Kids & Parenting
Combatting Bullying with Tough Love
Based on Patricia Backora’s latest book project:
Bullying: a Spiritual Battle
Bullying begins with the deliberate, often capricious selection of a target. Beware of violating the Law of Conformity. Besides being skinny as a snake, a girl must conform to a standardized height range. Pity her if she’s under five-foot-two or over five-foot-ten. Like odd-sized apples in supermarkets, unique individuals are destined for disposal. Cosmetic dissent is an unforgiveable sin, punishable by bullying.
Even if satan stops short of putting his victim in the grave, he’ll at least incite his devotees to cripple the spirit of that person with a campaign of verbal or physical abuse. A cat gets a bigger buzz out of slowly torturing a mouse to death than it does by killing it outright. The little furball feels like a powerful lion when he does that.
School bullying is one of the hottest topics on today’s news. I’ve lost count of the news stories I’ve heard or read of kids who ended up dead because of bullies. They’re casualties of war. A war waged by aggressors who know they can’t lose; criminal lowlifes who fear no retribution. Why? You can’t pull up the tares without hurting the wheat. If a kid tells the teacher he only makes more enemies.
Bullying thrives in this part of the world because it’s virtually illegal to effectively discipline kids. One girl was found dead of a drug overdose in bed. Why? Because she conformed to the crowd too well. She had the skinny figure and long shiny hair every girl wants...and she was hated for it at school. Ya just gotta keep the rules of this sick society, but ya gotta walk on eggs while you’re doin’ it! For those who haven’t lost their soul by the ninth grade high school is a gateway to hell.
These days the torture can start even earlier. One child began to be bullied in school at the tender age of five. The abuse continued for five eternal years. The boy ended up in the hospital because of naïve parents who had faith that underneath it all, human nature is basically good and their child could rise above the abuse and emerge triumphant through endless patience. How dangerous, to put your faith in corrupt human nature. It’s like expecting a bobcat to fast forty days in a chicken coop! The children of satan have the nature of their father, and in varying degrees they’ll act out his nature. Jesus says in John 10:10: The thief cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. Furthermore He says to His enemies in John 8:44: Ye are of your father, the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do .He was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Even if the bully doesn’t shoot or knife his victim, he ministers slow death to him through daily verbal poison, always trying to break his physical or emotional health over a period of time. The bully will steal every iota of his victim’s personal dignity. In time, he might even destroy his victim’s ability to love others. It takes the power of the Holy Spirit to restore souls ruined by satan’s kids.
Soft school administrators would take no action against the guilty pupils who battered a helpless five-year-old child, sent out to face a hostile world at such a tender age. The parents refused to take the little victim out of school, reasoning that if they did, it would mean the bullies had won! I don’t know if the polite tolerance of the British springs from their national tradition of genteel manners, but blood-thirsty bullies aren’t due such courtesies!
What’s more important, protecting a vulnerable child from a dangerous school environment by finding alternative ways to educate him, or forcing him to rise above every abuse cruel bullies hit him with? Parent, how would you feel if you were the one who had to suffer in a war zone for five long years, day in and day out, vastly outnumbered by your foes and unable to defend yourself? How can any sane adult rationalize leaving a mere child at the mercy of a mob of enemies who can’t be reasoned with? I wouldn’t treat a dog like that! THAT’S CHILD ABUSE!!
Why does the same sick scenario of serious injury or death happen over and over again? Because politically correct school authorities fantasize that if they close their eyes to a particular ongoing case, it’ll “come out in the wash”. It makes me heartsick and mad as a hornet! Over and over again I see heartbroken parents appear on the TV News weeping that their child has been driven to suicide after years of mental and physical torture.
Throughout history people who couldn’t live by the rules of civilized society have been banished from communities and nations when they refused to change their ways. The incorrigible bully, like a festering cancer, needs to be decisively dealt with for the good of all the other kids whose education is being ruined and whose life is being made a living hell by his nastiness.
WHEN THERE’S NO ROOM FOR DOUBT THROW THE BULLY OUT!!!
Kids who go to school to cause others pain should be at the receiving end of pain...a constructive kind. Hardened bullies have forfeited the right to free public education by abusing the privilege of going to school with civilized people. I know it’s against the law to swing the Board of Education anymore, but bullies should suffer the pain of expulsion. The government should set up special delinquent schools for expelled bullies who still want to get educated. Put ‘em to work to pay for the education they might have had for free. Our streets are fouled by their garbage. Set ‘em to work cleaning the streets, scrubbing off grafitti, doing landscaping. Then those unholy terrors will be too worn out to get into so much trouble!
