What if you witnessed a kid being bullied?
Would you just stand by in fear of aggravating the situation? Would you call for help? Or would you step in and intervene?
This is what YouTube content creator Matt TV wanted to find out.
Through his small social experiment, he wanted to tap into how we react when faced with bullying. With the help of four accomplices, Matt TV set up a scene where three teens gang up on a younger kid.
In the said scene, the teens will snatch the younger boy’s soccer ball and pass it around. They’d let the younger boy chase after the ball in vain while they make fun of him in the process.
The scene would play out in front of unsuspecting civilians.
This way, they can get genuine reactions through a staged interaction. And the reactions he got would make you believe in humanity once more.
The first encounter happened in front of a mother and her son.
The moment they realized that the younger kid was being made fun of, her son snatched the ball from the teens and stood close beside the bullied kid. His mother, meanwhile, walked up to the teens and confronted them.
She quickly asked the teens if they are friends with the kids. The teens said they were and that they’ve been good friends with the kid for two years now. The mom rebuffed them, saying friends don’t bully their friends.
The second encounter happened in front of an older woman.
At first, she was minding her own business when the scene unraveled before her. The teens didn’t know it yet, but the woman was actually listening to what they were doing. She was glancing at the kid from time to time, trying to establish a relationship between the boy and the teens.
Finally, she intervened.
She asked if one of the teens were the boy’s brother. When it became apparent that the boy was not related to any of the teens, she confronted them.
She asked the older boys what they were doing. When they said they were just playing, she immediately rebuked them by saying “That wasn’t playing.”
Finally, the last encounter happened in front of a middle-aged man.
The boy was just playing beside the bench he was sitting on when the teens approached them. They started harassing the kid in front of him and the man quickly took notice.
When the ball rolled far out in the park, this is where the man stepped in.
He made sure that he was not messing around the moment he confronted them. He stood between the boy and the teens to protect him. He asked them what they were doing. And when the teens insisted, they were just playing, he asked them if their parents would feel good to know that their kids were arrested for bullying.
These bystanders had different reasons for standing up to the kid but they all didn’t let this behavior go unchecked.
In 2019 alone, 1 in 5 kids experienced bullying.
Male victims are much more prone to be victims of physical bullying while their female counterparts are usually bullied through gossip. And no matter how harmless other kids think about this behavior, it leaves a lasting impact.
While the whole scenario is staged, it’s still a reality that some kids have to face. Hopefully, as more people come to the aid of these children, we can change the world one encounter at a time.
Watch how these bystanders reacted when they saw a kid being bullied.
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