At the end of the Broadway play “Camelot” King Arthur, facing the last battle he knows he will not win, encounters a young boy. He tells him, “Run behind the lines: Go to every town and village and tell the story of Camelot”, for he knew that as long as the story was alive, the dream of Camelot would still be alive.
At a time when our airwaves and cyber universe is filled with the likes of Justin Bieber, and Kim Kardasian, and Paris Hilton, and scores of other would be celebrity heroes, passing themselves off as pop culture icons and heroes; we need a Child of Camelot, running behind the lines, carrying the message that there is more to life, and there should be more to us. And maybe it begins with understanding who and what heroes really are.
Lizzie Velasquez was a gentle, little girl, born with a rare unnamed syndrome (one of only two known cases in the world) that didn’t allow her to gain weight. She is blind in one eye. Her face is drawn, her body emaciated; and at the age of seventeen, while looking for music on the Internet, she ran across a YouTube video naming her, “The Ugliest Woman in the World”. Over four million people saw it. Someone had posted it on the Internet; a bully–and it was a cruel moment that devastated her.
People posted comments like: “Someone should “kill her”. “Shoot her”. “Kill her with fire”. A gentle, sweet, innocent seventeen year old girl… labeled a “monster” all because of the way she looked.
On her first day at kindergarten she thought of herself as the same as any other kid; she could not see that she was different, but she would soon learn that even children can be cruel. On that first day she found many of the kids would not talk to her, or get even get close to her. They made fun of her, bullied her, tried to destroy her self esteem; cruelties that would continue throughout her life.
And that might have been the end of the story for most of us, causing us to crawl back in our shells and shut ourselves off from the rest of the world. But that Internet video of Lizzie, labeling her the “ugliest woman in the world”, changed her.
But you see being a hero is not just about being courageous: heroism is an act of “defiance”; of refusing to give up or give. It is refusing to be defined by one’s limitations, and a predilection to defy the odds. For many of us, heroes are the “Child” of Camelot, running behind the lines from village to village, telling the story of who we are, and more importantly, what we can become.
The strength of Lizzie’s voice and her message only grew. Inspired by her story a group called “Women Rising” invited Lizzie to do an interview on TEDx talk. The resulting talk went viral and the decision was made to make a full-length documentary. A Brave Heart: The Lizzie Valesquez Story. And the Women’s Rising CEO, Sara Hirsh Bordo, became the producer and director.
Today Lizzie Valesquez has achieved most of her dreams. She wanted to be a motivational speaker and her message of kindness, and hope, and strength has been heard by millions. She wanted to make a difference, and she has. She lobbied congress to pass a federal against bullying (which it did). And she graduated college with a degree in communications and a minor in English.
But it is important to point out that just as bullies are the result of people who have bullied them; there are likewise heros, often unseen, behind the hero we see. Heroes like Lizzie’s parents who refused to let their little girl be defined by her limitations; who taught her how to be strong, who sat in the audience as the documentary was screened, beaming with pride at the wonderful person their little girl had become.
They are heroes like Tina Meier who helped Lizzie to perfect her message, a mother herself, who lost her own thirteen year-old-daughter to suicide, the result of cyber bullying. Founding in her daughter’s name, the anti-bullying “Megan Meier Foundation”, in honor of her daughter.
They are heroes like TEDx for seeing and promoting Lizzie’s message; an organization that had the courage to take a chance and in so doing, gave Lizzie a chance to be heard. They are the Women Rising group and their CEO, Sara Hirsh Bordo who became the producer, director and driving force behind the documentary.
And they reporters like Beth Greenfield, Senior Writer of Yahoo Parenting who wrote the story that I read, that inspired me to write this blog.
We are all people who have been bullied, and we have all, at one time or another, been bullies ourselves– sometimes without even realizing it. Bullies aren’t limited to kids, we have them at every age. The first step in addressing bullying is to understand that we are all victims, regardless of which side we are on.
Activist laws are important, but in the final analysis, it will not be a change of circumstance that will turn the tide, it will be a change of heart. We need a Child of Camelot, running behind the lines, to help us find the kinder, gentler, and maybe even nobler angels of who we are; and when that happens the bullying will cease.
So I say to you Lizzie Valesquez, you are the Child of Camelot. Run behind the lines and tell your story to whoever will listen. Run—for those of us who cannot run. Run for those of us who don’t have your courage and your strength and your gentle spirit. Run–for all those who have given in, and given up.
Run for all of us. Run…Lizzie…Run.