Research on bullying ridiculous

Once again, research dollars have been put to brilliant use, providing us with a scientific study that could have been authored by Captain Obvious.

A study conducted at the Center for Human Growth and Development at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor has concluded that fat kids are at a higher risk of being bullied than average-sized kids.

No kidding.

I often wonder about studies like this. It seems like every month there's a paper being published that tells people something they already know. I wonder how much money is wasted on this crap. I wonder how the authors of these studies could possibly think it prudent to waste time and money on them. Did the author of this study grow up home schooled or under a rock? Of course fat kids get teased by bullies. Everybody knows that, you moron.

Even if you did grow up under a rock and truly had no experience being bullied, being a bully or just observing them, you could still figure out the fat kid is going to be the best target by watching movies and television. "The Lord of the Flies," "Heavy Weights," "Angus," or anything with John Candy or Chris Farley in it would tell you that fat people are to be laughed at, whether they're funny or not.

I don't think this is going to be an issue for long, though, because the number of fat kids is skyrocketing in this country. According to KidsHealth.org, one in three American kids is now considered overweight or obese. One in three.

When I was growing up, I was the only fat kid in all of the schools I attended until about seventh grade. I can't help but feel I was born in the wrong generation. Fat kids these days have it easier because there are so many of them, and they're getting more plentiful every day. They have backup. They provide multiple targets for bullies, meaning they can hide while some other fat kid gets picked on. Or maybe the bullies have to start cycling through them on a weekly schedule to make sure they're all accounted for.

At any rate, if the obesity trend continues, fat kids will be more common than skinny ones. Skinny will be the minority, the abnormality. Will the tables turn? Will fat kids turn into the bullies for all the skinny kids? Why doesn't somebody do a study on that?

Regardless of whether fat kids take over the schools or not, there will always be teasing, name-calling and hurt feelings in our schools. Kids will always be teased because they're too fat, thin, ugly, poor or just plain stupid. And the ones branded as "bullies" are not the only culprits in school. They all do it. It's human nature for kids to establish a pecking order, and no amount of counseling or feel-good TV shows about expressing feelings and resolving conflicts through talking will ever change that.

Researchers, please stop wasting time and money on pointless studies that tell us things we already know. Go research something more important, and leave the fat kids to do their revenge plotting on their own.