JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

I’ve been wanting to write about this case of bullying for months, but my friend stopped me. She wanted to give the school officials the chance to do the right thing. Months passed and they did nothing despite several meetings with my friend and her son, in the presence of psychologists and lawyers. They said they were concerned with “fairness”, which is this case means inaction. In the end my friend decided to just take her son out of that school, away from the bully who had tormented him for years, and the school administration that enables and protects this bully.

My friend’s son has Asperger’s syndrome (an autism spectrum disorder). When he is anxious, he fidgets and mumbles to himself. Otherwise he is your typical 20-year-old college student. He can look after himself and takes public transportation to school. He gets good grades. My friend enrolled him in that college because it claims to be sensitive to the needs of students with developmental disorders.

Two years ago, one of his older classmates began bullying him. This older classmate would draw penises on his schoolwork, make loud sexual remarks and act out masturbating in order to embarrass him in public. This happened often and regularly. My friend’s son was traumatized by this bullying.

My friend documented all the instances she was aware of. On three occasions she reported the bullying to the school administration. They made vague promises, but did nothing. Finally she demanded a meeting with the school officials, the bully and his parents. The bully and his parents did not appear, and the school officials did not censure them. The school officials even made excuses for their absence.

My friend asked for yet another meeting, and to underscore the seriousness of the matter she brought her son’s psychologist and her family lawyer. I attended the meeting to lend her moral support. The school officials were pleasant and reassuring. They said they would get back to her in seven days’ time.

Three weeks passed.

After 22 days, the school administration handed down a memo. My friend’s son and the bully were asked to sign an agreement that they would “refrain from acting aggressively toward each other”. The memo recommended that my friend’s son, the student who was being bullied, “control his behavior” and that he be “accompanied by a companion or a shadow” inside the school.

Not only did the school administration refuse to enact any disciplinary measures on the bully, but their memo made it sound as if my friend’s son, the boy with Asperger’s, had brought this ill treatment on himself.

After several more attempts to contact the school officials, my friend decided that she had had it. She was tired of being given the runaround by the very people who were supposed to have her son’s welfare in mind. It was clear that the school had no intention of censuring the classmate who was bullying her son. And she could not bear the thought that her son would continue to go to that college and endure emotional torment. She transferred him to another school.

My friend’s son is doing very well at his new school. My friend has decided to let the matter go, but her stomach still turns when she thinks of what her son had to go through.

I take a personal interest in cases of bullying. I was bullied in high school and I am still furious about it. While it was going on, no one stuck up for me for fear of being bullied themselves. Adults actually hinted that it was somehow my fault. I do not think it was funny. I do not attribute it to youthful shenanigans, nor am I amused at the effort of otherwise intelligent people to describe it as “a character-building experience.”

I am writing this because I want my friend’s son to know that he is not alone.