
At Last, Facing Down Bullies (and Their Enablers) - robg
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/09/health/09klas.html
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jswinghammer
I'm not sure what this would actually accomplish. I've been seeing articles
lately where bullies are just ignored by schools even when repeatedly reported
by parents. It seems like universal advice on this topic is unreasonable to
begin with. I recall in high school where the school would only get involved
when something too big to ignore came up like some kid getting thrown through
a window or something (this happened twice). I think the only advice I could
give a child going through this is to fight back and fight back hard even if
that means more short term pain. I don't think this is necessarily good advice
but it might be the only option when the schools ignore these problems as a
matter of de facto policy. Of course you could always home school and avoid
this problem entirely :)

~~~
tptacek
What's the value in teaching children how to respond physically to low-grade
physical violence? It's not valuable in adult life. Corner a coworker at your
office, shove them, stick a finger too close to their face while raising your
voice: you're fired. Is your boss dumb enough to let it go, or worse,
participate? Guess what: when employees sue, you lose, _no matter what_.

Why should my kids waste a moment's time trying to handle violence and
physical intimidation on their own? That's teaching them to handle problems
with both hands tied behind their back. I want my kids handling problems
smart, and "fighting back" and standing up to bullies on their own terms is
playing to lose.

There is all sorts of low-grade kids-stuff nonsense that doesn't need to be
escalated. But we're not talking about that here. We're talking about kids who
are so persistently targeted and oppressed by this juvenile bullshit that
they're considering withdrawing from academic programs.

Fuck that shit. If my son tells me he's quitting band because he's getting
pushed around over it, I am going fucking ballistic.

(For whatever it's worth, both my kids spend a good chunk of their
discretionary time in martial arts. But they're doing that on its own merits,
not as a tool to deal with behavior that would be _overtly criminal_ if it
occurred between adults.)

~~~
JabavuAdams
> What's the value in teaching children how to respond physically to low-grade
> physical violence? It's not valuable in adult life.

It's very valuable in playground life, though. The value is that they prevent
future low-grade violence by engaging in a bit of low-grade violence
themselves.

> I want my kids handling problems smart, and "fighting back" and standing up
> to bullies on their own terms is playing to lose.

Nonsense. It works really well, in my experience. The playground is not like
an office, so your extrapolation to adult behaviour doesn't apply. Teenagers
are nearly adult physically, but still unformed mentally and
ethically/morally.

> Fuck that shit. If my son tells me he's quitting band because he's getting
> pushed around over it, I am going fucking ballistic.

How's that going to help him? If he knows that you'll react that way, he
likely won't even tell you, and the bullying will continue, in secret.

Here's what I'm going to tell my daughter:

1) No one has the right to attack you. If you are attacked, and you can fight
back, do it! If the odds are not in your favour, try to flee to a safe area /
allies. Don't worry about suspension / expulsion, etc. I will back you up.

Try to keep the violence proportional, unless it's a do or die situation. I.e.
shoving vs. shoving, punching vs. punching, don't use improvised weapons
unless they do. OTOH err on the side of survival.

2) If anyone ever threatens serious violence, like rape or death threats, tell
me. These are not joking matters. It doesn't mean we'll go ape-shit and over-
react, but we need to know it's happening in order to figure out whether it's
a real threat.

3) If you're being bullied electronically, then tell us, but never ever react
to the bully. Don't feed the troll. If the person can't actually reach out and
physically hurt you, don't give them anything to work with.

If you teach your kids to never respond to violence with violence, you're
setting them up to be bullied, which will affect them throughout their lives.
Authority figures can't always (and often won't) save you. Sometimes you need
to fight first and ask questions later.

~~~
tptacek
Proportional violence is a great way to get your kids in the same kind of
trouble a bully is bound to get into. It also perpetuates the problem for kids
who unavoidably cannot respond in kind to these situations, so that's an
outcome I'm happy with.

I'm happy your kids can handle themselves in a physical confrontation. My
son's big for his age, and my daughter has really taken to her martial arts
classes, so I have high hopes for them too. But if I found out that my kids
were responding to low-grade violence by engaging in it themselves, they'd get
punished.

~~~
run4yourlives
The "trouble" that schools can dish out is nothing to the "trouble" life will
dish out.

