Hope

“Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here” was above the gates of Hell in Dante Alighieri’s Inferno. Written in the 14th century the words hold true even today. Hope is the state of being that allows us to continue with our lives, to expect that our lives will be better than they are. Without hope we find very little reason to continue our existence and it is the absence of hope that robs every suicidal person of their life.

Bullies hate hope and they want us to enter the gates of Hell with them. So they crush it. In order to fulfill their childish dreams of control and dominance they suck the very life blood that keeps us all going, hope.

Listed below are 21 names of children with whom the bullies succeeded. Each one of them was killed by a bully. But, the bullies didn’t do it by themselves. No, they had the co-operation of each and every one of these children, because they killed themselves.

Now, I don’t want to diminish the responsibility of the bullies in this matter. The taking of each and every one of these lives was done by the bullies’ hand just as surely as if they had manipulated the rope, gun or pill. The weapon that they used was deception to make the target feel there was no hope.

Children who are being victimized by a bully tend to internalize the stress they are enduring. They do not want their parents or others to know what is happening to them. Add to that the promises of retribution that the bully uses to ensure his safety from the target and what we have is an isolated child that is left alone in their suffering.

Being a child with a limited perspective on life makes the situation seems hopeless and there is no sign to them that this will ever end. Do you remember how long the days, weeks, month and years seemed when you were a child? Your limited perspective on the passage of time made everything drag on. As you got older everything began to move at a faster pace. To the point that if you are like me you wish things would slow down just a bit. Also, as we get older, we begin to see the outcomes of the experiences of our lives. We see that every situation has an ending and that sometimes if all else fails, all we have to do to resolve it is to endure and get through it.

But, children do not have this option. They have survived very little in their short lives and it takes experience and determination to “tough out” bully. And it takes hope.

Hope is the key to saving our children’s lives. We must find ways to communicate with them even if they don’t want to. We must give them the benefit of our wisdom and experience even if they won’t listen. They must know that we are there to protect them. To do what it takes even if it means fighting the bullies, the schools and the courts. We must lead by example so that when they are older they can lead. Most of all we must give them HOPE.