UNDEFEATED world boxing champion Joe Calzaghe yesterday spoke of how his childhood was blighted by bullies.
Launching a charity that helps the victims of bullying, he said: "If it can happen to me, it can happen to anybody."
The Welshman, who retired last month unbeaten after 46 fights, said he was deeply affected by the bullying he suffered between the
ages of 13 and 14.
He said other children would gang up on him and call him names – even though he was a British amateur champion at the time.
The former world super- middleweight champion was speaking as the charity Beatbullying launched an advertising campaign for its new website, CyberMentors.
The social networking site, which is the first of its kind, is staffed by more than 700 youngsters, who offer advice to their peers about bullying.
Since it was launched on 3 March, the site has been visited by more than 23,000 young people. Hundreds of those who have sought help have admitted to having suicidal thoughts, or wanted to self-harm, as a result of bullying.
Calzaghe, 37, is the patron of Beatbullying. He said: "I was the world champion for 11 years. I was the best fighter in the world, but I was also somebody who was bullied – it just goes to show it can happen to anyone."
He went on: "My boxing was like escapism for me. If I was sad and down I would go to the gym, and it was a way of expressing myself, getting out the anger and all the feelings inside me.
"Although I felt pretty bad at school, when I was outside and winning titles I felt good."
"A lot of kids do self-harm and do kill themselves, and maybe if they had someone to talk to this wouldn't happen," the boxer added.
The new adverts will be posted on more than 1,000 billboards and bus stops across the country and will also feature in magazines and on websites.
Beatbullying said, in a survey of 2,000 youngsters aged between 11 and 18, as many as 56 per cent of them admitted being bullied online.
Methods included sending hurtful messages, spreading rumours online, as well as editing photographs and posting video footage of someone being bullied on the web.
Calzaghe said: "I've been through it myself. It's a very horrible thing to go through, especially as a child at school.
"Although I was British champion at the time, I was only about 5st 10lb, so you can imagine how small I was.
"A lot of the other kids who I didn't really know would gang up and call me names, and that happened for over a year."
He added: "It was a very tough time for me. I bottled a lot of it up inside.
"I went into a shell; my personality changed. I used to hate going to school."
He said the website allowed children to open up to each other online and get help, adding: "The last thing you want to do is hide it."
The charity trains young volunteers in secondary schools to act as mentors who can talk to bullying victims through chatrooms on the website, offering them an easy way to open up.
The full article contains 551 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
