A young patient of mine has been the victim of bullying over the last several months.  His mom tells me that he was being physically and emotionally abused by a teammate.  He became so severely depressed, his parents were deeply concerned for his safety.

When he reported this abuse, he was further bullied on Facebook, with accusations of being a liar.  His abuser was suspended for a short time, but wasn’t kicked off the team.  When confronted, the bully’s mother apparently said that my patient “should have just manned up.  This is what boys do.”

So if a young woman is in a relationship, and is taunted, called names, punched or kicked, do we say that she should just “man up?”  Don’t we tell her that this is abuse, it’s illegal, and it’s not to be tolerated?  Don’t we tell her to get out, to be safe, and to report this crime?

But if a young man in sports bullies a teammate, we say this is just part of sports? Or growing up?  That it’s a rite of passage?

There was a recent story about a rookie on the Neepawa Natives hockey team forced to drag around a carrier full of water bottles and towels tied to his scrotum in the dressing room, while his teammates and an assistant coach watched.  Like my patient, he reported this abuse, and was apparently forced to apologize to his team for coming forward!

Do we force women who are abused to apologize to their abusive partners because they had the nerve to tell?!

I think this is preposterous.

There is no role for this kind of behavior in sports, or anywhere for that matter.  We want our kids to get into sports for so many good reasons: physical fitness, teamwork, leadership, learning the value of hard work, setting goals and achieving them.  We also get our kids into sports, I hope, to learn about sportsmanship, ethics, how to be a good winner as well as a good loser.  We want them to learn how to treat others when in a position of strength as well as weakness.  In other words, we put them into sports to help teach them the lessons they need to learn for the rest of their lives.

Fortunately for my patient, he has moved on, to a new coach, and new teammates, and he’s made a great recovery.  He’s happy, and he just wants to keep competing.  His parents are still haunted by this incident, wondering if he’s ok on the outside, but not on the inside.  I’ve told them to reach out to Kids Help Phone. 

Kids Help Phone maintains helplines 24/7 for kids in distress, whether from abuse, or family problems, drugs, depression, or other problems.  I’ve asked his parents to let him know he can call or email Kids Help anytime, to get advice or just to have someone listen, someone who’s away from the controversy and who won’t judge him for how he feels.  I asked them to let him know that he isn’t alone, and that he was right to speak up, that he should be proud of having the guts to help make this stop.

We should get rid of terms like bullying and hazing, and call them what they are – abuse.  We can all work together to end abuse.  Speak up.  Stop the violence.