I'm angry. Not just a little angry, but really angry. Last week I heard a story from a friend on Twitter that really got my dander up. Her 5 year old son, a kindergartener here in the Twin Cities, is being bullied.

By his second week of school, this little boy has already been kicked in the stomach, poked with a pencil and mercilessly teased by a 3rd grader on his school bus. How do you think these attacks will affect his view of school?

After hearing this story, others on Twitter shared stories of their 4, 5 and 6 year olds being physically and verbally bullied by older kids at their schools. While researching this subject, I repeatedly came across terribly sad and disturbing stories of teens taking their own lives after enduring repeated bullying by peers. This is absurd. This is not acceptable. We, as parents, cannot accept this attack on our children. We, as a community, cannot accept this kind of behavior from our youth. Our children should be safe at school. Our children should be able to focus on academics, athletics, art, music and socializing and interacting with peers and teachers in a positive way.

I have a 4-year-old. I worry about a lot of things, but this is not something I thought I needed to think about until later. This is a topic I had jotted down on a long list of post ideas for some time in the future. It immediately rose to the top of the list after I heard these stories.

The Outdated Approach
When I started doing research on anti-bullying laws, I was pleasantly surprised to see that so many states have laws on this subject. But then, I started to dig deeper and realized that a great number of these laws are not worth much. Many instruct school districts to have an official policy on bullying and are outdated, not even touching on issues like cyber bullying. That's not going to cut it.

The Conservative Approach
I was especially angered when I found an article in the Minnesota Independent written about Minnesota GOP gubernatorial candidate, Tom Emmers, stating that he would not sign a proposed anti-bullying Safe Schools for All bill, which was vetoed by current governor Tim Pawlenty in 2009.

This proposed bill would expand Minnesota anti-bullying statutes to specifically include sexual orientation, gender, nationality and disability. Conservatives say including sexual orientation makes the bill "pro-gay" and reject it on this basis. According to the Minnesota Independent, Emmers says it's up to parents to teach their kids about bullying and how to handle it.

Another Approach
While I agree with Emmers that parents should educate their children about how to handle bullying, I don't agree that there's not a need for laws protecting children being bullied. I have heard from too many parents, the one's talking to their kids about bullying, telling me it's happening to young kids, here in Minnesota. Educating your child about bullying is not enough in my opinion. There should be a law providing consequences and penalties for those doing the bullying.

This has nothing to do with being conservative, liberal, democrat, republican, independent, Catholic, Baptist, Lutheran, gay, straight, black, white, brown, male, female, a brain, a jock, an artist, a band geek, popular or not. It's about protecting our children from being beaten, threatened, humiliated and abused by peers. It makes no difference why bullies have decided to brand a particular child as something undesirable, whether it's simply a matter of size, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, disability, economic status, etc. All children deserve to be safe at school and while going to and from school.

What is Bullying?
Focus Adolescent Services defines bullying as abusive behavior by one or more students against a victim or victims. Bullying can be a direct attack, which includes teasing, taunting, threatening, stalking, name-calling, hitting, making threats, coercion and stealing; or the bullying can be a subtle attack accomplished through malicious gossiping, spreading rumors and intentional exclusion.

Both methods result in victims becoming socially rejected and isolated. Focus Adolescent Services adds that the key component of bullying is physical or psychological intimidation that occurs repeatedly over time to create an ongoing pattern of harassment and abuse.

The Laws
The fact that there is a law neither shields a person from being bullied, nor eliminates such behavior, but if authorities consistently and diligently enforce this law at the very least it can act as a deterrent, providing a consequence for the one(s) bullying and counseling or other aid to the one(s) being bullied.

There are 44 states with anti-bullying laws. Sounds impressive, right? But as I have already mentioned many of these laws are not up-to-date and are not providing much more than a suggestion to school districts to implement a policy on bullying. Bully Police USA provides a link to each state's anti-bullying law and gives a grade from A++ to F to each law.

Making the Grade
Bully Police USA graded each state based on a number of standards. Check to see what your state's grade means. The best laws include the word "bullying", provide counseling for victims, protect teachers and school administrators who report bullying, mandate that all schools implement a specific anti-bullying policy, including educating students, parents and school personnel about the various components of bullying, etc. The states with failing grades have no anti-bullying laws. There are 6 states with no such laws.

The Scoop
Have you or your child been bullied or been the bully? What do you teach your child to do if bullied or if your child witnesses someone being bullied? How does your state's law measure up? What are your thoughts on this subject? Please leave a comment. I love to hear from readers. On Thursday (note the change from Wednesday this week), I will post tips on educating your child about bullying and how to handle these situations, including when your child is the bully.

I realize that I have not discussed cyber bullying at all. I have decided to treat that as a separate topic and post on that subject in a few weeks. Cyber bullying is a whole other beast and certainly an important issue to examine in detail. Over and out…

This post was written by Anna Berend and originally published on Motherly Law.