They heard the words. Everyone gets picked on now and then. I suppose they didn't see the difference between the punishments meted out on me by strangers and those assessed in the home by them and my three younger brothers, who took their cues from mom and dad as well. If someone trespassed your boundaries, hit you, mauled your property, robbed you, or humiliated you, nothing was done to remedy the wrong. The only talking was the yelling, name calling, and the conversation that was hurried along to end the uncomfortable reality that something should be done.
Guns are really messy.
You can choke on your own puke. I was forced to return to school, because the option was yelling and beating, and I suspect I knew that I would suffer in the long run left without an education, even though I got little of that in public school as ignored and distracted as I was about who was going to fuck with me next. There were frozen days on the playground, where all were forced to go for an hour every day, unless it was pouring rain or snowing. Being lost in this crowd meant being out of eyeshot of any 'protective' adult types. Despite my pleas to my teachers to be allowed to stay inside and hide in the library, despite numerous efforts to feign sickness and sit in the nurse's office, I was shoved out the door into the arms of my most aggressive 'enemies'.