“You are a pig!” Those ugly mean words from a well known celebrity on a popular Canadian reality TV show made my stomach heave. With these kind of role models, is it any wonder that bullying is becoming one of the worst social problems in modern society? These are the kind of “heros” our children are force fed every day by an unscrupulous media industry that puts shock value before basic human decency. A quick channel surf will quickly reveal a disturbing reverence for bullies: the meanest guy gets the gold, the girl, that dream job. Viewers cheer and admire the tough, steely brute who wins at any cost. Meanness equals strength and power. Kindness is for wimps.
Whether we like it or not, art imitates life. How did our values get so screwed up and what can we do about it? Any student of history will see that the people who have really moved mountains had compassion as their compass. All the great humanitarians behind advances in health, medicine, science, human rights knew that human kindness is the core of all real power and strength.
What if kindness was the new ‘cool’ and kids were taught empathy from kindergarten to the grad prom? Bullying cannot thrive in a culture of compassion in our schools. When children are rewarded for being nice to each other, they take those skills to the schoolyard.
Maybe we should show our future leaders what a real hero is: someone who is not afraid to stand up for what is good and right. Show our children that true power and muscle comes from being a decent human being. And real self-esteem and confidence result from building our own egos, not flattening others.
Genuine “heros” like Ghandi, Mandela, Martin Luther-King and Tommy Douglas stand the test of time – only their voices will echo through future canyons and only their faces will align with the night stars at the edge of Orion.
By Doreen Marion Gee