:D

We are all adults here, and I think our perceptions come from the experiences we had as kids decades ago. I think things have changed a lot due almost entirely to Columbine. Schools take this shit very seriously now. At my kids elementary school they have a "peacemaker" program. They spend several hours each month going over core values and practicing conflict resolution. There is also a peer mediation program so kids can take conflicts to trained peers if they are afraid to take it to a teacher. Most importantly, the teachers take it seriously. They don't want bullying going on, so they work it out between students if they hear there is a problem.

It's still kids on a playground, but it isn't Lord of the Flies, like when I was a kid.

I saw a lot of bullying and did nothing about it because I didn't want the bullies to turn on me. That's probably the thing that bothers me most.

"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you... then you win."

Didn't we learn from the Breakfast Club that the bullies are just as damaged as those they bully? Isn't there a similarity to abusive relationships?

Yes they are. But we have a choice. I was bullied and beaten up often. But I never did it to anyone else.

No. We did not learn. As somebody said, if history teaches us anything, it's that we don't learn from history.

Unless they asked for it in juuust the right way?;)

No. It didn't make it ok. What I should have done was advise my friend to talk to her teacher, or indeed quietly talk to one of the teachers myself. What I did instead was serve up a very adolescent form of rough justice. I fed her the meal she'd been feeding my friend. It was the wrong thing to do. But, I, like her, was very young.

But that's my point Classic. People aren't setting up websites and engaging in a national debate in order to combat teasing, which I believe is what you thought was being referred to. They're trying to tackle a very real and destructive problem. It's something that affects a lot of people, and can have profound implications for their future happiness. Unfortunately there is a tendency within our culture(s) to look at bullying (of the kind I am talking about) and characterise it as teasing gone too far. It's not teasing gone too far it's a different animal altogether.

This subject winds me up a little. Not because I'm angry at stuff that happened to me as a kid. I'm not. BUt that kid and her family put their pain out there in order to try and empower youngsters coping with a very destructive force and I think they deserved a little more benefit of the doubt. I think that's what pissed me off. Our readiness to dismiss them. To mock them, even, as an instinctive response. With a lack of evidence (the ignorance you posit) our initial and instinctive assumptions are unkind and unsympathetic.

Umm...the message I took from that at the time was that being a Basket Case had mileage. It confirmed my own suspicions that the way to stave off bullying was to become a mental. Which I duly did.

huh....and to think....i went around taping all the nerds' butt cheeks together that year

lol jim

So you changed your behavior or self in some way, and the bullying stopped?

The bullying stopped when I kicked the shit out of Queen Hockey Bitch in the middle of an art class. But I'd already figured out people are less likely to want to fight you if they think you are dangerously unpredictable and suicidally reckless.

It doesn't say it is related to bullying but you have to wonder. Is this what we are coming to?

http://wcbstv.com/local/school.bans.hugs.2.969949.html

Thats where I was coming from.

Ya Bully Classic !!!!

That's because over hundreds, maybe thousands, of years, we've discovered it's the only thing that always works.
As you proved for the billionth time.

No I didnt prove it. Because that wasnt the first timei had faced down the bullies. It wasnt even the first time I'd faced down that particular bully. Facing down bullies didn't stop it happening. Not for most of my childhood.

What made that particular incident effective was that it was a vicious attack and took place in the middle of a classroom (I also accidentally punched the teacher who tried to intervene). I should not , as a 15 year old, have had to resort to beating someone bloody in order to buy myself a modicum of peace.

Actually, I didn't even beat her up to stop her bullying me. She'd started on my friend. And I had had enough.

The trouble is Classic, I think maybe you have a skewed view of what bullying is actually like. In particular with teenage girls. It's not crowding round you in the playground and stealing your lunch (though that happens) it's not waiting for you at the school gate and kicking the shit out of you (though that also is a part of it). With girls it's more subtle and destructive than that. It's a very social form of bullying with girls.

Social ostracism, jeers, taunts.. it's hard to substantiate beating someone to a pulp when all they've used against you is words.

I would have been expelled and kicked out of the house had I laid a hand on another student.

I've been thinking a lot about this, and remembering how cruel kids could be. There was a girl in elementary school who was picked on quite a bit. For even a few years after HS, she would call me because, as she told my mom, I was one of the few people who was nice to her.

Listening to your stories has opened up a side of the situation I had never really examined before, I guess. I do know that I had cruel moments, but I also remember many instances of being the one who stood up for people. Still, looking back, I wish I had done more.

Kids are kids. The problem is that adults need to be adults and know when to intervene and how to spot signs that a kid is in trouble. That applies both to bullied and bully. If it goes unchecked and the 'code of silence' prevails whlst young, then it sows seeds potentially for later bullying or aggressive and controlling behaviour in adulthood.