Okay, I expect a lot of kid-glove softies will call me a bully for saying tough problems call for tough measures. But banishing dangerous incorrigibles from law-abiding society is Biblical, even New Testament. In I Corinthians Chapter 5 Paul instructs church members to disfellowship wicked members who refuse to repent. Why? To prevent reprobates from infecting the rest of the church with sexual sins, dishonesty, drunkenness, etc. Violent behavior is every bit as bad as these sins. One bad bully can escalate to a gang of criminals who make school sheer hell for others and keep them from learning.
Putting a kid through public school didn’t used to be so bad, but it’s getting to be the next worst thing to hell. From the age of five the indoctrination starts. You’ve gotta have this, you’ve gotta act this way, respond to people that way. And if you don’t, the bullies are watching you, and you’ll be next. Well before a child reaches puberty he’s already gotten a warped sex education on TV and on the playground, and he’s pressured to be among the first to lose his virginity (which he’s brainwashed into thinking is a dread disease) and it doesn’t matter who takes his or her virtue, just so long as they can say they’ve done it. My heart truly goes out to Christian parents who are trying to raise their children to live decently in this filthy hellhole of a world, one that could make Sodom blush. Good, decent Christians don’t want the world to rob their little children of their innocence. I hope and pray the Rapture of the Church occurs before another generation of newborn babies has to be born and suffer the traumas of public school culture.
Or worse yet, old age. Pity the elderly too. I was saddened to read of the tragic death of an 86-year old Englishman. For two long years he had been subjected to fiendish psychological torment by a gang of teenage vermin. His crime? He was blind, as well as elderly. Satan incites bullies to despise and abuse the defenseless.
Demon-driven kids threw rocks at the old man’s house and called him names. They put obstacles in his yard to make him trip whenever he went outside for a stroll. Even if they had done nothing worse, they would still have merited divine judgment. Leviticus 19:14 warns against cursing the deaf, or placing stumbling-blocks before the blind. Deuteronomy 27:18 says: Cursed is he who makes the blind to wander out of the way.
Those devils are under a curse! Not only did their victim have to bear the heartache of blindness, but his tormentors made his life hell. In due course they will reap what they have sown. And no, God won’t let them off just ‘cause they’re under 18! God is not a politically correct, limp-wristed powderpuff politician!
Emboldened by the lack of consequences for their earlier harassment, those creeps converged on the old guy as he began his daily walk to the corner market. According to two teenage witnesses, they surrounded him on their mountain bikes, called him foul names and made obscene gestures. After he waved his cane at them and told them to go away, a boy kicked him in the leg and made him fall. One girl told the boy to stop. His reply? “I can’t. This is too much fun!” It’s cool to be cruel.
The post-mortem was “inconclusive”. There was, they said, no substantial evidence to link the bullying with the man’s death. His many relatives were enraged that those devils had gone unpunished. I find it baffling that more wasn’t done to protect the poor man from the bullies during the two years they carried out their hate campaign against him. Perhaps surveillance cameras could have been installed on his property to glean evidence to use against the delinquents. Had he been wealthy, he could have had his own personal bodyguard or lived in a gated community dotted with mansions nestled in a floral paradise.
What a shame satan’s servants have the upper hand. Society is at the mercy of incorrigible youth nurtured on a diet of Hollywood sewage. Today’s dimwitted policy is to let kids trash the neighborhood any old way they please. The little thugs are just impressionable babies, after all, the poor little sweetie pies. A bit of discipline or a term at a youth “brat camp” would only damage their precious little psyches for life. Heaven forbid that you should subject them to a day in court. And don’t resort to judo or karate to ward them off if they ambush you. You could get sued for defending yourself against those cute little cuddlies who are only expressing their individuality!
Hogwash! Those monsters who drove that poor old man to his death are first-degree murderers, plain and simple. They, like the cat torturing the mouse, killed him by inches. Just because it was “fun”, and wouldn’t cost them much even if they got caught. A few months behind bars is a bargain price for such a high.
