Bullying Frenzy
There is something absolutely wonderful about hearing birds of all descriptions singing their bright, cheerful songs first thing in the morning, and all through the day. As I stand on my porch and listen to the various notes, I admit, I can’t identify all the different birds by their sounds; but I can enjoy the sounds just the same.
When our children were young, I bought bird books and had our binoculars handy because we had all sorts of bird feeders to entice the feathered singing creatures to our yard. We had house finches, orioles, robins, chick-a-dees and others I can’t even name. We also planted flowers and bushes that would tempt them to our area, per the advice of the given reading material.
As time passed and we kept reading, we discovered the advice, that feeding the birds, was not always a good thing. It makes them dependent on humans for food and caused them to no longer forage for food naturally. After that, we slowly began deleting the bird feeders and only fed them when the ground was totally snow covered or iced over.
It’s interesting to note that some birds seem to be ‘bully’ birds! The bigger black birds, and others will chase off the smaller ones and dominate the feeders just because they can! I’m left with the ‘bully birds’ eating the food while the smaller birds who seem to have no problem sharing, regardless of color or size, can eat for a bit, retreat, allowing for others to have a share, then flit back in to retrieve more morsels and sometimes find another limb to perch on to eat their prize.
I couldn’t help but giggle as a friend posted a picture and comment how the black birds had come and ate all the food she and her husband put out for the birds during the snowstorm we had over the weekend! Another person commented they had the same problem. We had only suet out this time, and while the black birds came early and did ‘bully’ the little ones for a while, I guess they weren’t impressed with the suet and left it for the others!
People are like that too. When you watch small children playing, you rarely notice any distinction of color or any other differences including disabilities. Yet when a larger child joins the group, it changes things. Disabilities seem to warrant an extra dose of hostility because those who are different, are easily more vulnerable.
A child with a bad limp, Down Syndrome, or other visible disability is a prime target of those who choose to be hostile. It seems like our culture is set on having on a ‘bullying frenzy’ when someone is different from us. It’s like we put them is a special box saying ‘it’s okay to pick on me; I’m different.” That’s such a bad perspective.
We are created uniquely different. Each of us have some weakness, but not all are exposed. I contend that those who have a visible difference, we consider a weakness, are just as special as a movie star, famous musician, author or other person considered great! In fact, some of those with a disability have gifts that outshine other people of supposed influence. They can be gifted musicians, singers, writers, artists and more.
Like those of us who choose to chase away the birds that bully the small ones, we should be diligent about pushing away and restricting those who would choose to bully the disabled. I contend they are superstars and deserve to be treated in that manner!
Photo Credit: https://www.dreamstime.com/photos-images/bird-feeders.html