Stop Bullying Quotes

What a desperate, pathetic fool I was. Time after time, my "friends" had shown me their true colors. Yet, I still wanted to believe they were sorry for causing me pain. p. 128

If you see someone being bullied, make it stop. Why is that so hard for us to do?

Give me those keys.” “I will not!” “You win, Professor. I’ll buy you a car. Now give me the damn keys.” “I have a car.” “A real car. A Mercedes, a BMW, whatever you want.” “I don’t want a Mercedes or a BMW.” “That’s what you think.” “Stop bullying me.” “I haven’t even started.

We are all told to ignore bullies. It's something they teach you, and they can teach you anything. It doesn't mean you learn it. It doesn't mean you believe it. One should never ignore bullies. One should stop them.

Fight,” I said to no one in particular. Then remembering where I was, I turned to the camera. “Fight. The rebels are bullies. They’re trying to scare you into doing what they want. And what if you do? What kind of future do you think they’ll offer you? These people, these tyrants, aren’t going to suddenly stop being violent. If you give them power, they’re going to be a thousand times worse. So fight. However you can, fight.

People don't stop being bullies when they grow up. They just dress differently to fool you.

Everyone I say stop bullying it is sad and tears someones heart apart and next thing they do is Suicide because they think that is the right next step! If you are a Person who gets bullied find someone who will stop this! Don't just kill yourself for the other person to be happy because you are gone! They are just jealous of you and want to start problems and make you a troublemaker! Ignore those mean cruel evil people in you life and spend time with the nice caring sweet loving angels of yours! :D Because bullying is a dumb and stupid waste of time! Try to shake it off the mean hurtful stuff and keep on doing the right stuff that is going to help you become a better person and when i say a better person i mean more than a better person! ~Skye Daphne~

Speak with caution. Even if someone forgives harsh words you've spoken, they may be too hurt to ever forget them. Don't leave a legacy of pain and regret of things you never should have said.

Want to help stop the bullying epidemic? Don’t act like a bully. Don’t hit, threaten, ignore, isolate, intimidate, ridicule, or manipulate your child. Children really do learn what they live…

What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread prevalence of this very contemptuous pride. It stops us from listening to our juniors, subordinates and people down the line. You cannot expect a person to deliver results if you humiliate him, nor can you expect him to be creative if you abuse him or despise him. The line between firmness and harshness, between strong leadership and bullying, between discipline and vindictiveness is very fine, but it has to be drawn.

Tweet others the way you want to be tweeted.

As if on a conveyer belt, there will be a never ending supply of idiots and jerks that come and go in your life. Whether you stop the belt to dance with any one of them is up to you.

We need to take a harder look at what’s really going on. Stop trying to treat the symptoms and treat the cause of the problem. Maybe we should try a little harder to help these kids before they feel so cornered that they turn into monsters.

Freedom of Speech doesn't justify online bullying. Words have power, be careful how you use them.

Saskia lay back again, closing her eyes and continued eating mandarin wedges. After a pause, she added, “I think that the biggest danger for people like you and me is that we start blaming people for things that happen to us. Bullies smell that kind of thing from miles away. People like you and me have to stop thinking about our limitations and start thinking about our talents and not let other people define us.

What you post online speaks VOLUME about who you really are. POST with intention. REPOST with caution.

Knowing that someone is being bullied and not doing anything about it is abetting that bully. It is like you are the bully. There is no such thing as being an "innocent" bystander when a victim of bullying tells you to help them, and you don't. In some states, you can be prosecuted along with the bully, for not helping stop the crime. - Strong by Kailin Gow about Laws Against Bullying

The TV said you should ignore bullies and they would stop harassing you. In practice this worked about half the time. The other half, you ended up with two tall boys shadowing you through a trailer park, their fingers taking little nips at your clothes, like dogs.

Don't promote negativity online and expect people to treat you with positivity in person.

The Constitution designed the separation of church and state to prevent people from imposing their particular religions on others, not to stop people from allowing their religious beliefs to influence their views on public policy.

I will no longer let the fear of vicious comments or replies stop me from speaking what I believe to be right. I will also never give a message that everybody will agree with. I know that even my most faithful followers will never agree 100% with what I say. I also know that they know that and are fine with it. I am done letting the bullies win. They won’t anymore. Not here.

The singing stopped when I walked in. They all turned and stared at me, Bonne-Bell-Orange-Crush-glossed mouths hanging open, looking at me with the same horror and excitement they'd exhibit it I had just walked into the room naked. I stood there frozen, hyperaware of my scruffiness, my shirt untucked and one ponytail higher than the other. The Bad Dog turned me in on myself like a vortex, gleefully saying, Look, look. There they are, here you are. Separate. You do not belong.

It occurs to me that if anyone ever bullies me again I will warn them one time but probably start to stop loving them, and that if they do it again I will have my final answer, that a person who does that to me does not love me. And then I will explain that their behavior has made it clear to me that I want to leave, and although I will have been clear, I will have been respectful, I will leave without participating in condemnation. I will go without digging deeper into the dark.

I look around and see so much fear, people getting more and more comfortable with their hate, more at ease being mean, more united in their separation. And I think, NO. Not me. I will not get lost in this fearful world. I will not play with bullies. I will continue to be brave and kind. I will speak for real unity. And no matter what, I will never stop loving.

I can tell you a lot of things about bullying and what it does to a person.” Tears are forming in his eyes as he continues.”But sadly, I can’t tell you that I’ve done my part to make it stop.

Don't hate the bullies. Experience tells me that hating them, or being angry with them, will always make it worse. Instead, put your arm around them. Love them. Tell them that they are valuable. Tell them that you expect great things from them. They will stop the bullying. They will stop, because they will start to love themselves. And people who love themselves don’t bully others.

When I hear the phrase “Asians are next in line to be white,” I replace the word “white” with “disappear.” Asians are next in line to disappear. We are reputed to be so accomplished, and so law-abiding, we will disappear into this country’s amnesiac fog. We will not be the power but become absorbed by power, not share the power of whites but be stooges to a white ideology that exploited our ancestors. This country insists that our racial identity is beside the point, that it has nothing to do with being bullied, or passed over for promotion, or cut off every time we talk. Our race has nothing to do with this country, even, which is why we’re often listed as “Other” in polls and why we’re hard to find in racial breakdowns on reported rape or workplace discrimination or domestic abuse. It’s like being ghosted, I suppose, where, deprived of all social cues, I have no relational gauge for my own behavior. I ransack my mind for what I could have done, could have said. I stop trusting what I see, what I hear. My ego is in free fall while my superego is boundless, railing that my existence is not enough, never enough, so I become compulsive in my efforts to do better, be better, blindly following this country’s gospel of self-interest, proving my individual worth by expanding my net worth, until I vanish.

