My friend Yvette told me about the Red Cross Day of Pink that’s coming up on Wednesday, April 9 and I couldn’t pass up the chance to get involved. I want to stand up and be counted. I hope you will too.
The International Day of Pink is all about taking a stand against bullying, especially bullying by kids and in schools. It was started by two kids in Nova Scotia who had enough when another student got teased for wearing a pink shirt to school. They started wearing pink too in support of their friend. Now it’s an international event and has made its way to Saskatchewan.
I’m glad it’s here. Respect (the antidote to bullying) is a value I cherish, although I don’t always have enough of it inside me. I’m lucky though, in that I have a daughter with crystal clear perception of the people around her, since she was 3 years old. She sees the kids and adults that are hurting and tries to help them out, no matter what. I’m lucky to have that beacon to inspire me to improve myself.
She’s also helped me see just how pervasive bullying still is in our society. Maybe it’s not as overtly violent as when I was a kid, when if you were different you got beat up after school, but we can be as mean, dismissive, gossipy and hurtful as ever. That's not going to change overnight, but it has to change. It has to stop.
So I’ll be proudly wearing my pink t-shirt on Wednesday April 9. We all will. At Orange Boot (on Wednesday, we’ll be Pink Boot Bakery), we’ll all be baking for you and serving you in pink this Wednesday and making special t-shirt cookies too. All proceeds from the t-shirt cookies will be donated to the Sheldon Williams Collegiate Peer Support program to support the good work they are doing at the school.
I hope you come say Hi on Wednesday, have a cookie and even wear some pink of your own. Respect.
Photo from Red Cross Manitoba
update - I had originally called the SWC program "anti-bullying" but peer support is the correct name.