But I’ve got news for those thugs. Almighty God has already condemned those sacks of sin to the Lake of Fire! And believe me, not even the slickest lawyer could shorten God’s sentence! Most people think that if there is a future judgment, that our guilt or innocence before God will be established then and there. But Scripture shows that the awful Judgment Day of sinners will only ratify what was already established in their lifetimes. John 3:18 warns that sinners are already condemned to perdition because of their rebellion against God and rejection of His Son. Bullies try to pack as much deviltry into life as possible before they must finally stand before God for judgment. Basically people aren’t sinners because they sin, but they sin because they are born sinners. I believe there must exist a “mean gene” or “cruelty chromosome” which was passed on by Adam and Eve to taint the souls of all mankind. God is Love, so to rebel against Him is to choose hatred.
Those kids are probably gloating over getting away with it even now, but they’re more blind than their victim was. Too blind to see they are sitting on the death row where all unrepentant sinners are consigned. Only the Blood of Jesus can reprieve a condemned sinner from his date with eternal death in hell. And I wouldn’t bet one nickel they’ll ever be saved unless they’re exposed to a little tough love.
Years ago, if a brat raised hell in a supermarket, his parents would smack his bottom once or twice to subdue him. Today, kids must be given free rein to express their feelings, even if they ransack the potato chip aisle and rip open every bag. Sometimes a kid’s screams will reach a blood-curdling pitch before his passive parents pick him up to try to calm him. They’re afraid to do anything to cross the little tyrant, even appear angry. They’re scared stiff they’ll be arrested for child abuse if they give him a quick swat on his Seat of Education. What are the fruits of permissive child rearing?
In a word: anarchy. Where there is no restraint, chaos reigns, whether in society at large or in the home. In England, youth crime is endemic. Gangs of kids as young as ten boldly torment elderly people in quiet neighborhoods, shouting insults and hurling bricks through windows, expecting to get away with it. One 62-year-old lady died from the prolonged stress she was subjected to by little thugs. Oddly enough, they were rounded up and indicted for manslaughter. Had they been younger than ten, they would have been “incapable of committing a crime”.
I stick faithfully to the King James Version of the Bible, for its God-given answers have not been revised to conform to this politically correct age. I want to hear what God really has to say about unruly youth. I’ll give you an example. The Prophet Isaiah warned God’s people of the consequences of falling away from God as a society. Isaiah 3:5 states: And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbor. The child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base (vile person) against the honorable (KJV).
The Prophet Elisha didn’t take too kindly to being bullied. In his case, a far greater offense than making fun of his looks was involved: making fun of the wonderful works of God. In II Kings Chapter 2 the Prophet Elijah gets taken up into heaven in a chariot of fire as his apprentice prophet Elisha looks on, hoping to inherit a double portion of his master’s anointing to carry on his prophetic ministry. Can you imagine the holy wonderment which filled the heart of this young prophet as he walked down the road to Bethel, after seeing such an unheard-of miracle like that? Elijah is only the second man since Enoch, the seventh patriarch from Adam, who has been translated into heaven without dying. And Elisha had been privileged to witness it!
But Elisha’s holy communion with the Lord was interrupted by shouts of “Go up, you bald head! Go up, you bald head!”
Just like today’s bullies. Forty-two youths sprang out at one lone man, laughing and pointing fingers. They had heard of the miraculous ascent of Elijah, but it was like throwing pearls before swine. Instead of giving God glory for taking up His righteous servant into heaven, they mocked another of His prophets for having a sparsely populated scalp and told him to go up too. Elisha didn’t turn the other cheek in meekness. Those kids knew full well they were mocking the Holy God of Israel, not just His servant. In verse 24 Elisha cursed them in the name of the Lord. Immediately two angry female bears came out of the woods and executed God’s judgment upon them. People forget God can get as mad as a bear robbed of her cubs or a lion which has been provoked to wrath (Hosea 13:8). During this 2000-year Age of Grace God has been very lamblike in patience toward evil-doers, but He is about to show His other side as well: lionlike and bearlike toward blasphemers and hate-filled sinners.
The saddest story I ever read was of a young suicide victim. She was just a small child. She was bullied at school to the point of madness. When the Christmas holidays came, she found blissful respite. But when school was about to resume, she grew panicky. She pleaded with her mother not to be sent back to school. Her mother thought she was exaggerating the difficulty and wouldn’t listen to her plea.
Before she hanged herself in her bedroom, the little girl left her mother a note: “I hate you, Mom.”
