Spoiler alert:I’m talking about the distressing moment where Eleven – trying to fit in as a regular teenage girl named Jane – is ganged up on at the roller rink by a group of bullies,who encircle her,call her names,and throw a milkshake in her face without a single adult coming to intervene.
Watching the episode curled up on the couch,my husband turns to me in disbelief,exclaiming:“This stuff never happens!” Apparently,parallel dimensions and psychic monsters are fine,but teenage bullying is too far!
I wish it never happened,but the sad reality is that I was a victim of a very similar experience at a roller rink;only it was a decade after the fictionalStranger Things Rink-o-Mania incident of 1986,and I was on the receiving end of a hip and shoulder rather than a milkshake.
I was on a class excursion to the local skate centre when a bunch of girls from my class lined up,one after another,to try to knock me off my rollerblades – in full view of my classmates and a teacher.
I could see them coming,so I just braced myself and willed myself not to fall flat on my bum. One at a time,the bullies shoved past. But I stood my ground and they just bounced off me.
Little did I know that experience was my introduction to the sport of roller derby where,15 years later,I would become a fairly immovable force on the track as a blocker. I thought about that incident often,skating as my tough derby girl persona “Bleeder of the Pack”. In hindsight,I could laugh about it. “I wish those girls could see me now,” I thought.
Like Eleven’s alter ego Jane,I was called names and taunted without adult intervention. It was a different time back then,when people turned away when it came to kids and anti-social behaviour. Bullying policies weren’t yet a thing and my teachers didn’t appear adequately trained to handle conflict resolution.
Although,rather than retaliating with violence as Eleven/Jane did on the show,I copped a blood nose from a schoolyard bully who called me a weirdo. I was actually voted “Weirdest Girl” from my graduating class of 1999. I even received a certificate,which I have kept all these years as a badge of honour. That just wouldn’t fly today.
Fast-forward to last week,watching the work of fiction play out on my TV screen was somewhat triggering.
But I have my teenage resilience to thank for helping me become the confident and successful weirdo I am today.
I am grateful for today’s woke generation where schools and workplaces have adopted zero-tolerance policies against bullying.
Young people,and adults alike,are becoming more empowered to call out aggressors for their sexist,racist,homophobic,ableist and general nasty “othering” behaviour.
It’s about time.
I imagine my former school bullies watching that episode ofStranger Things with their own kids,feeling a pang of regret for being one of those who dampened another child’s sparkle. I only hope that anti-social behaviour is an ’80s (or ’90s) throwback that doesn’t make a modern-day revival.