How many more people are going to be damaged or even commit suicide before our society realizes just how common and damaging bullying is today?

Bullying can take many forms. It may be a snide comment or it could be an email or a Facebook post. If you ask most people, they may feel that bullying is always happening somewhere else to people they don't even know. The sad fact is that bullying is all around us.

Bullies generally target those people that may seem 'different' from the group. The difference could be racial, physical, mental or socio-economic. I have personally seen the ill effects of bullying.

When I was a High School Freshman, there was a student at my school that I didn't personally know, but have seen many times while walking through the halls. It was common knowledge on the campus that he was homosexual. Tyler Clementi graduated and went on to attend at Rutgers University. You may have seen the story on the news where his dorm roommate set up a hidden camera that captured this student and his partner having relations. These images were later broadcast on Facebook and YouTube for all the world to see. This was apparently too much for him to take and he committed suicide by leaping off the George Washington Bridge and fell over 200 feet to his death in the icy waters of the Hudson river.

While this may seem to be an extreme example of the impact of bullying, it actually is not. It happens every day all around us to people that you would not think would be victims of bullying.

Try to think of the impact of your actions when dealing with those that seem to be 'different'. You may find deep down they are more like you than you thought. Because in the end we are all equally human.

Remember to practice tolerance, temperance, and kindness to others.