And stop calling people gay. I don't even know why that's an insult. There are real gay people in the world, you know, and there's nothing wrong with them. Calling someone gay, like it's a bad thing, is like calling someone a dentist--it doesn't make any freaking sense!

Ben Says: Bullying is not cool...never is & never was! Be a winner and stop bullying today! Timothy Pina Bullying Ben

Lock a man in prison, and you might stop him from committing crimes. Teach a man to respect himself and his community, and you stopped everyone he might have taught, recruited, or bullied.

This book is a labor of love. It is dedicated to people who have cried themselves to sleep because they were 'different'. It is also a celebration of the 'inner outcast' in all of us, and a humble attempt to inspire tolerance, understanding, and acceptance." the intro from the author

....stood there and watched and didn't do a thing to help me.

Dear Girls Across the Globe, Let's stop body-shaming each other with hurtful comments about how another girl looks or doesn't look. We are all beautiful in our own unique way; so let's speak about each other with the dignity that we would want others to have when they speak about us.

Hey, you know that kid you stole lunch money from? His family is scaping up enough money for him. That girl you called fat? She’s starving herself. That girl you beat up today? She’s already cut lines on herself, and she’s depressed. I bet 99% of you won’t share. Share to stop bullying. ✌

If you teach your children how to bully, or do nothing to stop them, teach them also how to die for their cause.

A child who suffers from PTSD has made unsuccessful attempts to get help, and as the victimization continues, he stops asking for it. He withdraws socially, because he’s never quite sure when interaction is going to lead to another incident of bullying…. Different people have different responses to stress. In Peter’s case, I saw an extreme emotional vulnerability, which, in fact, was the reason he was teased. Peter didn’t play by the codes of boys. He wasn’t a big athlete. He wasn’t tough. He was sensitive. And difference is not always respected – particularly when you’re a teenager. Adolescence is about fitting in, not standing out.

Do not ignore being bullied, because it will never stop.

Stand firm, speak up—because silence is not golden, instead, it is deadly. Do not ignore being bullied, because it will never stop.

How to change the world: • spread positivity • bring people up instead of dragging them down • treat others the way you wish to be treated

Nondefensive phrases: • Really? • I see. • I understand. • That’s interesting. • That’s your choice. • I’m sure you see it that way. • You’re entitled to your opinion. • I’m sorry you’re upset. • Let’s talk about this when you’re calmer. • Yelling and threatening aren’t going to solve anything. • This subject is off-limits. • I don’t choose to have this conversation. • Guilt peddling and playing the pity card are not going to work anymore. • I know you’re upset. • This is nonnegotiable. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, these phrases will act like a referee coming in to stop a fight. They nip conflict in the bud. You won’t need them when someone is pleasant, but they’re essential when you’re being blamed, bullied, attacked, or criticized.

We must start asking what we want white manhood to be, and what we will no longer accept. We must stop rewarding violence and oppression. We must stop confusing bullies with leaders. We must stop telling women and people of color that the only path to success lies in emulating white male dominance.

If We Can't Stop Other Children From Being Mean And Bullying Other Children...Then We Must Start Teaching Our Children To Never Ever Hurt Themselves over It!

Injustice is ABUSE...No matter who or where it's committed! It must be stopped at all times!

That is the trouble with standing up to people, of course. Once you start doing it, you can hardly stop.

Silence cleared her throat, fearful her voice would come out a croak. “Is she asleep?” He blinked as if he, too, were waking from a dream, and glanced down at Mary Darling. “Aye, I’m a-thinkin’ she is—she’s stopped fussin’ at me.” Silence felt a huge smile of relief spread over her face. “She was fussing? Oh, how wonderful!” He shot her a look, one eyebrow arching. “Ye’ve taught the child to bully me, too, now?” “Oh, no,” she said hastily, embarrassed. Did he really think she bullied him? What a silly notion!

All this was lies. It was nasty, baseless, and ridiculous—there was far more evidence of anti-Semitism in the Occupy movement than there was evidence of racism within the Tea Party. But that didn’t stop the media from trying. In fact, they and their friends tried so hard to label the Tea Party racist that they stooped to planting faux racists, including faux Nazis, at Tea Parties, just to gin up racial controversy. The Tea Parties threw the infiltrators out.

Dear Hunger Games : Screw you for helping cowards pretend you have to be great with a bow to fight evil. You don't need to be drafted into a monkey-infested jungle to fight evil. You don't need your father's light sabre, or to be bitten by a radioactive spider. You don't need to be stalked by a creepy ancient vampire who is basically a pedophile if you're younger than a redwood. Screw you mainstream media for making it look like moral courage requires hair gel, thousands of sit ups and millions of dollars of fake ass CGI. Moral courage is the gritty, scary and mostly anonymous process of challenging friends, co-workers and family on issues like spanking, taxation, debt, circumcision and war. Moral courage is standing up to bullies when the audience is not cheering, but jeering. It is helping broken people out of abusive relationships, and promoting the inner peace of self knowledge in a shallow and empty pseudo-culture. Moral courage does not ask for - or receive - permission or the praise of the masses. If the masses praise you, it is because you are helping distract them from their own moral cowardice and conformity. Those who provoke discomfort create change - no one else. So forget your politics and vampires and magic wands and photon torpedoes. Forget passively waiting for the world to provoke and corner you into being virtuous. It never will. Stop watching fictional courage and go live some; it is harder and better than anything you will ever see on a screen. Let's make the world change the classification of courage from 'fantasy' to 'documentary.' You know there are people in your life who are doing wrong. Go talk to them, and encourage them to pursue philosophy, self-knowledge and virtue. Be your own hero; you are the One that your world has been waiting for.

I have faced bullying before. Not in high school. Not in any school but when I published my now bestselling book series as an indie author back in 2010 through 2012 and became a target for indie publishing, especially in YA because I stood by Amazon self-publishing versus the traditional publishers. How I dealt with it? I kept doing what I love - writing and publishing, and giving my readers what they love. Indie publishing took off soon afterwards and now it is a valid and more desirable way to publish books. So the lesson learned is...don't let bullies stop you from doing what you love and from keeping you from giving your readers the books they love to read from you." - Kailin Gow in a National Radio Interview.

I was the nicest person you'd ever want to know," Alex recalls, "but the world wasn't that way. The problem was that if you were just a nice person, you'd get crushed. I refused to live a life where people could do that stuff to me.

How is it fair that the respectful children always get in trouble and the bullies get away with shattering lives? You all need to put a stop to bullying instead of condoning it.

There will be many times in your lives--- at school, and more particularly when you are a grown up---when people will distract or divert you from what needs to be done. You may even welcome the distraction. But if you use it as an excuse for not doing what you suppose to do, you can blame no one but yourself. If you truly wish to accomplish something, you should allow nothing to stop you, and chances are you'll succeed.

