Bullies: you can take the group out of high school, but not the high school out of the group!

This has been THE weirdest morning that I have had in a long time.  I know that I am in the middle of the Catch Me If You Can –keeping up with technology series, but I had to put it on hold for a brief moment and share.

So, after yesterday’s blog post I did what every good little (ex) EVP of PR and Marketing in Hollywood is taught to do, I posted the link on my facebook wall, emailed it and dropped by my high school class facebook page :

“Hi folks, hope everyone is well, check out my new blog if you have the time and let me know what you think.  I even added a heart at the end.”  Sweet ,huh?

Now before I go on, good readers, I have to tell you a bit about me.  I am and always have been the #1 cheerleader and champion of all my friends, loved ones and quite frankly, even the guy on the subway who tells me about his BIG IDEA. I believe in order to get something wonderful out to the Universe to make it bigger and better, YOU SHARE AND LET IT GROW WINGS. Period.  End of story. Or should I say BEGINNING of story.

So here I am, happily going about my day.  I am in rewrites for my book, writing up a business plan, starting a script for a new webisode series and I have a deadline for a magazine article. Busy, right?  I received a facebook email from a classmate

Hi Alison - some really uptight people here in facebook - keep writing...say it as loud as you want

You know the dog in the cartoon that whips his head around, tilts it and say HUH?  That’s what I did. I checked out the school’s  facebook page and I was blown away by the HOOPLA my little one sentence post brought about.   You would have thought I kidnapped someone’s child

A shitload of outrage, self-righteousness, barbs at my expense and quite frankly some bizarre remarks that I still can’t unravel about self-promotion and advertising. One woman said that I was a writer wanabee who was doing this to promote my upcoming novel.  I thought okay, that’s weird, if I have an upcoming novel how am I a writer wanabee?   It was a virtual facebook feeding frenzy.  
Seriously all they had to do is drop me a line asking me not to mention my writing on the page.  Anyway,  I went on the page and took the high road and told them I was sorry and I will not talk about my writing or blogging anymore.  

Then this whole thing got me thinking. . .

Why does this sound familiar?  Because it is the whole group mentality, gang up on one person and go to town.   You recognize it—it lurks in every neighborhood, every school yard and unfortunately even in the work place.  The bully picks his target and literary starts picking on his target and the rest of the group, in an effort to deflect attention from themselves, chime in and add to the misery.  The negative energy grows exponentially.  The poor target doesn’t have a chance. He is shrunk all the way down to the size the bully and the group want him to be.  We’ve seen recently how unfathomably tragic an ending to this scenario can be.

Now, of course, what took place this morning, cannot ever touch the horror of what many people who have been the target of an angry group or bullies go through, but it feels similar.   The group mentality houses, protects and nourishes the bully persona--otherwise it would surely die of malnutrition.

We must recognize the bully (remember he wears many faces and lives in every age group) and stand up to him and the group he pals around with.  We need to stand BEHIND and in FRONT of every person who is the target of a group or bully. Period. People we need to live in a bully free zone!!

Now what do you think, should I post this on my high school class facebook page?

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www.alisoncaiola.com
@AlisonMCaiola
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Alison is the award-winning author of The Lily Lockwood Series: The Seeds of a Daisy and soon to be published The Silver Cord.

The Seeds of a Daisy is available paperback and digital download: Amazon, barnesandnoble.com and iTunes