Bullying is a bad thing. However, it still happens far, far too often. We all believe that bullying should be a thing of the past, but do we all do something about it when we see it happening?
Recently, a boy at Burger King wanted to quietly eat his meal. However, a group of bullies gave the 15-year-old a hard time… Continue reading on the next page to see how the bystanders dealt with the group of bullies.
Imagine going to Burger King as a teenager and spending your pocket money on a meal. Wouldn’t you want to be able to eat it in peace, without bullies bothering you?
It’s obvious that’s what an 15-year-old American boy wanted, but instead, a group of boys wouldn’t leave him alone. For instance, a bigger boy pushed him off his chair.
Bystanders see what’s going on, but they don’t do anything.
Even when the boy is pushed off of his seat, adults do not intervene.
The boy is pushed and the bullies say mean things to him.
An elderly man gives the Burger King staff a stern look. Hoping that they will address the group of boys. However, he does not say anything about it himself.
Even when the bullying gets worse, bystanders don’t intervene. For example, one of the bullies pours his drink over the boy’s food, so that he can no longer eat it.
The harassment is clearly picked up on by the other customers. You can tell from this man’s face that he is not comfortable with the bullying.
Does he come in between, though? Not from the looks of it.
While the Burger King staff may not seem to notice, they do know what’s going on in the restaurant.
The staff comes up with something clever. They start serving food that is not up to the standard of people ordering their famous Whopper.
A smashed Whopper, anyone?
Contrary to what you may think now, the smashed food is not for the bullies, but for the bystanders in the restaurant. They are the ones who get the ‘bullied burger’.
A woman walks away with her smashed Whopper, passing by the group of boys. She seems to pretend she doesn’t see the bullying.
What she does see, on the other hand, is that her sandwich is all messed up. Unacceptable, of course.
The woman is not the only Whopper victim. Several people in the establishment have been given the ‘bullied Whopper’ and seem surprised about this.
The man can’t believe his eyes and even puts on his glasses to give it a second look. Of course he’s going to say something about it. He will not accept that burger.
With his squashed hamburger, he walks past the group of boys who are still targeting the 15-year-old, who clearly indicates that he doesn’t like it. “Guys, stop!” he shouts desperately. However, the man only focuses on his burger.
The man is not the only one returning to the counter with their burger. Several other adults in the restaurant follow. One is friendlier than the other. This man wonders why his burger looks so squashed.
Another man is less friendly and demands that the manager speak to him. “This doesn’t make sense,” he says.
A manager arrives on site and finds that the burger has indeed been squashed. Or actually, bullied. “Have you bullied this burger?” he asks a staff member. “Yes,” the staff member admits honestly.
The customers are clearly confused.
“If you had seen me bullying this burger, would you have said something about it?”, the staff member then asks several duped customers.
Without a doubt, one of the men yells, “Yes!”
The people in the above examples weren’t the only ones who came to return their burger. Of all the people who got the bullied burger, 95 percent walked back to the counter to speak up. How many people said something about the bullying? A much smaller percentage.
Only 12 percent of the bystanders spoke to the group of boys and stood up for the 15-year-old boy. “Are you okay?” is what a woman in the restaurant asks the boy.
To encourage him, she leaves her own table and joins the boy.
And just like the woman in the example above, there are several people who go to the group of boys and confront them about their behavior. “He doesn’t like it, so you should leave him alone.”
Fortunately, the guys in the Burger King turned out to be actors. With the Bullying Jr. Experiment, the fast food chain wanted to see which of the bystanders stood up for the bullied boy.
30 percent of all students and pupils worldwide are bullied. That has to change. Only by addressing each other can we put a stop to bullying, a message that Burger King would like to convey in collaboration with the No Bully association.