How chilling. Doubtless, that poor child had never heard of the love of Jesus. Certainly not in her godless secular school. Her little being had cried out for love, but all she’d ever learned in school was how to be afraid and how to hate. . Whenever I read of such tragedies caused by the cruelty of others my spirit cries out to God for Him to take over the government of this planet and put down all wickedness. There is a righteous variety of anger, as well as a sinful kind. Righteous anger should lead to sensible actions, and Spirit-inspired prayers to the All-wise God Who alone judges the souls of men righteously. Rash courses of action should be avoided. There are times when God takes vengeance against unrepentant sinners, but that is His prerogative, not ours. If more righteous indignation over evil existed in this world instead of passive acceptance, what a difference it would make to mankind!
It is a heartrending tragedy when a victim’s ingrained survival instinct is overpowered by the urge to escape a hostile world. Compelled by law or circumstances to remain captive in school and “tough it out”, the victim is subjected to daily ambushes, teasing, vandalism of personal property, and any perverse tortures which wimpy school officials will tolerate. The very soul of the victim feels squeezed between a rock and a hard place. Finally, death seems to be the only honorable route of escape. School, a chamber of horrors, has now become an execution chamber for a rejected soul.
When people aren’t strong enough to survive bullying and end up taking their own lives, their blood is on the bully’s hands. He is a murderer, just as much as if he had blown his victim away with an AK-47. The laws of this world might excuse him, and chalk it up to happenstance. The bully might even “get a buzz” out of the tragedy, and feel more macho for pushing somebody else into a premature grave. He may grin triumphantly just like a genocidal Nazi, knowing that he’s wrung every last possible tear out of his prey. Smugly smiling, he boasts he got away with it. One British school neglected to protect a girl from long-term, systematic bullying. When she could take no more, she made a suicide pact with a friend, who survived it. But the girl didn’t. Unsurprisingly, the court absolved the school of any blame for the girl’s death. But God holds that wimpy school and her tormentors responsible for the blood of that girl, even if she died by her own hand. The seeds of death were sown in her soul by the bullies. No wonder there’s such a bullying epidemic. Even if a bully kills his victim, he might get a slap-on-the-wrist sentence “because of diminished responsibility.” And he’ll pat himself on the back for getting a cheap thrill in exchange for a year’s probation, max.
The very latest craze in the UK is “happy slapping”. A yob (young obnoxious youth) might go up to a complete stranger on the bus and assault him or her while his friends record the incident for transmitting and viewing on their cell phones. Yobs usually wear a baseball cap with a hood so surveillance cameras can’t catch them. But God knows who they are and their day of judgment is at hand. He’s got their number.
Today hellfire and damnation is taboo sermon material in modern churches, though Jesus said much more about hell than heaven in the Bible. Instead, a downy-soft “love” is being pushed from the pulpit, one which glosses over God’s role as Judge of the wicked. According to Ezekiel 13:22, God not only rebukes false prophets who condemn the innocent, but those who promise the wicked they’ll get off the hook, thus encouraging them to go on being wicked. Sinners have no incentive to repent of their wicked ways if they think God’s got nothing against them.
But God keeps accurate records in heaven. No computerized accounting program can approach His pinpoint accuracy. Not even one bird falls to the ground unnoticed by His ever-vigilant eyes (see Matthew 10:29-31). Human beings are of infinitely more value to Him; for His own image, though tarnished in mankind through Adam’s fall, is indelibly stamped upon each human soul. Sinners, especially rich or popular ones, might altogether escape the consequences of sin in this world. But God’s keeping track of all their dirty deeds. There is no statute of limitations on His justice, however long in coming it might be. One day the knees of sinners will buckle beneath them in terrible fear as they are ushered into the Presence of their Great Judge, and so they will finally bend the knee to that Holy One Who would have become their loving Savior had they repented. Vengeance upon the unrepentant is God’s prerogative, and He will surely repay (Deuteronomy 32:35; Romans 12:19).
A very grim warning. But bullies are gutless cowards who never start wars they can’t possibly lose, and never pick a fight unless they know they’ll emerge without a scratch. They’re brave enough to gang up on one skinny “dweeb” who can’t fight back, but they’re way too chicken to forsake their sins. Feeling safe and warm is far more important to them, so they won’t risk being put out in the cold socially for following Christ. So they’d rather follow their friends into hell.
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