Even bullying was important to Wonder Woman, and in Sensation Comics #23 she stopped a gang who were picking on a young boy, showed the head bully the error of his ways and learned about his home situation, spoke to his father about his abusive tendencies, and then helped the father get a job in a wartime factory. She always took the time to get to the root of the problem.

I urge you strongly not to give Stop the Goodreads Bullies traffic. Their initial postings were all doxings of reviewers. ... There are a lot of arguments on the legitimacy of doxing, but I think most reasonable people would agree that the response to a negative - not even libelous - review should not be the open posting of a reviewer's address. That's not the counter of speech by more speech, but with an implicit threat. It's not that you're wrong, and here's why; it's that I know where you live.

Stand firm, speak up—because silence is not golden, instead, it is deadly. Do not ignore being bullied, because it will never stop. Throughout my challenges with being bullied, I learned I have a choice, I have a voice, I have power over my thoughts, and my bully does not have power over me. Do not stand up against a bully alone.

They don’t ask, How do we stop bullies? Instead those assholes say, How can we get these stupid kids to stop painting bull’s-eyes on their foreheads? They put the blame on the victims, not the victimizers.

You know I meant it. I am human. And male. And not remotely blind. Do you want me to say it again? You are distractingly, even-if-that-is-not-a-real-word, pretty. You are so pretty that I bullied Clay Whitaker into drawing me a picture of you so I could look at you when you aren’t around. You are so pretty that one of these days I’m going to lose a finger in my garage because I can’t concentrate with you so close to me. You are so pretty that I wish you weren’t so I wouldn’t want to hit every guy at school who looks at you, especially my best friend.” I stop to catch my breath. “More? I can keep going.” I can keep going, but even as I say all of this, I know it’s not quite true. She’s not just distractingly pretty. She’s the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen and I want to touch her so badly right now that it’s almost impossible to keep my hands from reaching out and doing it.

You’re fond of pretending to be weaklings,” Rin observed. “Does that always work?” “Almost every time. The Mugenese are terribly attracted to easy targets.” “And they never catch on?” “Not as far as I’ve noticed. See, they’re bullies. Weakness is what they want to see. They’re so convinced that we’re just base, cowardly animals, they won’t stop to question it. They don’t want to believe we can fight back, so they won’t.

You can be the person who puts the 'kick me' sign on the back, or be the person that watches it happen and does nothing, or you can be the person who takes the sign off. That's it. Every day, every moment of your life, you're making this choice. Life doesn't stop for it, challenges don't make way for it, the choice is there and you own it. Welcome to adulting.

I did tell you, I always tell you. Not all the time, because nothing is ever done so I stopped telling my teachers. If one teacher isn’t around—I would tell another teacher, but he/she too will ignore what I am saying.

STOP wishing for a better tomorrow...when you can keep working for a better today!

As you continue breathing others take their last. So stop complaining & enjoy living your life as best as you can.

People have been bullied in school, and it's their right to stop and take a stand for what they believe in

Some good-byes are as gentle and inevitable as sunset, while some blindside you like a collision you didn't see coming. Some good-byes are schoolyard bullies you are powerless to stop, while others punctuate the end of a relationship because you decided: enough. Some are heartbreaking, leaving you a little more damaged than you were before, others set you free.

I am tired of you all tolerating bullying at your school! You all should be ashamed of yourselves! You all need to put a stop to bullying instead of condoning it. Take the wool off of your eyes and see the truth for what it is--and it is the bullying; known as the Silent Killer!

I'd like to start this week with a request, and this one goes out to the followers of the three Abrahamic religions: the Muslims, Christians, and Jews. It's just a little thing, really, but do you think that when you've finished smashing up the world and blowing each other to bits and demanding special privileges while you do it, do you think that maybe the rest of us could sort of have our planet back? I wouldn't ask, but I'm starting to think that there must be something written in the special books that each of you so enjoy referring to that it's ok to behave like special, petulant, pugnacious, pricks. Forgive the alliteration, but your persistent, power-mad punch-ups are pissing me off. It's mainly the extremists obviously, but not exclusively. It's a lot of 'main-streamers' as well. Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about. Muslims: listen up my bearded and veily friends! Calm down, ok? Stop blowing stuff up. Not everything that said about you is an attack on the prophet Mohammed and Allah that needs to end in the infidel being destroyed. Have a cup of tea, put on a Cat Stevens record, sit down and chill out. I mean seriously, what's wrong with a strongly-worded letter to The Times? Christians: you and your churches don't get to be millionaires while other people have nothing at all. They're your bloody rules; either stick to them or abandon the faith. And stop persecuting and killing people you judge to be immoral. Oh, and stop pretending you're celibate -- it's a cover-up for being a gay or a nonce. Right, that's two ticked off. Jews! I know you're god's 'Chosen People' and the rest of us are just whatever, but when Israel behaves like a violent, psychopathic bully and someone mentions it that doesn't make them antisemitic. And for the record, your troubled history is not a license to act with impunity now.

As Harry Potter was the only other thing I was passionate about, the doctors gave consent for me to leave the hospital and collect the fifth Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, from the local book shop. I was so ecstatic to have the book and excited to begin reading it, but there was never any hint of your imminent arrival and the way you would change my life so drastically. Luna, you instantly captivated me. I didn’t know why but there was something about you with your upside-down magazine, straggly blonde hair, and the honest, abashed way you stared at people without blinking that fascinated and perplexed me at once. You laughed hysterically at one of Ron’s quips and didn’t stop to excuse yourself and feel ashamed when it became clear that everyone found you strange. Throughout the book, I found myself waiting for your brief appearances and wanting to know more about you and why you were the way you were. You baffled me, not because you were odd (though indeed you were), but because you were… perfect. But it was a different kind of perfect to the perfectly thin, smiling magazine girls I simultaneously idolised and reviled. It was the way you carried your oddness like it was the most natural thing in the world. You didn’t market your oddness as your defining feature the way some insecure teenagers do, in guise of confidence and security. And nor were you oblivious to the awkward and uncomfortable feelings your oddness provoked in others. When, unable to comprehend how you wore your oddness so honestly and unashamedly, your peers reverted to mockery and bullying, you recognized this as a reflection of their own deep-seated insecurity and calmly let them carry on, quite above your head. You weren’t trying hard to present a certain aspect of yourself that would boldly identify you in the world. And that’s when it occurred to me how bizarre and positively ridiculous it was to apply the word “weird” to describe you, when you represented the most natural and unpretentious state possible to be; you were yourself.

