It is completely false to say that words can never hurt a person. It takes a strong person to say that no words have ever hurt them because everyone has been called a name they don't like or has been hurt by something someone said to them. Even though words might not physically hurt us, they definitely hurt internally. It is not the words that are necessarily bad, it is the way people interpret the words and give them meaning which makes them hurtful. Some words that are hurtful to people are racial slurs which are demeaning to many people.
Children seem to be becoming even more verbally viscous than ever before because of all of the social networking sites that children can use to bully other children. Not only can children be bullys at school, but they also can be verbally abusive through AOL instant messenger, my space, facebook etc. Because of this issue, I think it is very important to sit down with kids and talk about the power that their words have on others. They need to understand that they can really hurt someone by what they say.
Language is very powerful and especially now when the whole world seems to have to be politically correct. When teachers label a child they must use person first language so instead of saying "Schizophrenic Suzie", we must say Suzie who has schizophrenia. We also must not label anyone retarded or gay. Words which are also labels can have a very negative effect on some individuals. Religious holidays are also not allowed to be mentioned anymore in schools. Instead of saying "Merry Christmas," many public places say "Happy Holidays" to not offend people. Public schools are not allowed to sing Christmas songs either. Many people even want to have the words "in God we trust" taken off the dollar bill because they deem it to be offensive. There was also controversy over whether to have the ten commandments up in a courthouse or not.
Anyone who says that words don't hurt, are lying. Words offend people everywhere. This phrase has good intentions, because it is good for children to brush off ugly words said to them, but isn't really true. Children should learn to forgive people for the nasty things other say to them, but sometimes it is hard. The truth is WORDS HURT!
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You've brought up two good points: 1 - bullying and how words are used by children today either online or through texting. I've heard of a number of cases where suicides and dropouts were traced back to words that were being said about a child.
ReplyDelete2- the PC way of the world. I'm just not sure at what point we say, "get over it already". We live in a world where no one wants to be the one offended, but everyone offends. It's an interesting position to be in as an educator because your classroom will be filled with lots of different students from varying backgrounds.