Learning how to interact and survive in groups is an important part of growing up and being human. But the environments in which we expect our young to acquire those social skills is quite an artificial one. 1200 kids gathered in one building, loosely grouped in 30s and 40s. It's very easy to get lost in there. As an adult I can walk away. A co-worker makes my life hell, a boss unreasonably focuses on my faults to the exclusion of others, the culture I find myself in doesn't really fit my personality...I can walk away. I have the ultimate sanction on any bullying behaviour in the workplace because I am not legally obliged to remain.


Wtf does a kid do? When they just don't fit into a 1200 strong community. What do they do, if a teacher hates them and keeps picking on them, what do they do if their classmates don't like them, or if they hate going into the building so much it makes them feel physically sick? What if they just can't get past the overwhelming rage they feel and theyre stuck with people who look down on them and call them stupid; maybe they keep getting into trouble, beating up on younger kids and have no idea why theyre doing it. Unless they have parents able and willing to homeschool them, or with the money and resources to try out different schools, they are stuck. Legally bound to be in a place where they are tormented.

If we as adults are expecting them to spend five years or more in an institution with no right to refuse or to argue for terms, we damn well have a duty to ensure they aren't undergoing huge psychological stress whilst there.

I was bullied briefly in the second grade. An asshole who should have been in third (I've always thought that coz he was way bigger than all of us) held out his hand and demanded my milk nickle. So I stabbed him through the hand with a pencil and then again in the back as he ran away.

Funny thing... we never saw that kid again. My mom had to come get me from school and whipped the shit outa me but I was back in school the next day. Never got bullied again. EVAH.

Cyber bullying is way different though in that you can't stab them with pencils online. But you can get your mod to run his IP address and help you locate him and THEN kill him. Or you could just turn your machine off.:eek:

backstabber!

In my situation the adults helped make me a target. A 6th grade teacher was an asshole to me, a 7th grade chemistry teacher slapped me hard across the face after I pushed my friend's books off the table, a 7th grade guidance counselor simply looked the other way. Adults don't protect victims just because they're adults. Sometimes they have the same bullying instincts as the kids do.

I stabbed one of my bullyers with a pencil in 7th grade. It had no effect.

Unfortunately that matches some of my experience UT. Games (PE) teachers were the worst for that, but I recall two other teachers who effectively sanctioned the bullying. For example: once I'd been ostracised by my entire year, I cuoldn't just enter a class and take a seat. Because of overcrowding issues, there were often too few places in a class and someone wuold have to tag themselves onto the end of a desk, making a two place desk into a three place desk. Each time I'd enter my French class I'd try and find somewhere to sit and at each desk I'd get hissed at "Fuck off, dont sit here" " Eww, dont sit here dirty bitch" (dirty = eczema). I'd be fretting and trying not to show it, trying to find somewhere where I am not being hissed at. The teacher on more than one occasion shouted at me to 'Stop fussing and find a seat". She cannot have been unaware. Id been ostracised for nearly a year and I know there'd been a crisis meeting between my teachers and parents.

Not unusual.

Teachers can make it worse by trying to help, too. In fourth grade I was sitting alone on the playground, as was usual and fine with me, and the teacher came up and wanted to know why I wasn't playing with the other kids. Well, the short answer was they didn't like me and I was happier being alone. Oh no, she insisted, that can't be true. She marched me over to the large group of popular kids and ordered them to stop ostracizing me and "let" me play with them. Yeah, that didn't have any unintended consequences as soon as her back was turned again, no sirree.

Nonsense, that's the only valid reason, and even if it doesn't stop that bully, others will think twice about piling on. Plus it feels so right.
Maybe because girls are more susceptible, they're sensitive to that social standing shit.
Mind over matter... if you don't mind it don't matter.
We social clods can't be socially bullied, gotta get physical with us. That eliminates a lot of the bullies from the git go, and provides the opportunity to stop a lot of the rest right quick. :D

The fucker shouldn't have run. I was going for his eye.:mad:

Something that seems to have gotten missed here in this discussion, is that bullying isn't about teasing, it isn't "all in fun," it isn't a game, it's about POWER and CONTROL, plain and simple. Bullies seek to humiliate others in order to gain power over them through FEAR and INTIMIDATION. You could say they are mini-terrorists, without the bombs. After all, they are tormenting people, causing them to feel terror.

It comes from a place of weakness in the bully, weakness of character, fear (they are probably being abused in some way themselves, or neglected), feelings of inadequecy. So in order to feel powerful, and fearless, and OK, they prey on others who are weaker. The really sad thing is, many times the ones who get preyed upon are not really weaker, they are just unprepared to deal with the situation because let's face it, kids aren't given the skills they need to combat that particular kind of cruelty.