Roo: What’s your definition of popularity? Hutch: I used to think people were popular because they were good-looking, or nice, or funny, or good at sports. Roo: Aren’t they? Hutch: I’d think, if I could just be those things, I’d – you know – have more friends than I do. But in seventh grade, when Jackson and those guys stopped hanging out with me, I tried as hard as I could to get them to like me again. But then . . . (shaking his head as if to clear it) I don’t really wanna talk about it. Roo: What happened? Hutch: They just did some ugly stuff to me is all. And really, it was for the best. Roo: Why? Hutch: Because I was cured. I realized the popular people weren’t nice or funny or great-looking. They just had power, and they actually got the power by teasing people or humiliating them – so people bonded to them out of fear. Roo: Oh. Hutch: I didn’t want to be a person who could act like that. I didn’t want to ever speak to any person who could act like that. Roo: Oh Hutch: So then I wasn’t trying to be popular anymore. Roo: Weren’t you lonely? Hutch: I didn’t say it was fun. (He bites his thumbnail, bonsai dirt and all.) I said it was for the best.

How is the fair that the respectful children always get in trouble, but the bullies always get away with shattering lives. I am tired of you all tolerating bullying at your school! You all should be ashamed of yourselves! You all need to put a stop to bullying instead of condoning it. Take the wool off of your eyes and see the truth for what it is--and it is the bullying; known as the Silent Killer!

And What Good Will Your Vanity Be When The Rapture Comes” says the man with a cart of empty bottles at the corner of church and lincoln while I stare into my phone and I say I know oh I know while trying to find the specific filter that will make the sun’s near-flawless descent look the way I might describe it in a poem and the man says the moment is already right in front of you and I say I know but everyone I love is not here and I mean here like on this street corner with me while I turn the sky a darker shade of red on my phone and I mean here like everyone I love who I can still touch and not pass my fingers through like the wind in a dream but I look up at the man and he is a kaleidoscope of shadows I mean his shadows have shadows and they are small and trailing behind him and I know then that everyone he loves is also not here and the man doesn’t ask but I still say hey man I’ve got nothing I’ve got nothing even though I have plenty to go home to and the sun is still hot even in its endless flirt with submission and the man’s palm has a small river inside I mean he has taken my hand now and here we are tethered and unmoving and the man says what color are you making the sky and I say what I might say in a poem I say all surrender ends in blood and he says what color are you making the sky and I say something bright enough to make people wish they were here and he squints towards the dancing shrapnel of dying light along a rooftop and he says I love things only as they are and I’m sure I did once too but I can’t prove it to anyone these days and he says the end isn’t always about what dies and I know I know or I knew once and now I write about beautiful things like I will never touch a beautiful thing again and the man looks me in the eyes and he points to the blue-orange vault over heaven’s gates and he says the face of everyone you miss is up there and I know I know I can’t see them but I know and he turns my face to the horizon and he says we don’t have much time left and I get that he means the time before the sun is finally through with its daily work or I think I get that but I still can’t stop trembling and I close my eyes and I am sobbing on the corner of church and lincoln and when I open my eyes the sun is plucking everyone who has chosen to love me from the clouds and carrying them into the light-drunk horizon and I am seeing this and I know I am seeing this the girl who kissed me as a boy in the dairy aisle of meijer while our parents shopped and the older boy on the basketball team who taught me how to make a good fist and swing it into the jaw of a bully and the friends who crawled to my porch in the summer of any year I have been alive they were all there I saw their faces and it was like I was given the eyes of a newborn again and once you know what it is to be lonely it is hard to unsee that which serves as a reminder that you were not always empty and I am gasping into the now-dark air and I pull my shirt up to wipe whatever tears are left and I see the man walking in the other direction and I chase him down and tap his arm and I say did you see it did you see it like I did and he turns and leans into the glow of a streetlamp and he is anchored by a single shadow now and he sneers and he says have we met and he scoffs and pushes his cart off into the night and I can hear the glass rattling even as I watch him become small and vanish and I look down at my phone and the sky on the screen is still blood red.

REMEMBER THE LOTUS FLOWER Great people will always be mocked by those Who feel smaller than them. A lion does not flinch at laughter coming from a hyena. A gorilla does not budge from a banana thrown at it by a monkey. A nightingale does not stop singing its beautiful song At the intrusion of an annoying woodpecker. Whenever you should doubt your self-worth, remember the lotus flower. Even though it plunges to life from beneath the mud, It does not allow the dirt that surrounds it To affect its growth or beauty. Be that lotus flower always. Do not allow any negativity or ugliness In your surroundings, Destroy your confidence, Affect your growth, Or make you question your self-worth. It is very normal for one ugly weed To not want to stand alone. Remember this always. If you were ugly, Or just as small as they feel they are, Then they would not feel so bitter and envious Each and every time they are forced To glance up at magnificently Divine YOU. REMEMBER THE LOTUS FLOWER by Suzy Kassem

She was, probably, the nicest person I had ever known. Yet in the years following, for myself, I abandoned even believing in niceness or being nice. I could scarcely control myself, wherever I was, from telling everyone, anyone, what I thought of them. It was an urge, a compulsion, my tongue bitten a futile blue. That's a ridiculous thing to say. You must have been spoiled as a child. I couldn't stop myself. You are ungenerous. You parcel yourself out like an expensive spice. You idealize things; you're a narcissist. You seek only to etch impressions of yourself on someone else's face. It's a form of cheapness. You're cheap. You're patronizing. You're a fascist. You're a bully. I've always hated bullies. You look awful in that color. It was as if I'd been hit on the head.

This type of rhetoric is all too common among secularists on the left. They paint a false dichotomy between religion and science. They say that religious people are anti-science, because science makes God irrelevant—therefore, religious people want to stop scientific progress. They point to the fact that many religious people are skeptical about the theory of evolution—as though skepticism of a scientific finding were in and of itself unscientific.

Bullying has consequences. It creates ripples that span for years. Sometimes for an entire life. They call you fat and so you stop eating. You watch what you eat until you die. They call you a nerd and so you stop reading in public. You still look over your shoulder when you read on a park bench. It destroys you, a vital part of you. It fucks with your mind, with your heart, with your soul even. It changes your beliefs, your lifestyle. It makes you anxious. It causes panic. It won’t let you sleep. But then again, the bullied are powerful, aren’t they? We’re resilient. We’re strong. We’re a motherfucking force.

She's the one who sits in the back of the classroom. The one who never raises her hand. The one who might be the smartest girl you'll ever know. But ever time she speaks some one speaks their opinion before her. She's the one who cries herself to sleep. Who you never see in the hallways. Who is always late to class because she wants to avoid the wretched bitterness that halls expose. Who never tells anyone her problems. Who slices her wrists to get rid of pain. She is the girl who will never be the same. She is the girl who will never think she is ever good enough. She's the one who is feeling like she has no purpose. She is the one that can raise her voice and stop the bullying but will never choose to. She might be your best friend. She might be your daughter. She might be your girlfriend. She might just be the girl in the back of you class. And she will never live the same life she once did.

