I don't necessarily disagree with the original article or this sentiment. However, I have a hard time reconciling telling your child to stick up for him or herself when bullied vs "send him to the cemetary" or "As soon as he turns around, hit him in the back of the head as hard as you can. If you’re much smaller, pick up a hard object and do it."
These are children and their judgement is not always the best. Do you really want to risk that your child kills another child by accident while following your advice?
Will your child know how far is far enough? Is there a chance he or she might over-react to a situation that is not truly threatening?
I really think you are just playing semantics here. The quote wouldn't be nearly as effective if it read:
"Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, hurt him just enough so that he leaves you alone - but don't kill him."
The quote is fine. I worry about this glorification of violence. The original article and this thread seem to be filled with adolescent fantasies of revenge against bullies past and future.
I hope this is mainly internet posturing and bravado.
I'm not sure every child has the perspective to recognize hyperbole. There are times when violence may be necessary, but that doesn't make it any less horrible, whether justified or not.
Yes, that is a problem. It is one reason I don't advise kids (that I talk to about such problems) to take this approach.
One thing I actually disliked about the post is the way he has de-humanised bullies. When in reality the correct approach is to feel sorry for them - because they have all manner of deep seated issues. Not in a lovey-dovey way (which, he is right, is silly) but in an adult comprehending way.
The act of your violence is a potential learning experience for them too. Too much vitriol and anger and they may come away harbouring deep resentment, and later come back at you with escalating violence. But a short sharp shock could teach them some important truths.
For the most part, the really bad bullies I suffered at school are already failures in adult life. With the one exception of another bully who also got beaten up (not by me) late in the school system - he was dramatically changed after that and is currently one of the nicest and most successful adults I know (although there were other factors swinging in his favour).
So sympathy, but not hippy-love. Violence, but not retribution.
The "glorification of violence" is too intellectual a concern. It's an idea balancing precariously at the top of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
It's unfortunate that violence is sometimes necessary in school, but it is because bullying isn't taken seriously by the administration. Bullies spend all their time making trouble, so they get good at doing psychological damage and flying under the radar of authority. But the damage they are doing is potentially severe. Bullies usually have severe problems at home, and I feel bad for them, but they mustn't be allowed to spread their self-loathing virally by means of systematic low-grade abuse to anyone who is an easy target (ie. the weird ones, the free thinkers, the people who don't conform, and thus are more likely to bring something new to the world when they grow up).
If administrators took this more seriously and started expelling these kids, then that would get the attention of their deadbeat parents, and violence would not be necessary. However in reality, school is like prison, and sometimes violence is the answer.
Do you think the bullies know how far is far enough?
Bullying escalates. If you don't trust your kid to make a judgment at some point, it's basically a matter of time before they get seriously injured themselves.
I'd rather teach my kid to stick up for himself and have the mistakes happen at the level of "knocked out tooth/broken finger" than letting things escalate in the first place.
So your kid gets beat up. Then your kid beats up the bully. Then the bully comes back with a knife the next day. Or a gun.
Bullying does escalate. Therefore, teaching your kid to escalate on their side as well just makes it happen faster. The solution to escalating warfare is to break the cycle.
The point is that it only escalates when it's not deterred. "Break the cycle" is a platitude, not advice. What is involved in breaking this cycle, if not stopping the bullies?
The bullying cycle is this: bully on day #1 -> bully on day #365...repeat. I have witnessed people in school be bullied and them just ignore/deal with it politely and it didn't work for them until they freaked out and fought back.
If your kid actually wins the fight, it humiliates the bully, then there's a risk that it will escalate.
If your kid just gives the bully a few bruises but ultimately loses the fight then they've sent the message that they're not an easy target, and the bully has saved face.
Bullying is typified by a victim being picked-on mercilessly because he never fights back. Because the bullying tears him down. Because the bullied is a victim.
Bullying isn't a contest for the bully. They do it precisely because it isn't. They're not trying to 'win', they're trying to make someone else feel as bad as they feel. If they can't do that, because the victim refuses to be victimized, they find a new victim or find a new outlet.
