A crowd of 256 people attended a rally and a marching candlelight vigil to stand up against bullying in schools at a special event in St. Petersburg on Sunday, Oct. 11. The vigil was sponsored and produced by the King of Peace Metropolitan Community Church.
The march began at the city’s downtown Sunshine Senior Center, wound its way past St. Petersburg city hall, then across Central Avenue to the upscale Beach Drive, where outdoor diners at various restaurants spontaneously greeted the passing marchers with an enthusiastic round of applause.
Organizers Matt Moss, a regular attendee at the MCC Church, along with associate pastor Lorraine Brock, put the event together in less than a week.
Moss credits the vigil’s success to “the power of Facebook.” The two reached out to various faith based communities, social action groups and elected officials across the Tampa Bay area. In attendance on Sunday were representatives not only from the MCC Church, but from Lakewood United Methodist Church, the Quakers, the Unitarians, other faith based groups as well as community organizations like St. Pete Pride.
Openly gay St. Petersburg city council member Steve Kornell was also among the marchers.
“If one of our children is suffering, then that’s one too many as far as I’m concerned,” Kornell said. “I’ve worked on behalf of LGBT students—who seem to be particularly susceptible to bullying—for over 10 years. While the GSA program in Pinellas County is one of the strongest ones in the whole country, what I’d really like to see us work toward is an all inclusive LBGT youth group that could meet outside the regular school environment too. I hope tonight’s march can be a turning point where we can provide even safer more secure environments for our kids. I find it difficult to believe than anyone would not find it shameful for bullying of any kind to happen.”
Both Moss and Brock are familiar with school bullying. Moss said he was a short child, and he was picked on because of his stature and because he was gay. Brock taught in public schools for 21 years and realizes that teachers, too, have difficulty standing up to bullies.
Deb Larkin is a teacher at Morgan Fitzgerald Middle School. She teaches an 18-week program in 11 Pinellas County middle schools specifically addressing the issue of bullying. The course teaches tolerance, how to be a good bystander, how to disagree without being disagreeable, and how to find allies to stand up against bullies.
“We also do an aggressive outreach to parents too,” said Larkin. “We give the kids homework that must be signed by the parents and includes activities their entire family can do together to understand bullying, its causes and how to prevent it. Middle school is the worst place for bullying, followed by elementary school and then finally high school.”
Jim Jackson, an openly gay candidate for Pinellas County School Board, said he believes the school board does have some sound policies already in place, but they need to be implemented and enforced more effectively.
“What we need is for more monitoring, more trainers and systems to help and encourage students to be our eyes and ears about what is really going on at their school,” said Jackson. “The students themselves know best what kind of bullying is going on and we need to help them be our allies in fighting it without fear of retribution themselves. We need to not only address the real problem of LGBT related bullying, but also bullying of any kind. All our children are involved and we need to look out for all of their welfares.”
The rally and vigil was influenced by the recent deaths of nine students across the country who took their own lives as a result of bullying. Marchers carried nine large signs with pictures and biographical information on them about each of the lives lost.
For Carmen Flejtuch, it was a bit more personal. She carried a weathered looking old photograph of her friend Charles Vihilidal, who was the victim of a hate crime which took his life in 1994.