I’d decided to keep fighting, keep searching for answers. Because as long as I did that, there would always be a chance my holes would heal. I could have hope. My gaps only became inevitable when I stopped believing they could be filled. Because that’s when I’d sit back and let life pile on the crap. Like she did. As long as I had hope, the good things would stay good. So, no, I’d never be a kick-ass movie heroine. But I was real. And loveable. And for now, that was enough. A Note from the Author Bullying is a unique form of torture.

I was receiving at least ninety-nine incredible, positive, and life-changing responses for every negative or abusive one, yet I couldn’t stop looking at the one percent. I couldn’t get them out of my mind. I let them kill my excitement. I let them destroy my love for what I was doing. I let them shut me down. I let them bully me into changing the way I did things around here. I almost stopped. I almost gave up. I almost quit writing. But every time, I remembered my dad. He taught me better than that. And I forced myself to be excited again. I forced myself to see the goal and vision of why I was excited in the first place. I forced myself to start skipping over the negative replies and start diving into the loving ones.

I know you don’t want to stand up to the bullies, the peace-breakers, or even the demons among you. You want someone else to handle it, someone else to tell them to stop, someone else to bring the peace. And very often in your life, there will be someone else, and you’ll be able to stay in your place of peace. But other times, the peace you crave can only be found by fighting the battle, and the light you crave can only be seen by fighting the darkness.

Every day I meet people who have so much to give but have been bullied enough or frightened enough to hold it back. It's time to stop complying with the system and draw your own map. You have brilliance in you, your contribution is essential, and the art you create is precious. Only you can do it, and you must.

Where once witchcraft accusations were the norm, bullying has taken its place. And just as during the Trials, it's not always the usual suspects who get bullied; it can happen to anyone for any reason. But the only way it happens is if the community supports it. Group agreement and group silence are equally as deadly. The moment someone speaks up, it's possible to stop that cycle. It's not the easiest thing to do, but greatness is never without risk. And there is nothing greater in the whole world than kindness - kindness to someone being bullied, kindness to a stranger, kindness to an inured animal. Every act counts.

When I was in the third grade, I did my very best to fail every class so that the kids would like me and stop calling me a teacher's pet. It did not work out for me, though. My best attempts at failure in school garnered me an A- at best, and at my worst, I won awards for being the student of the month. -Mackenzie

But there was a sense of something tipping out of balance. The times seemed out of joint. There was too much decadence. Too much intensity. Too much change. Too much happiness juxtaposed with too much misery. Too much wealth next to too much poverty. The world was becoming faster and louder, and the social systems were becoming as chaotic and fragmented as jazz scores. So there was a craving, in some places, for simplicity, for order, for scapegoats and for bully-boy leaders, for nations to become like religions or cults. It happened every now and then. It seemed, in the 1930s, that the whole course of humanity was at stake. As it very often does today. Too many people wanted to find an easy answer to complicated questions. It was a dangerous time to be human. To feel or to think or to care.

There is something very interesting about bullies that make them special. You see, a bully is a coward; the bully is terribly afraid of the world around him, and he can’t stop himself from being in fear all the time. It is something organic that he can’t control. That is why the bully seems to have no discipline and never listen to authority or authoritarian commands. Now, another very interesting thing about the bully is that, as he is a coward, he needs to erase this feeling of panic of the world, by regaining control over reality. And the only way to do this is by picking the weakest link he can find, that is, the one that will not fight back, the safer victim around. This, however, does not mean that the victim is hopeless, weak or guilty of anything. The bully simply selects a target for his suppressed fear. If the victim reacts, the bully will have to start picking someone else to channel his endless frustrated sense of unworthiness. And although it is true that many people have the potential to be bullies, what makes the bully special is his lack of capacity to control himself, to stop himself or to feel ashamed of his own actions. Actually, the bully enjoys public performances of his cowardice the most, because that is how he feeds his very little ego and very weak personality. That is the only thing that makes his life worthy, for the bully has no sense of self-worth and often considers himself unworthy. As a matter of fact, the bullies that think they don’t deserve to be alive, are the ones telling others to kill themselves. Basically speaking, the weaker a soul, the more suppressive that soul will be towards others.

Weirdly, D&D didn't encourage my leanings towards trying magic of my own at all. In fact, it frustrated them. Even the most pompous and ambitious historical magicians, from the Zaroastrian Magi through John Dee, Francis Barrett and Aleister Crowley, never claimed to be able to throw fireballs or lightning bolts like D&D wizards can. So D&D was never going to feed the fantasies of practising magic in the real world. That is all about gaining secret knowledge, a higher level of perception or inflicting misfortune or a boon on someone rather than causing a poisonous cloud of vapor to pour from your fingers (Cloudkill, deadly to creatures with less than 5 hit dice, for those who are interested). The game, as we played it, just doesn't support the occult idea of magic. In fact, it might even be argued that, by giving such a powerful prop to my imagination, D&D stopped me from going deeper into the occult in real life. I certainly had all the qualifications—bullied power-hungry twerp with no discernable skill in conventional fields and no immediate hope of a girlfriend who wasn't mentally ill. It's amazing I'm not out sacrificing goats to this day.

He'll mind. I can see that he's very possessive of you--and very protective." He paused, then said, "Let him mind, Shori. Talk to him. Help him. Reassure him. Stop Violence. But let him feel what he feels and settle his feelings his own way." "All right." "...Let them see that you trust them and let them solve their own problems, make their own decisions. Do that and they will willingly commit their lives to you. Bully them, control them out of fear or malice or just for your own convenience, and after a while, you'll have to spend all your time thinking for them, controlling them, and stifling their resentment.

The last great humanitarian that tried to win the presidency was Robert F. Kennedy. As hard as he tried...He wasn't allowed to finish the work of trying to bring America together & to heal our nation. My prayer is that we may now all come together now and stop the hate, stop the obstruction and help our President continue to restore & rebuild our nation! The greater America becomes...the brighter humanity will be!

It's been happening since I was in kindergarten. Not them all the time, but other kids, you know. Every day. It never stops, and it never goes away, thanks to the Internet--it just keeps happening every minute, every day. And I just want it to stop. I think about how to do it, you know. How to kill them. All kinds of elaborate things, like trapping them in pits and burying them alive, or covering them with concrete.