The law doesn't punish you for defending yourself, why the hell would you
expect your kids to live to a standard that nobody else is subjected to?

~~~
tptacek
For two reasons:

(1) Because regardless of whether the standard is fair, in real life, off the
playground, violence is as likely as not going to break against my kids as it
is to break for them. This "standing up and fighting the bully" mythology is
exactly that. The outcomes are simply better if you avoid violence and use the
other tools at your disposal.

(2) Because some standards are intrinsically correct, regardless of what the
law allows.

~~~
run4yourlives
Well, I think it's evident that we fundamentally disagree on the action of
physical violence. Simply, I believe your views, while commendable are
impractical. I know that you perhaps feel mind are barbaric.

Are you Buddhist by any chance? Just curious.

~~~
tptacek
Nope. Catholic. Also, at times an unrepentant vicious asshole. I just think
violence is usually not the most pragmatic response.

~~~
run4yourlives
Well, we'd agree on that then.

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TallGuyShort
I was bullied a lot when I was little, and when my parents complained to the
school, it only got worse because the school handled it very publicly.

As much as I hated it, the bullying turned me into a stronger person, and made
me more aware of how I came off to others. I'm now very successful in what I
do, and it's partly because I focused on excelling in my field, but also
because I focused on improving my social skills. Although being a bully is a
sign you have a social problem, being the victim made me aware of my own
shortcomings, and I worked to correct them.

~~~
tptacek
Getting shoved and pushed around by drunk assholes outside your apartment
building every evening when you get home from work would probably also teach
you to be a stronger person who could keep a level head under physical threat.
But that situation, which parallels your school experience, unquestionably
involves repeated criminal assault and battery.

The mere fact that it is possible to draw life lessons from bullying does not
mitigate it.

~~~
TallGuyShort
Oh not at all - I didn't mean that it should be left alone. What I mean is
that there should be more emphasis on helping the victims grow from and
overcome the experience, instead of just trying to prevent it altogether. The
author of the article does touch on that, but I think it's generally absent
from the minds of most people.

"He's getting bullied at school". "Oh - have you called the school?"

I'm not saying people should be complacent, I'm just saying that helping the
victims is probably more important than other solutions. In my case, I always
reacted the wrong way to bullying. I think that if I hadn't reacted the way I
did, bullying would've stopped.

~~~
tptacek
Why should we teach people how to expend effort to overcome problems they
shouldn't be confronted with in the first place? If somebody assaults you, you
should press charges.

~~~
run4yourlives
One would hope that most people understand that life is slightly more complex
than that.

Negative situations are a part of life. They make us who we are. Even if we
could eliminate bullying entirely, we would also eliminate all of the valuable
lessons that a child learns from the experience. This is not to suggest I
support bullying at all; you don't learn how to ride a bike without falling,
and you don't learn confidence and action without being challenged.

~~~
tptacek
You _can't_ learn to ride a bike if you're afraid of falling. You _can_ and
_must_ be able to attend school, even if you're afraid of physical violence.

~~~
run4yourlives
I think you missed my point.

------
bobochan
I have pretty awful memories of bullying, fights, etc. from growing up and the
tyranny of the schoolyard pack. I had visions of those scenarios when my own
kids started public school but I’ve been very impressed with how the school
has made creating a good environment a top priority. A couple of things that
really impressed me:

1\. At the first meeting the principal said that he wanted to know if a kid
was having trouble fitting in, making friends. Creating a good environment
where kids enjoyed coming to school was obviously a priority at the top of the
organization.

2\. In addition to all of the classic recess games like kickball and four
square, the school put out some chess sets and got toys for the sandbox so
that kids had alternatives. There was a playground rule, “can’t say can’t
play” that instilled the notion that games were open to everyone.

3\. Counselors entered the classrooms early to talk about things like conflict
resolution at a level that the kids could understand.

This approach seems light years ahead of what I remember as a kid. In short, I
agree that schools can be very effective at eliminating bullying if it is a
priority.

------
ixnu
My son could have been the subject of the article. In 4th grade, he was
constantly harassed by a single bully on the bus and in class. Unsurprisingly,
all the cliches held: the bully had been in fights with most of the boys on
the bus; the school was completely unresponsive to requests for intervention;
and the parents of the bully didn't care.

