Bullying and Thesis Statement

Uprising plague" sounds vague and awkward. You may want to compare the increase and spread of bullying to an "epidemic", although that descriptor has been used a great deal in the media. Instead, you might want to rephrase your statement and write: "The increase of bullying in our society over the past few decades has harmed ever-greater numbers of people both physically and emotionally." Or: "Bullying has become an increasing problem in our society that threatens physical and emotional harm to ever-greater numbers of young people."

Whatever thesis statement you choose to write, be sure to always phrase it as a fact, because when you state your position in a thesis statement as a fact, your readers will want to continue reading in order to learn "why" you believe the way you do. For supporting facts, you may want to mention incidents of bullying that have been in the news recently. The sad fact is, some people are so deeply affected by the negative influence of bullying that they have actually taken their own lives. This is an important point to mention in any discussion of bullying. Although suicides represent a rare and extreme reaction to bullying, it is a real issue facing society today. You may also want to mention that bullying is often a factor in young people becoming depressed and having lower self-esteem. They may not be moved to take their own lives as a result, but they may become inhibited, or afraid to express themselves and possibly strive to achieve less in life than they are capable of. (For example, they may do poorly in school, or stay away from social situations because they fear being taunted or "made fun of". Because of this, bullying may be an obstacle to success.) On the favorable side of bullying (if there is one), when mistreated by bullies, some people will actually work harder to succeed, in order to "prove" the bully wrong. Or they will fight back against the bully and gain an important sense of achievement, that - win or lose - they were able to stand up for themselves and fight their way past their tormentor. Either way, the bullying can serve as an obstacle to overcome, and once it is behind the bullied person, he or she may emerge from the situation with a stronger personal character. Bullying has another negative impact - on the bullies themselves! People who bully others usually lack self-esteem and they torment others in order to take the focus off of themselves, or to take out the anger and frustration they have at the world on another person. They may also do it for attention, or because they are afraid of other people and want to bully others in order to make everyone stay away from them.

They may have enjoyed bullying others in school, but the behavior will almost certainly become an obstacle for them later in life. When they grow older and leave school, bullies will have to learn how to behave differently, or if they do not, they will probably not be able to have a happy or stable life. For example, if they begin to bully people at their place of work, their employer will not likely tolerate this, and they may be fired. Because bullying behavior is offensive to a lot of people, a bully may not have many friends in their life, and they may not be able to keep a boyfriend or girlfriend, either. If they bully others at their apartment or in their neighborhood, they might risk being evicted by their landlord. And, of course, if they bully others in public, they run the risk of being arrested by the authorities and locked away in jail or prison.

Remember: Write a strong thesis statement in your introduction. Follow this with some background information about your topic. Continue by restating your position (that bullying is an increasing problem) and use evidence to support what you say. Finally, conclude with a summary of everything you wrote about earlier.