People can be really mean. I wish I could tell you that they’ll stop, or that you won’t have to deal with this in a few more years, but unfortunately, you’ll have to deal with bullies forever. You can’t stop them or control what they say or do; you can only control what you do. Don’t give them the satisfaction of letting their words hurt you. If they want to say something rude and mean, let their souls be scarred with that hatred. Let them drown in their own unhappiness. You’re better than that. Don’t even look their way. Don’t allow their words to carry weight or merit. I know it’s hard, I do, but you do it a couple of times, and they’ll stop because without your reaction feeding them, that darkness that they’ve created—it starts to drown them.

Often the circumstances in which we lost our self-esteem were relationships distinguished by a steeply unequal power balance. Our spellcasters were parents. Teachers. Bullies. So-called friends. Strangers. Romantic partners. Cliques. Coworkers. Your spellcaster was the mean first grader. Or the psycho in the dark. Or the town, school, Scout troop, spiritual community, family, neighborhood that did not understand your type, whatever that type was. Your spellcaster could even be society at large, that nameless, faceless "them" with boundless power and a thousand biases. And it became unbearable to be the bullied one, the hounded one, the outcast and excluded one. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, the old saying goes. Others hated us, or appeared to. We joined 'em.

Here's one way that we try to actively and immediately bring in kindness in our meetings and camps: we ask our girls to stop before they speak and reevaluate what they're going to say based on this acronym: True Honest Important Necessary Kind Is what they're out to say True? Is it Honest? Is it Important? Necessary Kind? We ask the to T.H.I.N.K. before they speak text, or type, and try to incorporate it into their daily lives -- especially within their interactions with their friends and classmates -- as much as possible. It's a choice girls can make: Do they want to encourage others with their words, or bring others down? You might think this won't resonate with your middle school girl, but I promise that it works. It's not about self-editing or asking her not to speak her truth, of course; it's about thinking of others too.

America and Greece are at different stops on the same one-way street, all too familiar to us immigrants. There's nothing new about Obama: been there, done that. Nothing could be less hopeful, or less of a change. He's the land where we grew up, with its union bullies and marginal tax rates and government automobiles and general air of decay all re-emerging Brigadoon-like from the mists entirely unspoilt by progress. it's like docking at Ellis Island in 1883, coming down the gangplank, and finding everyone excited about this pilot program they've introduced called "serfdom".

Disgusted with herself, she’d slipped beneath his blankets. Matthias always slept with his back to a wall, a habit from his days in Hellgate. She’d let her hands wander, seeking his pockets, trying to feel along the linings of his trousers. “Nina?” he’d asked sleepily. “I’m cold,” she said, her hands continuing their search. She pressed a kiss to his neck, then below his ear. She’d never let herself kiss him this way before. She’d never had the chance. They’d been too busy untangling the skein of suspicion and lust and loyalty that bound them together, and once she’d taken the parem … It was all she could think of, even now. The desire she felt was for the drug, not for the body she felt shift beneath her hands. She didn’t kiss his lips, though. She wouldn’t let parem take that from her too. He’d groaned slightly. “The others—” “Everyone is asleep.” Then he’d seized her hands. “Stop.” “Matthias—” “I don’t have it.” She yanked herself free, shame crawling over her skin like fire over a forest floor. “Then who does?” she hissed. “Kaz.” She stilled. “Are you going to creep into his bed?” Nina released a huff of disbelief. “He’d slit my throat.” She wanted to scream her helplessness. There would be no bargaining with Kaz. She couldn’t bully him the way she might have bullied Wylan or plead with him the way she mighthave managed Jesper. Fatigue came on suddenly, a yoke at her neck, the exhaustion at least tempering her frantic need. She rested her forehead against Matthias’ chest. “I hate this,” she said. “I hate you a little, drüskelle.” “I’m used to it. Come here.” He’d wrapped his arms around her and gotten her talking about Ravka, about Inej. He’d distracted her with stories, named the winds that blew across Fjerda, told her of his first meal in the drüskelle hall.

When I was a child, I believed God would set everything right. When I found out about the Nakba, I was sure that one day my friend Ahmad's grandmother would be able to return to her house in Palestine. I waited for the day our teachers would explain the theft of the land we lived on, the way our textbooks spoke about Indigenous people like they no longer existed and all the books we read were written by dead white men. I was sure that the school bullies would be punished, that the police would stop pulling over my Black friends' parents late at night, and that my classmates with undocumented aunties or grandparents would one day be able to stop worrying they'd be taken away. Allah is the remover of obstacles. But after the fire, after your burial, after the police dismissed the threats you'd received—by then I'd understood for a long time who had built this system, and for whom, and I'd long since let go of my ideas of justice.

Hey. Remember what I said when Shigaraki made swiss cheese outta me? 'Stop trying to with this on your own.' But I had more to say. I needed to tell you that I got stabbed cuz my body moved on its own. You know, I always looked down on you cuz you were quirkless. You were s'posed to be beneath me... ...But I kept feeling like you were above me. I hated it. I couldn't bear to look at you. I couldn't accept you the way you were. So I kept you at arm's length and bullied you. I tried to act all superior by rejecting you... ...But I kept losing that fight. Ever since we got into U.A.... ...Nothing's worked out how I thought it would. Instead, this past year has forced me to understand your strength and my weakness. Now I don't expect this to change a thing between us, but I gotta speak... ...My truth. Izuku... I'm sorry for everything. There's nothing wrong with the path you've been walking down since inheriting One For All and following All Might's lead. But now... You're barely standing. And those ideals alone ain't enough to get you over the wall your facing. We're here to step in when you can't handle everything on your own. Because to live up to those ideals and surpass All Might... ...We gotta save you, the civilians at U.A., and the people on the streets. Because saving people is how we win. We get it." ~Katsuki Bakugo -aka- Great Explosion Murder God Dynamite

To illustrate the marked atmospheric contrast between the two cities, the writer Frank Carpenter observed that in New York, “a streetcar will not wait for you if you are not just at its stopping point. It goes on and you must stand there until the next car comes along. In Washington people a block away signal the cars by waving their hands or their umbrellas. Then they walk to the car at a leisurely pace, while the drivers wait patiently and the horses rest.” While the capital might lack “the spirit of intense energy” that animated New York, Carpenter concluded that Washington, with its broad, clean streets and fine marble buildings (and its shanties generally hidden from view), offered “the pleasanter place in which to live.

