Home Away From Home?

      In my opinion, school should be home away from home. A safe place to go everyday and be happy. Now, we all know that bullying cannot be stopped and people will continue to bully others, however, there are ways to prevent harm and reduce bullying to a minimum. It isn't fair to those who are bullied because we are all human and we are all equal so why should other people be treated as if they were less worthy? It does not make any sense. Some people don't see how harmful bullying is and sometimes they don't see that what they are doing is considered bullying. Sure, it could just be just a joke but when the person is bothered by it, clearly it is not a joke anymore. The effect of bullying leads to horrible consequences that are filled with regret and life is honestly too short for that.

      We all know how avoidable these situations are. It all goes back to, talk to someone, you are not alone, someone is always there for you. But honestly, people who have experienced bullying are afraid to go to someone because they feel the person who bullies them will just be worse to them because they 'snitched' on them. I believe that we can do as a community is too start being more attentive to what is going on at school and to actually bring it to attention and not be afraid of being a tattle.
       Here at Mary Ward, there are many resources to turn to if you are a victim of bullying or witness bullying. The staff will always be supportive, such as admin (principal, vice- principal), your T.A. or even your guidance counsellor. I know for a fact that these people are very supportive and would do their best to make their students happy and make Ward a very safe place to go to. Unlike other places,  admin would do their best to eliminate the problem by following up on students and setting consequences for the bullies. We also have clubs such as "Stop the Stigma" which promotes anti-bullying and these members show support.
      Do we really need new services? I personally say no because what we have is enough. What we have is all that we can get because it isn't like we can get personal bodyguards or something. Mary Ward is safe enough, sure there can be some bullying here and there but that easily gets solved.

Believe It or Not...

Memes have become a huge part of the internet community. We connect through them and it brings joy to our lives. Some of these memes are just for laughs but for some reason, people take them seriously. Everyday of my life, I am on my laptop, going through Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and I don't even realize how these things just past by, they just seem like useless things but it's information that stay there on the internet as small bytes. It literally goes in through one ear and out the other (metaphorically). The things we see, people who really think about it, know it is most likely fake, however, there are certain people who just love to believe everything. These people panic for no reason (unfortunately, I somewhat fall into this category) I am smart enough to know it is fake but I still somehow believe it. For example, when the world was gonna end in 2012... that was dumb, that was fake, but I followed the bandwagon and believed it. Also, when people post photos of like marks left in corn fields. What do i believe? Aliens are gonna invade. Are aliens even real..probably not but my small pea brain loves to believe it.

Judging by the fact that even bright people believe some of these things just shows how careful we need to be when upload posts and photos. Once it is on the internet, people can capture it, and even if we delete it, it somehow shows up again. We have to really think about what we are about to post because of how it can affect ourselves as well as the people around us. The minute it goes online, even when you delete it, it will still be there because people save it, people manipulate it and people do anything they want with it.

In general, we have to be careful with we do with information on the internet. We never know what happens with it and we are responsible for what we believe in.