Boy Attacked By Wolves

The title got your attention, didn’t it? Would you have been as likely to read this post if it had been titled, Boy Attacked By Bullies? My guess is no.

Why? Because you are thinking that bullying is not a big deal but wolves attacking a boy is a big deal. In either scenario, the boy could have died. Isn’t the possible death of a boy a big deal? It would be if it were your child.

What does it take to have people, all people open their eyes and ears and take a stand to stop bullies? How are kids who are bystanders expected to step up to help protect a bullied kid when adults don’t?

This story was made public today. A group of six, maybe seven teens aged 14 to 17 ganged up on 13 year old Nadin Khoury in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania. They beat him, kicked him and  dragged him through the snow while shouting vile obscenities at him. Then they hung him by his jacket on a seven foot spiked fence.

During the attack, a woman walked right by the boy and his attackers as he screamed for help. She did nothing to help. Nobody called 911. Why? Maybe they thought someone else would help the traumatized boy…or maybe they just didn’t care.

Someone described these thugs as a gang of wolves and I believe it to be an excellent use of a metaphor. Wolves are social predators. They hunt in a group. When they select their prey, they work together to wear it down until it is so exhausted that it can’t escape. Each member of the pack gets his piece of the victim.

The boys who attacked Nadin Khoury were are part of a program that isolates students who have made poor decisions in the past, many times aggressive.  The “alternative program” is meant to protect the regular high school population from students such as these.

Well what about a kid walking home from school? What protects him?

Simply removing dangerous students from the high school population during school hours isn’t sufficient. Do prisons let dangerous inmates out of prison after classes are over for the day? Of course not because they are a threat to society. Why is this any different?

This isn’t a complicated thought process. It just takes people to stop ignoring the obvious. They must observe, report and take a stand to stop bullying everywhere, during all hours of the day and night.

At least this time, the victim wasn’t killed. The next time the victim might be. It’s time to stop ignoring the obvious. This could have been your child who was attacked by wolves.

Photo: Harlequeen