> However, I have a hard time reconciling telling your child to stick up for him or herself when bullied vs "send him to the cemetary" or "As soon as he turns around, hit him in the back of the head as hard as you can. If you’re much smaller, pick up a hard object and do it."
The second one no, but the second one is mostly an exaggeration for "don't be the one who starts fights, but be the one who ends them". Cemetery is probably a bad idea as it'll breed revenge, but going at it until they are physically unable to fight back is probably a good idea.
If you don't want the other side to escalate, take it there first and do it fast. If you are truly worried about escalation, then by induction, all fights are fights to the death because beating the bully "just enough" will lead to the bully coming back with more firepower. Lather, rinse, repeat until firearms are involved.
So, you over-compensate. You do everything within your power to kill him and hope someone can stop you or they run away. If you don't take shit from anybody, people will stop trying to give it to you.
"In 1965, after breaking with the Nation of Islam and denouncing its separatist doctrine, Malcolm X told his followers that the Nation of Islam under Elijah Muhammad had made agreements with the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan that 'were not in the interest of Negros.'"
She was doing an essay on Malcolm X, these fellas attended one of his conventions. The one in the middle threatened to make a lantern out of her (Arnold is Jewish).
In her later interviews she mentioned that many people get really upset when they see this photo, and exhibition curators often objected to its inclusion.
OK, but you don't object the supremacist part? Good, we are on the same page.
Um ...
She was doing an essay on Malcolm X, these fellas attended one of his conventions.
While remaining agnostic to your point, it's troubling that you keep citing references that don't support it. The caption on that photo makes no reference to these Nazis being in attendance at a Malcolm X rally.
This advice fails when it suggests to pick up something hard and hit a boy in the back of the head with it. That could lead to serious injury and I think would likely do serious long term damage to both young people's lives.
I'm sold on the fight back attitude, but not with that level of danger. And that is the problem with the whole fight back attitude in general. You can teach it, but you must also teach respect for human life and how easy it can be to seriously damage somebody permanently.
"This comment will be controversial, especially for North Americans and Western Europeans."
No not really. It will perhaps offend the bizarre establishment that has invaded school administration. However, this is bully repulsion 101.
If the system doesn't protect you, you must find a technique that does. Would we avoid school shootings,etc, if we taught our kids to stand up for themselves, don't let yourself get bullied? Real self respect vs the artificial "everyone's special" of today's thinking?
Sidenote: Why is this behavior (bullying) tolerated in school? What other part of our culture accepts bullying as "part of growing up" or "just the way it is?"
In Maharashtra(India), laws penalize 'ragging' - a ritualized form of bullying freshmen in the first month of college.
Earlier, ragging led to a few suicides, which in turn prompted the passing of the law. It does occur however; I have been ragged myself. Personally though, it didn't affect me as much as I feared it would.
If we accept that "loving the bullies" is a sign of weakness that encourages more bullying, allowing the school to intervene is a sign of extreme weakness that encourages even more bullying whenever kids are out of sight of authority figures.
The problem seems to stem from the fact that bullying occurs out of sight of authority figures regardless, and that when children report it they're basically told to suck it up.
I agree that children should learn to handle confrontation for themselves, but at the same time when there are chronic offenders there needs to be repercussions. If a bully picks on a kid and they fight back, the bully will move on to the next kid. If he keeps doing it, take him out of the system, expel him from school, or (optimally) find him some way of acting out his aggression, anger, etc. in a more productive manner.
'Fighting back' would soon reduce the school to anarchy outside of the presence of a teacher, but telling kids to deal with it and shrugging it off as 'part of growing up' just encourages the bullies by teaching them that they can do whatever they want, as long as they don't get caught.
In high school I was told my the assistant principal to "Deal with it" when a bully was stealing stuff, like my TI-86 calculator, from my locker. A few weeks later I ended up getting in a physical fight with him which resulted in me getting suspended. When asked why I did it, which I fully admitted to hitting first, I would only reply that the assistant principal told me to.
This question ate me in elementary school. I knew that the teachers & staff KNEW who the bullies were and who were the bullied. But they did nothing, and all of their punishments would give equal blame to both parties.