While I was never bullied, there was this one retarded girl at my school that other people liked to bully. I always stood up for her. I always tried to shame the people who were bullying or making fun of her. I have always been that way. I also say shit to people when they litter. Or when people are cruel to animals.

I have to say though, a part of me has grown cold to the cruelty in the world. If it wasn't, it would break me. There is just too much of it out there, and nothing is being done about it.

Have you ever seen the show WEEDS? (Scene with Shane at his new school in the lunchroom. :D)

What kills me is, they KNOW who the bullies are, so why go to all the trouble of new rules that are stupid? Just KICK THE BULLIES OUT! Geezuz. It ain't rocket science.

Well said Dana. Adults ARE part of the problem. They seem oblivious to what goes on around them, and even the good ones (at least in this country) have no power to stop it, because of the dumbass rules we have in place.

And in actuality, it's worked pretty well so far, because if you really look at the issue, that is how the masses are kept under control. Fear and complacency.

You can only kick the bullies out if you have somewhere to kick them out to to. Chances are those are precisely the kids we most need to reach. Just kicking them out of the school isn't the answer. It stops them bullying the kids in that school but it does nothing to resolve the core issues. They're still kids. They're likely suffering a good deal of emotional or psychological pain and/or confusion. They're the ones who most need our attention and concern.

Well then, maybe there should be a special school for problem kids, so all the kids who are there to learn aren't distracted and abused while trying to get an education, and the bullies can get the special education and attention THEY need. I know we aren't dealing with the problem very well here in the states, at least in Savannah.

"The beatings will continue until morale improves."

Who's going to pay for this "special school"? I really don't want to spend another million dollars a year for every kid that needs a slap up side the head.

Just send them to an after-school program where xoB can give them "a slap up side the head". :lol2:

lol - ya bully!

Christ, do I have to do everything? Send them home to their parents, that's their job.

WWWWWWWHAT. THEFUCK. ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?

I didn't comment before because I thought maybe I misremembered what you looked like, and there's nothing more patronizing than telling a genuinely ugly person that they are not..... ....but no... you just posted this pic.... you are as cute as all get out.... and I am a non les-type who isn't into all the girly false compliment shit..... so shut up and listen....

Huge brown eyes to drown in, framed by eyebrows (note the plural -nowhere near a unibrow) that architects would die to design. Cheekbones plastic surgeons would use in their after ads... nose and chin so cute disney would design characters around them, and last -but by no means least- a smile that promises way more than any human has any right to expect to get. I'm not even going to start on the hair... much....but it ain't mouse and it knows it wants to be wavy. that rocks in my world.

SO SHUT THE FUCK UP ALREADY. (But still don't have babies unless you want them.)

I do feel your pain. It's only in the last 5 years -since I found the pictures of me -the fat nerdy bullied 16yo in the cerise bathing suit- and looked at them through my grown-up eyes, that I realised I wasn't actually fat then. i just believed the assholes who said I was. I was still a nerd with bad fashion sense -still am and am OK with that, but it's the fat thing that has always stuck with me and -damnit- turns out I wasn't. Turns out you're not ugly.

I agree with monster Pie. You are cute as hell. ;)

Word.

Amen to that. Yer hawt.

Well said Monster.

Oh, yeah. The Pie is babe-a-licious. I always said so.

(Well, ever since she first posted a picture)

Possibly. Here's what you said: "some folks are out there LOOKING to be victims. just sayin'"

The subtext I heard was "... so they deserve whatever they get."

If that's not the statement you intended to make, then I'm confused as to why you brought up the point.

Because I try to act ethically and I speak out against unethical behavior? Does that equal stuck-up to you?

I don't think it is possible to overestimate ethical behavior. It is the basis for trust.

I think you should think about why you heard a subtext that isn't there. "Deserve whatever they get" is a judgment and not what we're talking about at all. Acknowledging the roles we play in the events in our own lives isn't about judgment, it's about learning, growing, being safe etc...
I can believe that rape is bad and rapists are always at fault and still teach my daughter that she is responsible for her own safety.

If you only address half the problem, you're gonna get a half-assed solution (see Mercs article).

I admit that I have a sensitivity to the subject having been bullied in HS, but I think it was natural to read that subtext into Jims post. After reflection, I realized that I had read that into his post.

I am still confused, however, by just why he would post that. Do you and Jim believe that this is the most common scenario? That bullies pick on those who set themselves up to be bullied? I don't buy that. It may occur, but I'd be willing to bet it is a very small percentage of the cases.

