Tries to weight in without fanning the flames too much higher
While I think certain people in this thread could have been more tactful about making this point, their point is a valid one.
It is in your better interest to develop a “thicker skin” and learn to not get too wrapped up in what other people SAY about you. Sticks and Stones and blah blah blah blah blah…
These are the sorts of things you HAVE to learn to not allow to bother you. Because it only gets worse if you don’t learn this now (or at least in the next couple years or so. Your profile says you’re what, 14? Yeah, this is about the time to start learning this skill, if you don’t have it already).
Now, obviously I don’t have the whole story, but what I’m concluding from what you’ve given us is that you’ve “reported” (a less tactful word might be “tattled”) people to this mediation thingy quite a bit before. Now, I don’t know what sort of things have prompted you to this in the past, but, given how you’re reacting to this, I’m going to assume for the sake of argument that you’re reporting people for stuff at about the same level as this nasty email.
Or, in other words, you’ve acquired a reputation for being easily rattled and/or overreacting to low-level harrassment. Which means the people who get off on this sort of giving people this crap are just going to end up giving you more of it until you are baited into going off and doing something self-destructive, like, say, getting yourself suspended.
Which means they “win.”
But if you realize and accept that these minor incidents (and truth be told, a few harsh words by email is NO BIG DEAL) aren’t worth the effort of getting worked up over, you’ll eventually stop getting them. You stop giving them what they want, they go away.
Now, you’ve said you know this person, and since you know them (and yourself) better than any of us do, you’ll know better than any of us if confronting this person, and how to go about confronting this person, is a wise course of action. [If you’re not prepared to assert yourself once you confront the person, it will most likely backfire. Also, “confront” does not necessarily mean “get in their face and yell and call them out for a fight after school” (that, in fact, is another way people often allow themselves to get baited into doing something self-destructive).]
Also, starting threads on message boards over “trivial” stuff like this tends to bring out the harsher side of other posters, hence the “OMG WTF are you posting about this for you whimp?” reaction this topic has attracted. It also comes off as a cry for attention, similar to the “OMG I’m in a bad mood so I’m leaving everybody make a big long thread of goodbyes for me.” Those types of threads have never really gone over too well around here, and while we generally seemed to look the other way on them, I think our collective tolerance of them has diminished lately (maybe we’ve all seen one too many of them).
A lot of times HOW (and WHEN) you say or do something is more important than WHAT you actually say or do.
Oh, and by the way, harsh as this will possibly sound, Cybercompost/Rountree has a line in his sig that I really feel you should familiarize yourself with:
“Life is unfair. Either Kill Yourself or Get Over It.”
Bad stuff will happen. Things will be “unfair.” You can either walk around naively and unprepared and let the “unfair” stuff eat you up, or you can accept that unfairness exists and prepare yourself beforehand so that you’ll be better able to deal with shit when shit happens (and it will).
Sincerely,
Kaiser
P.S. DON’T, however, grow a set of balls. That’d just be awkward and confusing for a girl your age. :get it?:
I can always count on Sorc to say what needs to be said.