If there was actually unequal punishment then you'll get a lot more "he started it!" kind of arguments, kids will lie to get whatever they want.
And at the same time, I realize looking back on school is that the teachers & admins in public school aren't that bright. As a group they're the poorest-performing college students.
When I'm a father, maybe I would rather have equal & consistent punishment for both parties, rather than some crappy teachers trying to decide who did what.
Why is this behavior (bullying) tolerated in school?
They're just children. They're not going to pay you. They're not going to vote. Their parents aren't actually the ones getting kicked (WOW would you see a different scenario in that case). It's easier to write it off as "childish" and do nothing. And if you actually sided with a child, there would be loss of status from affiliating with such a low-prestige person.
Same reason society tolerates rape in juvenile prisons. Same reason textbooks and teaching are so uniformly awful. Children have no power, and there's nothing to be gained politically or socially from siding with someone who can't side back.
Probably has more to do with the parents. Kids that end up as bullies don't come from extremely loving and/or close-knit households (for the most part). The parents will likely put up a huge, "You're picking on my kid; don't tell me how to raise my kid" type argument.
> Sidenote: Why is this behavior (bullying)
> tolerated in school? What other part of our
> culture accepts bullying as "part of growing
> up" or "just the way it is?"
There is a huge, "I went through it and survived and so will you"/"I had to endure it and so do you"/"it builds character"/etc attitude that extends beyond bullying (or even the education system).
It's important to the train the unwashed masses to give up their lunch money to the bullies when they embezzle the entire country's capital structure and need another hit of finance-o-crack.
Why is this behavior (bullying) tolerated in school?
My theory is denial. Parents of bullies don't want to admit that their kids are doing wrong, and the parents of victims don't want to face the fact that they need to get involved.
That was my situation, at least -- even with known bullies... when I finally fought back, I got dragged to the principal's office... and I let him have it. Another rarity is that my parents actually backed me on that one.
I have never quite figured out how I'd teach my kid this. I never had to deal with violent bullies myself (even though I was totally a geek, I kind of made friends with skaters and druggies etc, and I later heard a lot of them respected me) so I have no life-experience with fighting back.
Only time things ever came to blows, the other guy (who struck first) was 8-10 years older than me, muscular and a good 2-3 feet taller, and that is a fight you do NOT fight.
Ah, but it doesn't apply to the business world, that's the thing. What makes school bullying viable is that nothing you do matters---the effect of everything you do is delayed twelve years. Everyone progresses at the same rate through the institution, in spite of high or low performance. So if no one's going to outrace you (and even if they did, it would only be academically, which no one cares about it in k-12), there's no real penalty for becoming some poor kid's private nightmare.
Not so much in the business world (and especially tech); while you're busy engaging in a dogfight with Joe Competitor, some third company is kicking your trash by spending money on R&D rather than winning a marketing/feature war. So it generally makes sense to avoid direct confrontation, because it slows you down.
I liked this post until he started talking about fighting the Chinese mafia and jump kicking criminals. At that point I wasn't sure whether his point was, "take your own bullying into your own hands" or "watch me brag about how badass I am on the internet."
Yeah, I don't know if fighting people who have deadly weapons (or at least access to deadly weapons) is a good idea. Even if you win a first encounter, what's to prevent them from finding you later and shooting/stabbing you?
I guess that can also apply to bullies in some American schools nowadays. What if the bully wants to prove how badass he is by taking it to a level that involves guns and knives?
Thank goodness I graduated before that kind of stuff started.
His account of the 9th grader reminds me of the advice to punch out the toughest looking guy in the room on your first day of prison to establish a reputation of unfuckablewithness.
Agreed. My next question is: why are our _schools_ comparable to prisons in this way? Is it really such an inescapable facet of human nature?
Why can't we change the culture of school such that, at least while you're actually _in_ school, you're focused on being the smartest person you can be and not looking over your shoulder?
It's because they are both institutions founded on compulsory incarceration where rules and regulations reign supreme over common sense and human decency.
At least, I think that might have something to do with it.
