Wear pink and take a stand against bullying
Posted Feb 27, 2013 7:11 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The last Wednesday of February is now known across Canada and around the world as Pink Shirt Day.
Six years ago, Travis Price and a friend of his distributed dozens of pink t-shirts to students at their school in Berwick, Nova Scotia after watching a bully threaten to beat up a classmate, simply because he was wearing pink.
Price tells 660News they posted their story online and the next day, 1,000 students showed up wearing pink.
An Airdrie teenager is adding her voice to the movement aimed at eradicating bullying.
Mackenzie Murphy says she even tired to take her own life to end the constant abuse she was being exposed to at school and in cyberspace.
A number of events are planned in Calgary to raise awareness about bullying and to urge victims to seek help.
Students at Strathcona-Tweedsmuir school are putting together a flash mob in the cafeteria, while a sea of pink will be created at John G. Diefenbaker High School.
London Drugs stores in Calgary and area are selling pink t-shirts, but one manager in Airdrie reports she is already sold out.
Proceeds from the sale of those pink t-shirts benefit Boys and Girls Clubs; over the years, the campaign has raised more than $300,000.
Pink Shirt Day is not only a Canadian phenomenon; it’s estimated in 2011 more than 6.4-million people across the globe participated.
Price says he’s blown away to see how a simple gesture to support a classmate has become a rallying point to battle a very real and serious social problem.
According to StopABully.ca, bullying happens in many different forms ranging from name calling and shoving to exclusion and cyber attacks.
According to numbers on the website, Grade 6 students are bullied the most with more than 26 per cent of students – boys and girls – reporting they have experienced it.
