends took other subjects like home science. I would constantly have the thoughts of skiving all my computer classes and taking another subject. This messed up with my self-esteem, and I was not confident anymore about school and even other subjects.
Other short-term effects include drug abuse, stress, anxiety, and depression. The long-term effects of bullying are generally mental health problems such as having suicidal thoughts, eating disorders, self-harm to oneself and social anxiety. Nowadays, the typical form of harassment is the Cyberbullying. A lot of people get trolled on social media.
Some of the ways we can join hands to combat this social vice are forming and joining communities which help people to overcome mental issues that most likely were triggered by bullying, using social media as a platform to spread positive vibes and not trolling others. Also, legal action to be taken against people who perpetrate cyberbullying.

References
Kochenderfer-Ladd, Becky, and Marie E. Pelletier. “Teachers’ views and beliefs about bullying: Influences on classroom management strategies and students’ coping with peer victimization.” Journal of school psychology 46.4 (2008): 431-453.