Recently, I have read a lot of french and international press articles about bullying in school, because this is a subject I had wanted to write about for a long time. I have read interviews of victims, of bullies and a lot of articles full of facts and statistics.
Last week, this article in particular caught my attention. It is about Loïc*, a 10-year-old black child, who is currently unable to go to school at least until Monday because he was beaten up by his classmates the week before. Why ? Because he is the only black child of his class. His skin is covered by bruises, his nose is broken.
It wasn’t the first time. He had been harassed by the same classmates for three years : racial slurs, wounds… His parents had written letters to his school, but the school did nothing and the bullies kept hurting their child so they filled several complaints against them and against the school. They never went to trial.
Psychologists have declared Loïc suffers from depression and is suicidal. He is only ten, but he already wants to kill himself.
The poor boy was hit in the middle of the playground, yet the school claims that none of the teachers have witnessed it. How is that possible ?
I think we all can assume this is a lie. If it’s not, then what were doing the teachers ? Where were they ? Aren’t they supposed to look after their students ?
I have read again the articles about bullying in school that I had kept somewhere on my computer. Some of them try to list common caracteristics of victims of school harassment. For example, the fact that they are new pupils or are different from the others because of their clothes etc. Their possible ethnical difference is never mentioned.
However, I’m pretty sure that he wasn’t the sole child bullied because of his origins. As a mixed girl, I was like him in primary and middle school. My classmates didn’t like my afro and it got even worse when I hit puberty whereas other girls didn’t. I was told that I had to go back to Africa, I was called ugly because of my features and I was sometimes beaten up or isolated. They often stole my belongings and my mother wrote to my school but my bullies were never punished.
My little brother was bullied too. One day, I picked him up to his school and saw him surrounded by white young boys calling him “dirty negro” and hitting him. A teacher was looking at them, and she wasn’t doing anything. I went to them and I was so angry that I couldn’t refrain myself from telling them I was going to kill them if they did that again.
A few hours later, the school called my mother to tell her the boys’ parents wanted to fill a complaint against me. My brother told us those parents were cops.
Since that day, my brother stands up for himself by fighting back and sometimes he gets punished for it.
Some of my friends were bullied for the same reason.
Last month, I have talked to one of my teachers about a classmate who likes to use the N-word and make racist jokes such as calling black people “slaves”.
Do you want to know what the teacher told her ? “You have to understand that not everyone has your humor.” That’s it. Most of my classmates told me I was exaggerating and that these jokes weren’t racist at all. My classmate tried to justify herself by saying to everyone that her boyfriend is mixed as well. I’m still waiting for her to say she’s sorry.
I have looked for statistics about racism in school but couldn’t find any. Nonetheless, the government must know about this issue because I have found on its website some ideas to educate children about this.
Why is racism in school such a taboo ? Why wasn’t Loïc helped by adults ? How many victims of harassed are children of color ?
Not protecting children from racism is a racist act. You, teachers, parents and schools should know better than anyone that racism is taught.
We all know that white children are taught to hate black people. It is time for us to acknowledge that children of color are taught to suffer.
This has to stop.