If you think that each person can (on their own) deter being bullied, then you are mistaken. Some of us are smaller or fatter or weaker.

I didnt like his statement either considering the topic, but I read it a little differently than you did, dar. I thought he was characterizing the site - how people are there to play up their victim status.

so you heard what you expected to hear, and assumed my intent. I already clarified this point, but once more.....SOME people are looking to play victim. as for why I brought it up....it was because the victim DOES play a role in bullying.....and no one had mentioned that yet. hence.....discussion. until you began casting personal aspersions about. yes you...

jinx pointed out something interesting to me...

notice how all of the people that have said they were bullied have lashed out inappropriately at one person or another? sheldon is glad someone is DEAD? wtf?



no...it's not because of WHAT you say...it's HOW you say it. condescending tone that implies your superior sense of honor......constantly. and what behavior of mine was unethical in this thread? I have been making an effort lately to NOT bully or personally insult people unless they go first. you have not noticed this, i expect.....



i agree with that.

Not me. But I think this is the fundamental problem with bullying--in most cases, I think the bullies honestly don't understand the torment they're inflicting. Yes, they know they're deliberately hurting someone, but they can't conceive of what it really feels like. So when someone who has been bullied expresses (or acts on) a desire to inflict equivalent pain, bystanders are shocked at the viciousness, because they fundamentally can't relate to the amount of pain the bullied victim is in.

i don't know about that either....i think a lot of bullies have been or are being bullied themselves.

here's a question......

for those of you that were bullied all throughout school....was it the same bully the whole time? or were there a series of bullies?

One bully, from sixth grade up through senior year. Before she came along I was already a big nerd and not very well liked in general, but she was the only one who made me (and later several of my friends) miserable. And what's more, she encouraged her closest group of friends to be far meaner than they were before she showed up.

I believe I've mentioned here before that summer camp was my sanctuary. At summer camp I was popular, because there were no grades and no one had to know what a big smarty pants I secretly was. It had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with the environment we were put in.

I've remained quite a while here to try and get a grasp upon what you all are trying to express. I was in some less than cool clubs in school. I didn't have any friends that I know of who were bullied nor was I to the degree that you folks seem to have been. I certainly wasn't any more popular then than I am here on teh Cellar.

I never equated bullying with the vicious harassment that most of you do. I always looked at it more like teasing. This is a completely different and foreign reality to me.

It was more of a group bullying situation... tag team if you will. ("Hey, I'm kinda tired today, you wanna take care of Steve for me at recess?" "Sure thing, bud, take it easy.")

I guess maybe I remind dar of the guy or guys that bullied him?

I must admit, I got a similar impression to Dar's from your original comment on victims, Lj. I'm glad that wasn't what you meant, and clearly it's something that could be taken to mean a number of different things.

Have you considered that rather than reminding anybody of bullies they may or may not have encountered, your comments instead appeared to belittle the problem of bullying and place responsibility for that bullying onto the victim instead of the bully. That you did not necessarily mean that doesn't change the fact that a number of people read it that way. Mainly people who'd experienced bullying. Not because they're super sensitive to being bullied, or that they considered you to be like the bullies, just because it's a kick in the teeth to have something so fundamental belittled and your experience of it disparaged. Intentionally or not.

Oh yeah I was also bullied briefly as a Senior in college, by some guys in my dorm hallway. That one never made any sense to me. I was willing to fight back, at that point I was not victimizable. But I would have been murdered in hand-to-hand combat with the guys doing it. So after about four ridiculous incidents, I fought back with a BB gun, spring loaded, looked like a hand gun. That only made them madder, until one guy actually threatened to kill me with a baseball bat, I mean bat in hand headed for my door, and had to be talked down. At that point everything stopped.

In the semester that followed, three things got most of the guys actually into my favor.

One was that I smoked the highest quality weed they'd ever had, and I would talk at length with them about bong additives. They were convinced that milk was the ideal bong water, because it made the smoke smoother. I pointed out that the fats in the milk would leech some of the THC from the smoke. They were happy to receive this tip. I was happy not to have to deal with the unusual stink combination of bong water plus spoiled milk.

Two, after they egged my door, I repainted it... with the address on the door written in huge letters in spray paint. It looked somewhat ghetto, but memorable. "I live at 100 Mohn Hall." "Oh! You're that guy!" The housing director liked me, so I never caught any shit for it.

And three, one day they were golfing with a nine-iron in the corridor. With a real golf ball. I came out and asked - "What are you guys doing?" They replied, "We're carpet golfing." I came back with "Well, always remember to replace your divots." and turned around and closed the door.

They loved that. Although they never did replace their divots.

Well there is teasing, and there is bullying. They are really two completely different things, although they may overlap some.