Working hard is important. But more effort does not necessarily yield more results. “Less but better” does. Ferran Adrià, arguably the world’s greatest chef, who has led El Bulli to become the world’s most famous restaurant, epitomizes the principle of “less but better” in at least two ways. First, his specialty is reducing traditional dishes to their absolute essence and then re-imagining them in ways people have never thought of before. Second, while El Bulli has somewhere in the range of 2 million requests for dinner reservations each year, it serves only fifty people per night and closes for six months of the year. In fact, at the time of writing, Ferran had stopped serving food altogether and had instead turned El Bulli into a full-time food laboratory of sorts where he was continuing to pursue nothing but the essence of his craft.1 Getting used to the idea of “less but better” may prove harder than it sounds, especially when we have been rewarded in the past for doing more … and more and more. Yet at a certain point, more effort causes our progress to plateau and even stall. It’s true that the idea of a direct correlation between results and effort is appealing. It seems fair. Yet research across many fields paints a very different picture. Most people have heard of the “Pareto Principle,” the idea, introduced as far back as the 1790s by Vilfredo Pareto, that 20 percent of our efforts produce 80 percent of results. Much later, in 1951, in his Quality-Control Handbook, Joseph Moses Juran, one of the fathers of the quality movement, expanded on this idea and called it “the Law of the Vital Few.”2 His observation was that you could massively improve the quality of a product by resolving a tiny fraction of the problems. He found a willing test audience for this idea in Japan, which at the time had developed a rather poor reputation for producing low-cost, low-quality goods. By adopting a process in which a high percentage of effort and attention was channeled toward improving just those few things that were truly vital, he made the phrase “made in Japan” take on a totally new meaning. And gradually, the quality revolution led to Japan’s rise as a global economic power.3

Speak to me about power. What is it?” I do believe I’m being out-Cambridged. “You want me to discuss power? Right here and now?” Her shapely head tilts. “No time except the present.” “Okay.” Only for a ten. “Power is the ability to make someone do what they otherwise wouldn’t, or deter them from doing what they otherwise would.” Immaculée Constantin is unreadable. “How?” “By coercion and reward. Carrots and sticks, though in bad light one looks much like the other. Coercion is predicated upon the fear of violence or suffering. ‘Obey, or you’ll regret it.’ Tenth-century Danes exacted tribute by it; the cohesion of the Warsaw Pact rested upon it; and playground bullies rule by it. Law and order relies upon it. That’s why we bang up criminals and why even democracies seek to monopolize force.” Immaculée Constantin watches my face as I talk; it’s thrilling and distracting. “Reward works by promising ‘Obey and benefit.’ This dynamic is at work in, let’s say, the positioning of NATO bases in nonmember states, dog training, and putting up with a shitty job for your working life. How am I doing?” Security Goblin’s sneeze booms through the chapel. “You scratch the surface,” says Immaculée Constantin. I feel lust and annoyance. “Scratch deeper, then.” She brushes a tuft of fluff off her glove and appears to address her hand: “Power is lost or won, never created or destroyed. Power is a visitor to, not a possession of, those it empowers. The mad tend to crave it, many of the sane crave it, but the wise worry about its long-term side effects. Power is crack cocaine for your ego and battery acid for your soul. Power’s comings and goings, from host to host, via war, marriage, ballot box, diktat, and accident of birth, are the plot of history. The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.” Immaculée Constantin now looks up at me. “Power will notice you. Power is watching you now. Carry on as you are, and power will favor you. But power will also laugh at you, mercilessly, as you lie dying in a private clinic, a few fleeting decades from now. Power mocks all its illustrious favorites as they lie dying. ‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, might stop a hole to keep the wind away.’ That thought sickens me, Hugo Lamb, like nothing else. Doesn’t it sicken you?

No,” she whispered. “No more.” His breath came hot and heavy against her ear as his arm crept back around her waist. “Why not?” For a moment her mind was blank. What reason could she give that would make sense to him? If she protested that they weren’t married, he would simply put an end to that objection by marrying her, and that would be disastrous. Then she remembered Petey’s plan. “Because I’ve already promised myself to another.” His body went still against hers. An oppressive silence fell over them both, punctuated only by the distant clanging of the watch bell. But he didn’t move away, and at first she feared he hadn’t heard her. “I said—” she began. “I heard you.” He drew back, his face taught with suspicion. “What do you mean ‘another?’ Someone in England?” She considered inventing a fiancé in London. But that would have no weight with him, would it? “Another sailor. I . . . I’ve agreed to marry one of your crew.” His expression hardened until it looked chiseled from the same oak that formed his formidable ship. “You’re joking.” She shook her head furiously. “Peter Hargraves asked me to . . . to be his wife last night. And I agreed.” A stunned expression spread over his face before anger replaced it. Planting his hands on either side of her hips, he bent his head until his face was within inches from her. “He’s not one of my crew. Is that why you accepted his proposal—because he’s not one of my men? Or do you claim to have some feeling for him?” He sneered the last words, and shame spread through her. It would be too hard to claim she had feelings for Petey when she’d just been on the verge of giving herself to Gideon. But that was the only answer that would put him off her. Her ands trembled against his immovable chest. “I . . . I like him, yes.” “The way you ‘like’ me?” When she glanced away, uncertain what to say to that, he caught her chin and forced her to look at him. Despite the dim light, she could tell that desire still held him. And when he spoke again, his voice was edged with the tension of his need. “I don’t care what you agreed to last night. Everything has changed. You can’t possibly still want to marry him after the way you just responded to my touch.” “That was a mistake,” she whispered, steeling herself to ignore the flare of anger in his eyes. “Petey and I are well suited. I knew him from before, from the Chastity. I know he’s an honorable man, which is why I still intend to marry him.” A muscle ticked in Gideon’s jaw. “He’s not a bully, you mean. He’s not a wicked pirate like me, out to ‘rape and pillage.’” He pushed away from the trunk with an oath, then spun towards the steps. “Well, he’s not for you, Sara, no matter what you may think. And I’m going to put a stop to his courtship of you right now!

Grateful! Good God! Am I never to get away from the bleat of that filmy adjective? I don’t want gratitude. I don’t want kindness. I don’t want sentimentality. I don’t even want love—I could make you give me that—of a sort. I want common honesty.’ ‘Do you? But that’s what I’ve always wanted—I don’t think it’s to be got.’ ‘Listen, Harriet. I do understand. I know you don’t want either to give or to take. You’ve tried being the giver, and you’ve found that the giver is always fooled. And you won’t be the taker, because that’s very difficult, and because you know that the taker always ends by hating the giver. You don’t want ever again to have to depend for happiness on another person.’ ‘That’s true. That’s the truest thing you ever said.’ ‘All right. I can respect that. Only you’ve got to play the game. Don’t force an emotional situation and then blame me for it.’ ‘But I don’t want any situation. I want to be left in peace.’ ‘Oh! but you are not a peaceful person. You’ll always make trouble. Why not fight it out on equal terms and enjoy it? Like Alan Breck, I’m a bonny fighter.’ ‘And you think you’re sure to win.’ ‘Not with my hands tied.’ ‘Oh!—well, all right. But it all sounds so dreary and exhausting,’ said Harriet, and burst idiotically into tears. ‘Good Heavens!’ said Wimsey, aghast. ‘Harriet! darling! angel! beast! vixen! don’t say that.’ He flung himself on his knees in a frenzy of remorse and agitation. ‘Call me anything you like, but not dreary! Not one of those things you find in clubs! Have this one, darling, it’s much larger and quite clean. Say you didn’t mean it! Great Scott! Have I been boring you interminably for eighteen months on end? A thing any right-minded woman would shudder at I know you once said that if anybody ever married me it would be for the sake of hearing me piffle on, but I expect that kind of thing palls after a bit. I’m babbling—I know I’m babbling. What on earth am I to do about it?’ ‘Ass! Oh, it’s not fair. You always make me laugh. I can’t fight—I’m so tired. You don’t seem to know what being tired is. Stop. Let go. I won’t be bullied. Thank God! there’s the telephone.

