Hugh Jackman sends powerful message to schoolboy bullied for dwarfism: 'You've got a friend in me'
Quaden Bayles' mother shared footage of her son in tears to raise awareness of the consequences of bullying
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Your support makes all the difference.Hugh Jackman has shared a message of support to a nine-year-old boy who is being bullied because of his dwarfism.
Earlier this week, Quaden Bayles' mother, Yarraka, shared a video of her son in floods of tears after picking him up from school on Facebook in a bid to raise awareness of the consequences of bullying.
In the video, which has subsequently been viewed more than 17m times, Bayles can be overheard saying “I'm going to kill myself" and "I want to die".
After witnessing the emotional footage, Jackman posted his own video to the schoolboy on his Twitter account in which he tells Bayles, who has a type of dwarfism called achondroplasia, that he will always be his friend.
“Quaden, you are stronger than you know mate, and no matter what, you've got a friend in me,” Jackman said.
The Greatest Showman star also sent a message to the child’s bullies, saying that “life is hard enough” without people going out of their way to hurt others.
"So, everyone let's please be kind to each other, bullying is not OK,” he said.
“Life is hard enough, so let's remember, every person in front of us is facing some kind of battle, so let's just be kind.”
A number of other celebrities have shared their thoughts on the footage after it was shared on social media, including Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in Star Wars.
“The cruelty is as astonishing as it is heartbreaking,” Hamill wrote on Twitter.
The Walking Dead actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who plays Negan in the TV series, also shared a message of support, writing: ”My man, I don't know your name, I don't know your mum's name, but I saw your video.
“What I want you to know is that you have friends, me included. You haven't met me yet, but we'll see if we can change that for one.”
In the original footage, Bayles, who raises awareness about his condition in his home country of Australia, can be seen getting visibly upset after being picked on at school about his height.
During the clip, his mother says “this is what bullying does” before explaining that she has to “constantly keep my eye on him because of the suicide attempts”.
“So now we have a severely suicidal child who is sick of the bullying that is every single day that he attends school or is in public,” she said.
"It's every single f***ing day and we're sick of it."
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