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Time to stare bullies right in the face

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By TOM JACKSON tjackson Tom Jackson

@tampatrib.com tjackson@tampatrib.com

Published: May 17, 2009

These days, one can scarcely swing a copy of "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" without whacking someone guilty of Valance-style behavior. Which is not altogether a bad thing. Bullies are on the march, and they merit whacking.

Where, oh where, is John Wayne when you need him?

If it's not President Barack Obama bullying bondholders into subordinate positions in the remaking of Chrysler, it's news that Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke bullied banks into accepting federal bailout funds to the detriment of shareholders.

Not that we think any of these folks need shooting, although, if we are to stick with cinematic allusions, we wouldn't object to a series of firm slaps on the nose like Dorothy gave the Cowardly Lion.

Closer to home, newsmaking bullying has been extreme in its horror. Authorities say Richard Anthony McTear, a 21-year-old with vacant eyes and a head full of dreads, flung an infant from his car traveling on Interstate 275 near Fowler Avenue. And four teens, members of the Walker Middle School flag football team, next door in Odessa, are accused of pinning a younger teammate to the locker room floor and violating him with a broom handle and a hockey stick.

Times like these, one wonders: Are there no fathers? Are there no woodsheds?

Moments of cowardice

The pivotal moment in Khaled Hosseini's brilliant and haunting 2005 bestseller, "The Kite Runner," occurs when the narrator's lower-class friend and servant is trapped by bullies in an alleyway, assaulted and sodomized even as the narrator watches, hidden by a tumbled wall, too terrified to intervene.

Hassan, the victim, recovers - after a fashion - leaving Amir, who shrunk back, to live well into adulthood in guilt-edged agony inspired by his cowardice, locating some small measure of redemption only in the book's final pages.

When preventable thuggery prevails, as the episodes implicating McTear and the Walker Middle four almost certainly were, we all become Amirs, our stomachs knotted, our throats taut, our jaws clinched in meaningless fury. Why do such things happen?

It's our responsibility

Immediately, we launch sorties of blame. The teachers, the coaches, the cops, the social workers, the school district, the schools superintendent, the Legislature (darn that sovereign immunity!), the parents, the kids, the victims themselves.

Cut it out. These episodes are only partly about systems failures. Mostly, they are about us. The lessons are plain, if we are willing to learn, and they instruct all of us.

Step up, be vigilant, intervene, be accountable, and demonstrate courage and righteousness in the face of abject evil. Stare it down. Call it out. Gangsterism is emboldened and escalated by every glimpse in a neutral direction.

The first step to shutting it down: Look it squarely in the face. It's not John Wayne and his trusty Winchester, but it's a very good start.

"The Jax Files Weekend" with Tom Jackson airs at 11 a.m. Saturdays on WGUL, 860 AM.

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