The second annual Pink Shirt Day is set to take place February 25. On that day, everyone, both young and old, is encouraged to wear pink as a means to bring awareness to the growing problem of bullying.

The genesis of Pink Shirt Day came from rural Nova Scotia where a 14-year-old boy was picked on for wearing a pink shirt on the first day of school.

Two older students decided to stand-up for their schoolmate; they purchased pink tops and distributed them to all the boys in the school. The next morning, 50 boys in pink huddled around the bullied teen in a show of support. The creative protest worked - the tormenters were silenced.

That small show of protest has turned into an event of vast proportions.

"This event has just taken off," says Dave Texeira co-founder and organizer of British Columbia’s Pink Shirt Day

"Last year we had over 128,000 sign up on Facebook. I think we will double that this year."

In B.C., it’s estimated that 10 per cent of students are bullied on a regular basis; 14 per cent of minority students have been bullied due to their race. While physical schoolyard bullying is easier to detect, it’s the subtle psychological bullying - the name calling, the excluding, the rumor mongering, the gossiping - that is often more prevalent and can have harsher long term psychological implications.

With the advent of communication technologies, face to face assaults have been progressively replaced by a pervasive online bashing. Savvy students are increasingly using Instant Messaging, e-mails, chat rooms, and social networking sites to bully their peers.

"It’s used to be that you would be at school and the bully would be at school and you could walk away from it," says Texeira.

"Now you can have this person virtually bully you as well. They text, email, or even put disgusting comments about you on a Facebook or MySpace page."

For more information about Pink Shirt Day and the issue of bullying please visit www.pinkshirtday.ca