This is my confession: I used to be a bully

Growing up, I always considered myself someone who believed in gender equality. With a grandmother who single-handedly raised her children and a mother who came to the United States alone as a young adult, the women of my family found their independence early on in their lives. My family consequently was non-traditional in the sense that the women were not afraid to assert themselves and the men confidently supported their decisions. As a result, near the close of high school, it was difficult to acknowledge that I had become the opposite of what I believed in. I was a bully.

The exact details of how the bullying all began are now muddled, but it involved me, the victim, who I will refer to as Sasha, and a group of people who were fueled by the demoralization of the victim. I was part of that group. And while I did not directly cause her turmoil, I partook in slut-shaming Sasha, who was once my best friend.

Between the tenth and twelfth grade, I laughed and engaged in conversations that criticized Sasha for “dating around” and justified my failure to interfere in the spread of libel by reasoning that she was inconsiderate of the people who she had dated and had “deserved it”. People began to make assumptions about her sex life. Gossip was saturated with news of her dating, which had caused names like “home wrecker”, “slut”, “whore”, and “bitch” to be used to casually refer to her behind her back. Even when Sasha was harassed online, I did nothing.

As the bullying persisted, I continued to interact with her as if nothing had happened. I smiled at her and engaged in small talk with her in class. My rationale was that treating her nicely could compensate for my faceless role in her persecution.

Unfortunately, these efforts did little to mitigate the guilt I felt. Before my own eyes, Sasha changed. She became more reserved in class, avoided the lunchroom, and limited herself to a small number of friends; however, by the time I realized what I helped to cause, I thought it was too late. Rather than coming clean to her, I instead left high school full of regret.

It was not until upon entering college that I returned to this unresolved conflict. Sitting in on a sexism workshop, I was reminded of the recent incidents of Brock Turner’s release, the suspension lift of the unnamed Brown University student accused of sexual assault, and Sasha’s suffering.

In a room among other students, many of who which identified as female, students of color, and/or queer, I was reminded of the misogyny and violence towards females, trans, and non-gender conforming individuals that my sheltered upbringing had protected me from. I was shocked to hear that one in five US women (one in four on college campuses) had a chance of being raped and fifty-four percent of rapes go unreported. When given the explanation for the lack of reports, I was told that justifications for victim-blaming rape included the victim’s past expression of sexuality and sexual activity, the notion that husbands cannot rape their wives, the perceived sexual nature of certain races, and the belief that women lie about rape. Because of these justifications for rape, many victims failed to report out of fear or the belief that no one would help. In these situations, the victims were perceived to have deserved rape, just as Sasha was perceived to have deserved slut shaming. In both situations, the victims were oppressed for asserting sexual confidence.

It was in that moment that I realized that my excuses for ridiculing Sasha echoed victim-blaming sexual assault justifications that proliferated misogyny. I was promoting a culture where females were vulnerable because of the clothes they wore and their perceived sex life. Labelling Sasha a slut had done nothing but give others the right to use her as an object of sexual gratification. My failure to interfere gave others that right and as a result, I betrayed her.

I am not solely responsible for bullying Sasha, but I only allude to the group for the sole reason that the group consists of good people. They are intelligent, hardworking individuals who were confused and hurt. We were all friends at one point in time, but jealousy, stress, and loneliness, the difficulties of growing up, interfered with our lives. Misunderstanding emerged and ties got severed. I cannot explain their rationale for choosing to torment Sasha, but I am here to take responsibility of the part I played. Slut shaming, bullying, and betraying a friend of eleven years is not something I am proud of. The hardest thing about writing this was knowing that she had trusted my loyalty to her throughout this ordeal. My biggest hope about coming clean is that she will one day forgive me despite my shortcomings.