To This Day Project: Joining The Fight Against Bullying

Why else would we still be here?

Whoever coined the phrase “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” was both a liar and was giving bullies bad ideas. Bullying is a sad subject. But sometimes we must look at the sad things in order to improve our own outlook and to help improve others. Do you remember being bullied? I certainly do. Few people can say they were never teased or hurt by their peers, even if it was not extreme.

Nerds, geeks, freaks, LGBT, disabled, and so many others who are considered “abnormal” (by bullies whose opinions shouldn’t matter) are subject to cutting words and physical violence. Poet Shane Koyczan was subjected to such treatment in school, along with some of his friends. He wrote a spoken word poem called “To This Day” along with creating an animated art project in order to spread the word on the harm bullying causes to children and the adults they will become.

“To JK Rowling, From Cho Chang”

This is a slam poetry piece by Rachel Rostad, a finalist in the 2013 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational. There isn’t anything I can say here that’s more eloquent than what she says, but to anyone who doubts that media representation of minorities affects real minorities, take the four minutes and watch this.

Edited to add: Hey guys, this post is getting a lot of hits and I want to make sure that you see this video too. It’s the original performer responding to some legitimate critiques of her piece.