Her name is Lucy, and I’ve only met her twice. Yet, through only knowing her for small fragments of time, she’s made me think hard on few things. She was this incredibly intelligent seventeen-year-old. When she spoke, she shared stories of how she was bullied frequently throughout her high school years. Looking at her and hearing her speak, I first couldn’t imagine why. She was nice. Well-spoken. She looked you in the eyes when she talked to you—something I wish I could do with ease. Then Lucy told me she was Muslim.

I was fine with that, of course, but I knew other people wouldn’t always be. And I was right. Students picked on her constantly for being Muslim. They went so far as to tug at the traditional scarf she wore around her head every day. Many offensive slurs were thrown at her throughout the course of her high school years, including the word “terrorist”. She constantly received threats. Every morning before school, Lucy would cry and ask her mother if she could stay home. School was supposed to be a pleasant learning environment, and yet she was terrified to take two steps inside the building each day. What is that saying if she was afraid to go to what was supposed to be a positive environment?

I would say that I was shocked to hear of her ordeal, but I wasn’t. Actually, for anyone to say that they’ve never heard of this sort of thing happening to someone in their lives would’ve surprised me more. That thoroughly depresses me, since it should probably be the other way around. It just shows you how jaded we’ve become to the way things are. It’s now the norm to hear this sort of bullying taking place. Isn’t that kind of sad?

If I were to make a list of all the people I know who have been teased for just simply believing what they want to believe or living how they want to live, my list would probably roll out the door and stretch down the street. Sexuality. Religion. Gender. Social status. Disability. If it’s different from the norm, people lock their minds and throw away the key, so to speak. Psychologically, people are afraid of the things they don’t understand. Instead of taking the time to embrace the idea, they shun it or worse—try to get rid of it completely. It’s become a bad habit to us.

And, while physically bullying somebody is obviously substantially worse, verbal bullying has hurt more than its fair share of people as well. Remember that old phrase we were taught when we were kids? “Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words may never hurt you.” I know this to be a big, fat lie. Words can either be like pillows or like bricks. If you’re nice and fair about what you say, meaning that what you say is justified, they don’t hurt. But if what you say is offensive or judgmental, they leave people bruised. My father once spoke to me about a kid he knew in middle school who was teased every day by his locker. The antagonists never beat the kid up, but what they said was enough to make him go home and commit suicide. That poor kid’s self-esteem was completely obliterated by people who never really knew him. They had no idea that he might’ve actually been a good person. A life was destroyed completely because of their bullying.

What I’m trying to say here is that people are cruel. It’s been said over and over again, but it’ll never be said enough—people need to be more tolerant of other people. I’m tired of seeing the pain in every friend I make. It needs to stop at some point. We as students cause each other massive amounts of pain without even realizing it. People don’t deserve to grow up in that sort of negative energy. People deserve room to be themselves without worrying about every little consequence.