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Letter reveals bullies drove Tim Winkler to suicide
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by sweet east pearl | August 13, 2008 at 01:15 am
566 views | 7 Recommendations | 4 comments
Sadly, some students are so traumatized by being bullied that they become very depressed. Miserable and unable to communicate their dilemma to anyone, they feel their situation is hopeless and sometimes commit suicide.
BULLYING victim Alex Wildman was the second teenager at a NSW high school to take his own life after being targeted by cruel students.
In an eerily similar tragedy it has emerged that 15-year-old Tim Winkler committed suicide after he too was hounded by bullies over several months.Like Alex, Tim was an unhappy student at Kadina High School, in Lismore on the Far North Coast, and had been bullied over a long period.
Both boys shared a strong interest in motorcycles but were unable to cope with their tormentors and killed themselves, leaving shattered families and friends.
Yesterday Tim's family launched an impassioned plea to stop bullies from "destroying" more lives.
His mum Rhonda Winkler contacted lawyers acting for Alex Wildman's family offering to help their campaign against bullying.
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (4)
at 03:19 on August 13th, 2008
at 15:27 on August 15th, 2008
sweet east pearl, I like this story. It's good stuff.
OK it has been many years since I was in a high school classroom but either bullying is MUCH worse or kids are just mentally weak these days. We, like all schools, had bullies. Some kids would get picked on, beat up and generally harrassed but NO ONE committed suicide because of it. I think part of the problem is the way parents try to shield their kids from anything unpleasant these days. Kids gotta face adversity to build self-esteem and mental toughness. Try to keep everythrng unpleasant from kids and this is what happens.
at 02:50 on August 16th, 2008
eastvanray has obviously never been subject to the ammount of bullying these young boys went through. parents can only do so much to sheild there children from this problem..but if parents aren't there to offer love and support who else can these kids turn to? this school has alot to answer to so much for the education systems anti bullying pollicy!
at 08:35 on August 16th, 2008
Bullies are like germs and viruses....kids need to be exposed to some of them so they build "immunities" to them. Life can be tough and being "shielded" is not going to produce survivors. I faced my fare share of bullying in school and I have the scar tissue to show for it. I also have the survival skils to go with them. Parents have to support their children not dhield them. Help to make them strong not prevent them from challenges and failure. Bullies also need to be punished so that their behaviour can be modified. No one in the city I grew up in (over 1 million population at the time) ever killed themselves over bullies. Something else is going on here.