Bullying
What is bullying?
Information about bullying in British Sign Language (BSL).
Bullying can happen to anyone, at any age and it affects lots of young people. People bully others for all sorts of reasons – what they look like, being clever, the clothes they wear, or because they’re deaf – and sometimes for no reason at all.
Bullying is never ok and if you are bullied it’s important to remember it’s not your fault. You may feel sad, angry, scared or bad about yourself, but you can get help to make it stop and there are people you can talk to.
You can talk to friends, family or a teacher. It doesn’t matter who you tell as long as you think about telling someone.
Bullying can mean lots of different things, including:
- name-calling or teasing
- hitting, kicking, pinching, pushing or pulling someone around
- being ignored and left out from friendship groups
- breaking, hiding or stealing someone’s things
- people making up and spreading nasty stories about you
- sending nasty messages online or by text
- making you do things you don’t want to do or making you feel uncomfortable
- making you feel frightened, stupid or bad about yourself.
Bullying can be one of these things, or a few of them and it can happen again and again. Some people pick on others because they think they’re cooler, cleverer or better than them.
The important thing to remember is that if you don’t like something that someone is doing, you don’t have to put up with it – tell someone.
Try not to worry. It can be sorted out.
Don’t believe the bullies. They’re not your friends and may be saying untrue, nasty things just to make you upset or angry.
Tell someone. This can be a friend, parent/carer or teacher, or you can contact Childline – you won’t need to tell them your name. A counsellor is someone you can share your worries with.
Try to stay away from the bullies. Stay close to your friends or your family if you don’t feel safe. Make sure you walk or get the bus home from school with someone and ask your mates to look out for you.
Don’t fight back. You might feel like lashing out, but it won’t help – this can make things worse and could get you into trouble yourself.
Make a record. Keep any nasty notes, texts, emails or drawings the bullies have sent you so that you can show someone what’s been happening. You can also write down what’s been said to you.
Remember it’s never your fault.
Tell someone. A friend, parent/carer, teacher or contact Childline.
Ignore them. Don’t reply to the text messages, emails or posts and don’t answer calls from someone who’s bullying you, even if you know them.
Keep the messages so that you can show someone (take a screen grab of the page or take a picture using your phone).
Talk to someone you trust and only give out your phone number or email address to friends and your family. Ask them not to share it with other people.
Block the bullies. Most websites will let you block people you don’t want to hear from. You can also block the sender of nasty texts. Not all mobiles can do this, but it’s worth checking but it’s worth checking if yours does.
Change your privacy settings on social networks (Facebook, Twitter, etc) so that only your real friends can contact you and see your page or profile.
Report them. If someone’s posted something upsetting about you on a website, you can report them. If you’ve been bullied on your mobile phone, you can report it to your mobile network company.