Trigger warning: Mentions Of Physical Assaults, Suicidal Thoughts, Self-Harm
I study at a very posh school, where people come from very well educated and sophisticated families in Delhi, I was in my third last year of schooling when something started to happen with me, which has left a deep scar in my heart and crushed my self-esteem. It’s been around 1.5 years and still, it bothers me each and every single day. Being a boy, you face toxic masculinity at an early age, which suggests how boys should be tough and should fight back and not be scared.
I faced physical assault and bullying in my third-last year of school.
There was a boy in my class, whose father is a very powerful politician in the Parliament, my school really respected the person. He started to physically assault me every day, or he would continuously slap me or push me every single day in public. One of the worst feelings in this world is when someone touches you without your permission, you feel disgusted, especially when you can’t do anything about it. I started to get scars and bruises on my arms. None of my peers went up against it.
I spoke to my class teacher, a very strict woman, about this issue and all she ever did was that she spoke to him ever so sweetly and requested him not to do this again. If it were someone else, she would have got the person penalized and the parents would have been involved. He continued to hit me every day until I went up to the headmistress, who spoke to him sweetly again. I felt an entire volcano of anger inside me, not only because of the things that were happening but also when you can’t fight back due to discrimination and no one helps you.
I started to self-harm and I always got suicidal thoughts. I never involved my parents, since they would call me a sissy or that I can’t even fight back being a boy, this is what I call another part of toxic masculinity. I tried to miss school, I cried almost every day, and nothing ever happened. No teacher did the real effort of penalizing him because his father is a politician and they didn’t want to upset him.
I failed to convince people to be on my side and tell the authorities they were witnesses, as they were good friends with him and didn’t want to get into the ‘mess‘, my own so-called friends NEVER supported me.
He used to tell me every day, “my father’s a politician, I don’t give a shit, I’m *****’s son, do you think that they will take action against me?” and he was right. For reference, you can take the 1999 Jessica Lal murder case, where the murderer, a son of a politician got arrested after 7 years, only by continuously bribing witnesses.
Board exams came and the year ended but that one year has left a drastic impact on me as a person, and left wounds that will never heal. I still feel the anger, that year has drastically changed my life forever. My self-esteem is very low and I started to hate myself. I get nightmares about that thing every week. I don’t know where to speak up or how to get back at him. I followed Buddhism after going into depression which helped me temporarily forget this. I am a strong believer in Karma, and I hope that someday the same things happen to him as well.
It felt good to use this website, I feel a little relieved.