Tomorrow, Wednesday, April 14th is Pink Shirt Day. What is Pink Shirt Day? It all started in Nova Scotia when David Shepherd and Travis Price, in their teens, organized a day of protest when a new grade nine student had been bullied.
Together they distributed pink t-shirts to all the boys in the school for a day of solidarity and to send a message about bullying.
I love what these two teens did, and it has taken off and evolved into a well-organized and developed day with sponsors to make a statement about bullying.
Present day organizers are not the two original teens, but are the inspiration for tomorrow’s Pink Shirt Day. The Pink Shirt Day website is a great resource dedicated to bullying and homophobia
This topic is dear to me, as during grade 8 until 12, my life was hell. I remember being harassed on a daily basis to the point where I had absolutely no self-esteem.
It all started when I had to share my locker with one of them in grade 8, The guy kept stealing my gym clothes, homework etc. I had no choice but to say something.
It is one of the reasons why I always hated my voice and started to mumble. A couple guys routinely mocked me to the point where I didn’t want to speak.
Those years were the worst in my life. At one point in Jr. High, I was placed in the track (the group that followed a particular class schedule) with the bullies. As soon as I found out I went straight to my mother and said I would not go to school if I had to be with them.
I was dead serious.
We then went to the principle where I reiterated that I would stop attending school if they forced me to be in this group.
To this day I don’t know why they just couldn’t put me in with the other group. Instead I had some special schedule.
It wasn’t until my last year in high school when I discovered “downtown” Winnipeg, and the gay club that I started to not care about what was happening as school.
Nonetheless, the baggage inflicted from those years lasted for years, and still have a faint voice in my head that I no longer listen to. It does tell a bit of the story of why I took on a shy-yet-rebellious tone in my life, which I maintain until today.
If you have a pink shirt, or have time to get one, put it one and stand in solidarity for those who still have to endure this kind of behaviour.
