Editorial: A scourge at our schools

A 14-year-old adolescent hanged himself from his bed with his belt.

As the evidence so far indicates, he committed suicide to save himself from fellow students who mocked him, beat him up, and cursed at him every day at school.

His suicide demonstrates our collective inability as a society and as a state to provide solutions to the scourge of bullying at our schools.

Any child, younger or older, might have been in his position.

That is because we have not taken care to create a nexus of written and unwritten rules, and have not set up social services to effectively confront such phenomena, before incidents of brutalisation come to a tragic end.

It is absolutely necessary that all of us turn our attention to each and every case that is similar to what happened in the Athens neighbourhood of Kolonos.

Parents, teachers, competent facilities, and the state must stop turning a blind eye to the anxious scream of desperation of children who fall victim to psychological or physical violence from their schoolmates.

Unfortunately, bullying and the terrorising of students have become an integral part of students’ everyday school experience.

That is why, aside from offering psychological support to those who fall victim to such violence, we must seriously discuss correctional measures for the attackers.

Even those who are simply third party observers must be encouraged to speak out and report abusive behaviour, because bullying concerns us all.