I was bullied for practically all of my school life. I was even tormented by someone I thought of as my friend. It took me years to work out that people just don't behave like that in what we call normal society.

It can be difficult for a victim to recognise that they're being victimised.

It can be difficult to go against the crowd when everyone around you is against one individual.

It can be supremely difficult to judge what the right thing to do even is.

We absolutely, positively, desperately need more moral education in schools and at home. Not just "this is what our holy book says" but also, "this thing is wrong no matter what" or "this thing should be right".

And I recognise that formalising those rules is going to be tricky business, because we all have the baggage of yesteryear trailing along with us.

I learned to think about life inside other people's heads (possibly one of the reasons I'm a writer) and I can't fathom why nobody else learned about this. It's not that hard if you have an imagination. But then, I'm recognisably weird.