Respect is learned by respecting | Natalia Gonsález | TEDxPitic
[Music] I could tell you that I have a simple, normal, ordinary life. I enjoy dancing, going out, like any young person. I enjoy my family, my friends, school. But more than anything, I feel somewhat special, and I think everyone must feel special at some point. But I have been reborn, reborn in a positive way, to help people, children who scream without anyone hearing them. And this wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for this: I suffered bullying for three years of my life. When I entered high school, I remember going in very happy. I expected many new things: new learning, having many friends, starting to go out, you know, the transition from child to teenager, etc. And unfortunately, it was n't like that. I ran into very difficult things. I was hit, insulted, used, abused. And I was excluded and labeled. I was the fat one, I was the ugly one, I was the nerd. I was practically alone. I remember once in a literature class, we had a rather special teacher. That time, the teacher was talking about the writer Gabriel García Márquez, back when we still had him with us, and she She said that Gabriel García Márquez was a Mexican writer and that he had already passed away. This was about two years ago, more or less. So I knew she was wrong and I mustered up the courage to raise my hand. So there at the end of the last row, you can see my small hand and the teacher yells at me, "What do you want, González?" Well, teacher, with all due respect, Gabriel García Márquez is a writer who lives in Mexico, but he was born in Colombia and he hadn't passed away yet. At that time, the teacher didn't take my comment very well and started yelling at me in front of the class while I was standing there, asking if I thought I was so smart, asking who I was to tell her, someone who had studied, someone who had a life, how to correct her. This caused the class to start yelling things at me too and demanding that I be kicked out of the classroom. I just sat down and stayed quiet until the teacher came over to my desk, leaned against it, and said, "I'm not afraid of you. You're nothing. You can't do anything to get me fired because I'm grown up and you're small." Hello, teacher. It hurt a lot because it didn't just happen once, but every day, and every day it was Three times, four times, I would get home and lock myself in my room and cry, cry all day, all night until I fell asleep. And when I woke up, it was almost daily torture to have to get dressed, get ready, and walk to a place where a part of me died every day. At that time, there were many children who I noticed also suffered from violence, but they didn't do anything, they didn't even try to... I don't know how to stay, to do something for themselves. Instead, they followed the bullies, you could say, and became part of them, joining the gang to be accepted and not be abused. Then I also had a problem with a boy whom I tried to help. I told him that in some way, no one has to suffer from this because we are all the same. We are all bones if we take away our skin and organs; we are all bones. Fat, thin, pretty, ugly, we are all the same, and we all feel pain. Unfortunately, the boy felt threatened, I think, by me because he knew that I was a strong person in front of the class. I didn't let them get away with it, I didn't talk back, I didn't hit them, but I was strong. I held on. It ended up with the boy saying that I was the one bullying him. That led to a lot of teasing, a lot of online mockery—practically all five: cyberbullying, sexual abuse, psychological abuse, verbal abuse, and physical abuse. I suffered it. My arm turned purple, like when meat rots and turns purple, yellow, and green. That's how my arm looked because it had been hit by a girl I thought was my friend. I tried to commit suicide [Music] three times. I couldn't take it anymore. I didn't want to be there. I really didn't see the point in going to a place to be hurt, and I really didn't understand why. On my last suicide attempt, which could have been the final one because there was the opportunity, the time, and the gun, I sat in a chair, closed my eyes, and started visualizing all the things that had happened to me: all those blows, all those insults, that time they touched my body without permission. But at the same time, I also remembered my mom's smile, my dad's smile, my brother's smile, the music, the food, the desserts, the beach, and I really could I realized that life is very beautiful, that yes, there are painful and difficult days, but they are worth living because there are more happy days full of opportunities for everyone. That day I washed my face and put a stop to everything because enough was enough, because I wasn't going to let myself be taken advantage of anymore. I spoke with my parents; I never lost communication with them, which made me feel heard. They changed my school, and there I was able to finish middle school. During my last four months of middle school, I met extraordinary people who lent me a hand and opened a piece of their hearts to me. I graduated and entered high school. And then I realized that I really wasn't alone. There are many children and young people who suffer from this type of violence, cases like mine, and worse cases. And unfortunately, there are young people and children who have committed the terrible act of taking their own lives. I grew up with this trauma; you could say that I really used it as a springboard. I was able to achieve several things, one of them being the child advocate for children's rights at the municipal level and then at the state level. All of this started when my mom showed me a call for applications that was in I've been working for the newspaper since I was 12, advocating for the rights of children and young people in Mexico. I won the Municipal Youth Music Award, which was one of my greatest achievements, you could say. At that time, I also had the opportunity to receive the State Youth Award in 2002, and my most recent award was the National Youth Award, presented last November by President Enrique Peña Nieto. All of this has made me realize that pain and fear are part of life, but it's something we must let go of. They really don't need it; they need to see beyond it. We need to know that we are not alone and that many people suffer, but we have the opportunity to help. We change; we change others. I started giving this talk to elementary and middle school children, and it was very moving because many children approached me to tell me that they too suffered from violence. They wrote letters where they described everything they felt and their pain that had been kept silent, and why they didn't feel free to talk to their parents. And it's true, it's very important that we don't... Let's not lose that humanity with people, and I know that if I ever die, which I know I will, I'm going to die happy because I haven't lived in vain. Because I've helped children have hope. I'm Natalia, and this is just the beginning. [Music]