For the first time, I forced my son into an activity - martial arts. After a
few months, it gave my son the confidence to stand his ground against his
tormentor and fight back. Again, unsurprisingly, my son served his first, and
the bully his fifth, suspension for violating the "zero tolerance" for
throwing fists in school. It was a great life lesson about fairness. He has
not had a problem since.

Most kids, esp boys, will be bullied at some time, but I shuddered at the
thought of my son being the constant target every year.

~~~
run4yourlives
_He has not had a problem since._

Key phrase in your comment.

------
pasbesoin
I experienced a strong case of PTSD and low self-esteem as the result of an
extended period of quite pernicious and malicious bullying. In my case, the
principal bully -- the leader of a pack who all engaged in the bullying -- was
the son of a higher level school official; some of the school staff saw it
occurring but took no action, I speculate out of fear of retribution.

For my part, I was also confused and frustrated by the situation. I had no
desire to fight the fellow, and I didn't understand where this aggression was
coming from. I also literally didn't know how to fight. No one ever taught me
even the basics.

The psychological impact was strong enough that I will live with it, to some
extent, for the rest of my life.

My recommendations to a parent or mentor would include:

\+ Ensure the child is trained in self-defense. I will not allow any child of
mine to be without such training. The purpose is not to become aggressive and
controlling of others. It is to learn to remain centered and in control of
oneself, and hopefully in control of the situation. At least in control of
one's reaction to it.

\+ Understand that, per my limited reading, bullying _is_ an _effective_
social strategy. Perhaps that may change as society evolves, but it has and
does serve the purpose of promoting the bully and gaining them certain
rewards. Not that the bullying is necessarily a conscious, pre-meditated
decision with such rewards as the known and expected outcome. However, it is
not a purely pathological social aberration. As such, it is something that
will appear and that will need to be addressed. Saying it is "wrong" and
"unfair" does not help the victim in dealing with the situation. Creating a
social structure that aids the victim while mediating the bullying does.
However (again), the individual cannot count on others always fostering such a
social structure. The individual needs to be able to take care of themself.
From that standpoint, they may then also be in a position to help foster a
social environment that mediates against bullying.

\+ Modern society seems to me to have created a bit of a "Lord of the Flies"
situation. Many parents' daily lives are so separated from those of their
children. Kids spend 8, 10 hours away from their parents in social
environments that are strongly weighted towards their peer group, with limited
participation by teachers, coaches and such as supervising adults. An entire
subculture develops largely independent of broader society. Kids can end up
very vulnerable within this. And the culture's message and influence is often
to _not_ communicate problems to adults. This reinforces the isolation of the
victim.

~~~
kirse
_I experienced a strong case of PTSD..._

Sounds like this guy was full out abusing you rather than just "bullying" you?
I got occasionally pushed around in school and dished it out myself, but it
was hardly bad enough to cause shell shock and extreme psychological trauma
years later.

~~~
JabavuAdams
Don't dismiss him so lightly. There's a huge difference between infrequent
bullying and sustained bullying. As you say, sustained bullying is abuse (in
its modern sense), though we often use the words interchangeably.

Imagine that you're in a situation where you're thrown together with people
who if they even see you will try to do something nasty to you. Now imagine
that happening every day, for years.

I can see how it would change someone.

------
dhimes
A website about the actual prevention program:
<http://www.clemson.edu/olweus/>

~~~
dhimes
perhaps better: <http://www.olweus.org/public/index.page>

As you can see, the program is for sale.

~~~
tptacek
That doesn't call the original work into question, if that's what you're
implying.

~~~
dhimes
+1 for alerting me to a possible misinterpretation of my comment.

I was curious why there wasn't a real description of the solution to the
bullying problem in the article, so I followed the trail back to the
originator. Turns out he's a bit entrepreneurial in using the model of
business to bring his solution to the masses, and probably (I hope) allow him
to better refine the solution as he goes. I'm trying to do the exact same
thing.

What struck me is that it seems plausible to me --and I'm fantasizing here--
that this story was suggested/planted/encouraged by his company as a PR move.
This is what we should all be doing, and if he did it then he did it very
well.

