#StillShiningOn The Bullycide of Brandon Swartwood Bullies Who Kill

The Bullycide of Brandon Swartwood Bullies Who Kill

By his mother, Cathy Swartwood Mitchell - Director, Bully Police-Oklahoma

cl_swartwood (at) hotmail (dot) com

I have tried to write this message for three days and have not been able to complete it-- maybe today. I have a lot to say and this is a very painful and emotional subject for me. While my heart goes out to the victims of these school shootings--my life has been devastated by a different type of crime that is happening in our schools.

Although rarely labeled as such, "Bullying" is a crime. This "other" crime of "Bullying," injures, maims, destroys and kills-- as effectively as a gun. Until a proactive approach is taken with the crime of "Bullying," a reactive approach to the crime of school shootings is futile.

"Bullying" is a crime in which the perpetrators are rarely punished and the victims rarely receive justice. This crime is usually repetitive-- a victim is injured and traumatized over and over. Yet, "Bullying" is rarely acknowledged as a crime. When "Bullying" claims yet another victim, few notice and few care. Oftentimes, the victims themselves are blamed by being told that they must be doing something to "deserve" it.

These victims are isolated and usually suffer in silence. The media doesn't broadcast the injuries or deaths of these silenced victims. Our Great Nation doesn't share in their pain or extend sympathies to the survivors. Communities aren't outraged by these senseless, (and equally) devastating crimes being committed in our schools. The only outrage in our nation, in our communities, is when the psychiatric injuries caused by the "Bullying" are externalized, and we have another school shooting.

In the adult world, we have laws against "Bullying" crimes. We do not tolerate these crimes in "our" workplace. Yet, our children are told they must tolerate this in "their" workplace-- our public schools. Society, in general, has the mindset that it is "all right" or "a rite of passage" for "Bullies" to deliberately and systematically destroy their victims-- our children. Why, but why, would anyone ask our children to endure more than we as adults could?

How could anyone expect our children to make it through humiliation, torment, isolation, assaults or a brutal beating unscathed? We shouldn't. And they don't.

In the adult world these offenses and crimes have names. Society uses different terms for these offenses and crimes when our children are the victims. I must pose the question to law enforcement, to school administrators and to our society-- At what age does teasing become harassment, taunting become tormenting, following-stalking, punching-assaulting, or a fight become a battery or a beating?

As long as this mindset prevails, our most vulnerable will continue to be our least protected. Oh, some kids will survive the "Bullies" just like some adults survive being victimized. However, in both instances, the injuries and the recovery depends largely on the number, frequency, severity and duration of the crime or crimes.

Some children will leave school to escape the victimization. They might only be deprived of their education-- a small price to pay to escape the torment and humiliation. Some children will leave their hometowns to get away from the harassment and torture. Some children will turn to substance abuse and self-medicate in an attempt to escape their pain and suffering. Some will lose all self-confidence and always believe that there must be something wrong with them-- that they did deserve it like everyone said. (If not, why would those in a position to help-- to save them from a living hell-- have condoned these crimes against them?) Some children will leave this world to escape their living hell on this earth-- as their pain is with them wherever they go.

Other children will learn to accept the physical and/or psychological injuries inflicted upon them-- "just for fun." They will go to the doctors and take their medications and accept the fact that life isn't fair. They won't question "the system" or why they were not allowed to get a public education "just because" someone didn't like the way they dressed, or perhaps the way they looked. Or maybe it was the music they listened to, or the vehicle they drove. Could have been that they were really intelligent or perhaps that they really struggled to learn. Or maybe the "Bullies" used even better excuses like they thought they were a Christian or they thought they were a Satanist, they thought they were gay or they thought they were straight, they thought they were rich or they thought they were poor, etc., etc., etc.

At any rate, surely, we shouldn't think that these victims would have a problem with some "Bullies" setting themselves up as judge, jury and executioner-- thus depriving their victims of their education, their health and their happiness. Surely, we should expect the victims to be okay-- to come through this uninjured and unscathed?

When we don't acknowledge "Bullying" as a "real" crime, we dismiss the very real injuries that are inflicted upon it's victims. Although the the psychological injuries and the extent can be varied, they are real injuries. Sometimes, the symptoms are internalized and sometimes they are externalized-- sometimes both. In either case "Bullying" kills. In both cases children die.

I speak from experience. My beloved son, Brandon, was a victim of "Bullies."

Brandon developed PTSD, (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), and Depression, after being harassed, tormented, isolated, assaulted and brutally beaten in our public school system. When we took out a protective order against one of the "Bullies," he, the bully, decided to send a friend into the principal's office to claim that Brandon had made a bomb threat. It was absurd, along with the way that the school handled the allegation. The damage done to Brandon over this incident alone, was beyond measure-- victimize the victim.

The assistant principal later told me that he was convinced that Brandon had not made the bomb threat. Unfortunately, the damage to Brandon could not be undone. Brandon had to live with the stigma of the would-be-bomber. This is just one of the incidents. There were many.

On 12/16/00 Brandon put a loaded gun to his head, pulled the trigger and ended his pain. Some of the "Bullies" have said, (through their crocodile tears), that they didn't realize what they were doing-- that they were, "just having fun."

Those years that I watched my son die a slow and painful death. Those years that I saw the sparkling light of joy, love, and hope in his big, beautiful, brown eyes-- slowly replaced with the darkness of pain, devastation, and hopelessness. The night that Brandon stood by me and told me that he felt "dead inside"-- then the morning, three weeks later, that I stood over his dead body, knowing, that despite all my efforts to save my beloved son, the "Bullies" job had been too well done. Their mission had been accomplished. Suffice to say that through all this, Brandon and all of us who love him were not having fun. Where was any justice for Brandon? Where is justice for us? Our light, our hope, our joy has been replaced with darkness, hopelessness, and an unrelenting sorrow. We feel "dead inside."

As tragic as all of these deaths are, the greater tragedy is if society doesn't stop to look at the reasons, and pause for a moment to see "all the victims."

For more information on Brandon, visit the site his mother created by CLICKING HERE

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