The essence of Roosevelt’s leadership, I soon became convinced, lay in his enterprising use of the “bully pulpit,” a phrase he himself coined to describe the national platform the presidency provides to shape public sentiment and mobilize action. Early in Roosevelt’s tenure, Lyman Abbott, editor of The Outlook, joined a small group of friends in the president’s library to offer advice and criticism on a draft of his upcoming message to Congress. “He had just finished a paragraph of a distinctly ethical character,” Abbott recalled, “when he suddenly stopped, swung round in his swivel chair, and said, ‘I suppose my critics will call that preaching, but I have got such a bully pulpit.’ ” From this bully pulpit, Roosevelt would focus the charge of a national movement to apply an ethical framework, through government action, to the untrammeled growth of modern America. Roosevelt understood from the outset that this task hinged upon the need to develop powerfully reciprocal relationships with members of the national press. He called them by their first names, invited them to meals, took questions during his midday shave, welcomed their company at day’s end while he signed correspondence, and designated, for the first time, a special room for them in the West Wing. He brought them aboard his private railroad car during his regular swings around the country. At every village station, he reached the hearts of the gathered crowds with homespun language, aphorisms, and direct moral appeals. Accompanying reporters then extended the reach of Roosevelt’s words in national publications. Such extraordinary rapport with the press did not stem from calculation alone. Long before and after he was president, Roosevelt was an author and historian. From an early age, he read as he breathed. He knew and revered writers, and his relationship with journalists was authentically collegial. In a sense, he was one of them. While exploring Roosevelt’s relationship with the press, I was especially drawn to the remarkably rich connections he developed with a team of journalists—including Ida Tarbell, Ray Stannard Baker, Lincoln Steffens, and William Allen White—all working at McClure’s magazine, the most influential contemporary progressive publication. The restless enthusiasm and manic energy of their publisher and editor, S. S. McClure, infused the magazine with “a spark of genius,” even as he suffered from periodic nervous breakdowns. “The story is the thing,” Sam McClure responded when asked to account for the methodology behind his publication. He wanted his writers to begin their research without preconceived notions, to carry their readers through their own process of discovery. As they educated themselves about the social and economic inequities rampant in the wake of teeming industrialization, so they educated the entire country. Together, these investigative journalists, who would later appropriate Roosevelt’s derogatory term “muckraker” as “a badge of honor,” produced a series of exposés that uncovered the invisible web of corruption linking politics to business. McClure’s formula—giving his writers the time and resources they needed to produce extended, intensively researched articles—was soon adopted by rival magazines, creating what many considered a golden age of journalism. Collectively, this generation of gifted writers ushered in a new mode of investigative reporting that provided the necessary conditions to make a genuine bully pulpit of the American presidency. “It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the progressive mind was characteristically a journalistic mind,” the historian Richard Hofstadter observed, “and that its characteristic contribution was that of the socially responsible reporter-reformer.

I work as fast as I can. Binah will come soon looking for me. It’s Mother, however, who descends the back steps into the yard. Binah and the other house slaves are clumped behind her, moving with cautious, synchronized steps as if they’re a single creature, a centipede crossing an unprotected space. I sense the shadow that hovers over them in the air, some devouring dread, and I crawl back into the green-black gloom of the tree. The slaves stare at Mother’s back, which is straight and without give. She turns and admonishes them. “You are lagging. Quickly now, let us be done with this.” As she speaks, an older slave, Rosetta, is dragged from the cow house, dragged by a man, a yard slave. She fights, clawing at his face. Mother watches, impassive. He ties Rosetta’s hands to the corner column of the kitchen house porch. She looks over her shoulder and begs. Missus, please. Missus. Missus. Please. She begs even as the man lashes her with his whip. Her dress is cotton, a pale yellow color. I stare transfixed as the back of it sprouts blood, blooms of red that open like petals. I cannot reconcile the savagery of the blows with the mellifluous way she keens or the beauty of the roses coiling along the trellis of her spine. Someone counts the lashes—is it Mother? Six, seven. The scourging continues, but Rosetta stops wailing and sinks against the porch rail. Nine, ten. My eyes look away. They follow a black ant traveling the far reaches beneath the tree—the mountainous roots and forested mosses, the endless perils—and in my head I say the words I fashioned earlier. Boy Run. Girl Jump. Sarah Go. Thirteen. Fourteen . . . I bolt from the shadows, past the man who now coils his whip, job well done, past Rosetta hanging by her hands in a heap. As I bound up the back steps into the house, Mother calls to me, and Binah reaches to scoop me up, but I escape them, thrashing along the main passage, out the front door, where I break blindly for the wharves. I don’t remember the rest with clarity, only that I find myself wandering across the gangplank of a sailing vessel, sobbing, stumbling over a turban of rope. A kind man with a beard and a dark cap asks what I want. I plead with him, Sarah Go. Binah chases me, though I’m unaware of her until she pulls me into her arms and coos, “Poor Miss Sarah, poor Miss Sarah.” Like a decree, a proclamation, a prophecy. When I arrive home, I am a muss of snot, tears, yard dirt, and harbor filth. Mother holds me against her, rears back and gives me an incensed shake, then clasps me again. “You must promise never to run away again. Promise me.” I want to. I try to. The words are on my tongue—the rounded lumps of them, shining like the marbles beneath the tree. “Sarah!” she demands. Nothing comes. Not a sound. I remained mute for a week. My words seemed sucked into the cleft between my collar bones. I rescued them by degrees, by praying, bullying and wooing. I came to speak again, but with an odd and mercurial form of stammer. I’d never been a fluid speaker, even my first spoken words had possessed a certain belligerent quality, but now there were ugly, halting gaps between my sentences, endless seconds when the words cowered against my lips and people averted their eyes. Eventually, these horrid pauses began to come and go according to their own mysterious whims. They might plague me for weeks and then remain away months, only to return again as abruptly as they left.