Everyone’s Into Bullying in 2021
One of my favorite shows is Cobra Kai. If you’re unfamiliar with the show, it’s a continuation of the Karate Kid saga from the 1980s, only this time the script is flipped. We discover the old bully — Johnny Lawrence — isn’t as bad as we once thought. His rough upbringing, unloving father, and brutal sensei, sent him down a destructive path. Now he’s trying to make amends, while still dealing with a rivalry from the old hero, Daniel LaRusso.
As a kid, I got beat up and picked on, so I resonated with the Karate Kid. With my long hair and love of metal and art, I attracted the bullies, so I was desperate to learn martial arts. The problem was that the town I grew up in was intensely fundamentalist, and the populace viewed metal and karate as evil. Even as a teenager, I’d hide my cassettes and CDs in my car, lest my parents find them. To throw them off the scent, I’d often tune the dial to some Christian radio station that always had “Spirit” or “Dove” in their branding.
Eventually, my parents gave in and let me learn karate and I earned my black belt, growing more confident and standing a little straighter.
So when Cobra Kai premiered first on YouTube (before moving to Netflix), I dove all in remembering my childhood. What’s stood out to me in the three seasons, though, is that despite the 30 years that have passed, adults and kids are still dealing with bullying, just in new — and sometimes crueler — ways. People can’t even disagree with each other anymore without getting labeled and seen as untouchable outcasts. Say what you will, but even some forms of cancel culture are just alternative ways to bully others from the safety of a keyboard, without the threat of physical violence. We wonder why suicide is at an all-time high, but look at any social media feed. The rage, vitriol, and disdain morphs into new cliques where groups gang up on someone. Then when something horrible happens to said person, they rejoice in their suffering. Looking at this logically, that’s pretty sick and twisted. We’ll often treat animals with more grace in these troubled times than we will a fellow human.
I suppose that’s why I love Cobra Kai. Even the bullies get a chance at redemption. In an age where it’s easier to hate people, the show stands as a rebuke to our culture that people can change and that old enemies can become allies.
My wife often reminds me of a simple, but profound truth that embodies this. In the biblical New Testament, there’s a famous chapter everyone uses during weddings — 1st Corinthians 13. It’s a chapter about love and how it should operate. My wife reminds me that if we actually love people then we’ll bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, and endure all things (1 Cor. 13:7). For me, I know there are people I disagree with personally and politically, but each day I choose to believe the best about them, hope for them, and bear their shortcomings because I know that I’d want them to do the same for me. I don’t always accomplish this, but I’m still trying, because that’s what love does — endures.
Right now, we’re seeing a lot of online bullying, and more often than not, it’s adults doing it. Shaming someone online and telling them they’re stupid, racist, or a bigot won’t change them. But love will. As we just celebrated Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Right Movement, I reminded of his words and will leave you with them to ponder this week:
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction … The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.”
Until next time,
Honor. Virtue. Perseverance.
— Benjamin Sledge
