Singers Tell Students: Be Resilient When Bullied

Photo by Hannah Grossman

 

By Hannah Grossman

 

Hundreds of public school students found their seats on red-velvet concerto chairs and watched performers sing contemporary pop music. In between the performances, the singers recounted their stories and tried to pass along wisdom achieved from their life struggles.

Keschi, a singer from America’s Got Talent, who survived a plane crash that killed 107 people in Nigeria, sang, “This is My Fight Song,” created by Rachel Platten.

Cheers erupted from the crowd.

“What a lot of people don’t know about us is that we came from broken communities, and our mission is to let people know that no matter how difficult it is, you have to stay strong, be strong, and be positive,” said Shon China Lacey, a member of Linkin’ Bridge, an acapella group and finalist on America’s Got Talent.

“I’m talking about shoes too small or too big, I’m talking about not having enough to eat,” Lacy said about his impoverished childhood. Lacy grew up in the projects and then was moved to a foster home when his mother was incarcerated. “It was hard. I could have said I’m gonna sell drugs to get money, but I said no. And I let go and I gave it to God,” he said.

As he detailed his struggles with being raised in the projects and having a parent who was incarcerated, “yupps” resounded from the children with whom the message apparently resonated. “My message to the you is: Stay strong because there is light at the end of the tunnel. Be the lighter for your community,” Lacy said.

Another performer, Jessie Funk, said that after she was bullied, she became the bully. “I got caught in the cycle,” she said.

Funk explained that she took her pain and her disappointment from her “mean girl” days and used that to create something positive. For the past 13 years she has studied behavioral psychology in order to understand bullying so she can be a better advocate against it.

One of the dynamic approaches of Be Strong is that the program does not seek to label bullies.

“If someone is bullying you, there is something going on. No one is born mean. Take a pause, there is something else going on. Having said that, we don’t have to put up with it,” she said.

Funk explained that labeling can create a self-fulfilling prophecy in a child. In her own experience, when she acted like a “mean girl,” she was suspended and categorized as a bully by her principal. This ended up causing her to keep living up to the label. “We are capable of being hurt and we are capable of hurting,” she said.

“We encourage the kids not to bully each other and not to use foul language. This [event] is a reward for them. They can see the strength that comes from not bullying,” a Bronx teacher, Alisha Black, said.

In the social media age, children don’t get a break from bullying when the school bell rings. “Before it was an experience from 9 o’clock to 3 o’clock but now they can wake up to it,” Black said. “It’s a big problem. All these kids are committing suicide, and it’s because of social media. Now they go home, and it’s a problem,” said Black.

In the darkness of bullying and hardship, students were encouraged to become heroes of their own story, by asserting themselves as individuals in healthy and creative ways.

“You can get tattoos, but that doesn’t mean you should do stupid things,” Lacy said.