Simple reason: You're required to be there. In the rest of life, you can quit your job, move, and find a better crowd of people. It will always turn into lord of the flies if you throw a bunch of (truly) random people together who don't depend on each other and force them to deal with it day after day.
I suffered 5 years of bullying at school; and tried everything to get it to stop, without success.
Until one day I just got fed up, walked up to the main tormentor in class and, unprovoked, hit him really hard in the mouth (I think I broke his nose, I'm not sure). Was in weeks of trouble (with the staff) :) but once that was out of the way no one touched me again.
I've never outright recommended this approach to anyone; and indeed it's probably not the right thing to do all the time. But some sort of short-sharp-shock can work just as well (so... barging them to the ground etc.) as long as it is sufficiently hard.
Same here, I was a fat pudgy kid in high school. After being tormented daily from seventh grade onward by a particular group, there was one day the high school quarterback and a few other football players decided to throw water balloons at me in middle of January. Of course, they got me with about six of them, soaked my backpack, and school work.
I. flipped. out.
All I remember was walking very calmly towards the quarterback and punching him in the face repeatedly, he tried to hit me but I grabbed his arm and bent him over backwards and just kept punching until he started bleeding from his eyebrow. His friends pulled me off and then threw me down and started to kick me, but it was broken up. Sure I got suspended, but that group never picked on me again.
As a counter point to the football player thing, I lifted with a lot of the O-line guys in college. Most of them were comic nerds, and a handful played Warhammer 40k.
One of them straight up asked me: "I'm coming at your base with two rockvees and an ambo - you've got a Jarmen, two scorps, and a quad. What do you do?"
To be fair to the those unfortunates who were not on the offensive line, I actually got recruited to dungeon master by/for a bunch of the star high school football seniors when I was a sophomore. I want to say there was a quarterback, a running back, and a linebacker involved, but it's been long enough I don't remember all the details.
It's certainly true that our offensive lines were usually at least half national honor society members -- there was always significant overlap with the quiz bowl team -- and we had at least one hard core geek each year. It wasn't at all unusual to find two of us trying out the latest RPG or swapping indie B&W comics.
Same here. I was bullied (verbally and physically) all the way through grade school and high school. My mom was a peaceful hippie from the 70s, taught me that violence wasn't the answer and if there is trouble the best thing to do is tell. 10+ years of telling didn't help. Taking the abuse day after day, missing months worth of school because I was 'sick'. Hell, I even got suspended in 5th grade for getting my ass kicked by a bully.
Nothing changed until I started fighting back in 10th grade. A few fights later, along with a suspension I actually earned this time, and I never had anymore problems.
I was also bullied in middle school. One day, walking off the school bus, I slammed his head against the window as I walked off. The bus driver, who had witnessed his bullying me for months prior was awe-struck and kept the bus running for about a minute before driving on past my block (no clue what she was thinking or saying, but it was really awkward as I walked from the bus down my block to my house). I spent the weekend thinking I would be suspended when I got back to school on Monday, but when I got on the bus on Monday, she didn't say anything, and nothing ever happened. Apparently the bus driver appreciated the fact he had it coming. And he never bothered me again...
Same here, some guy had been bullying me in high school and calling me names for a long period. One time he came to the park where I was in my friends and started calling me names again and generally being belligerent. After the second punch he fell down, he didn't really need much more than that. He didn't even get the chance to lay a finger on me, and never looked me in the eye again.
Come to think of it, shit, he really wasn't tough at all. Going down on the second punch and coming back up dazed? Good thing (for him) I didn't know how to throw a punch...
I have never been seriously bullied, but one time some bullying started for a couple of days that could have dragged on for a long time. Multiple people were throwing around stuff from my bag to each other, me trying to get it back. Of course you lose stuff quicker than you get it back. I'm small but I ran into one of them and bashed my head against his (I have a thick skull ;), knocking him to the ground. Never had a problem since.
It's nice being nice, but sometimes it does not work.
The "take your stuff, throw it around" game? I got out of that by grabbing the person who took the item originally and telling him that getting my stuff back was his problem now and if he didn't I would hurt him, no matter what excuse he had.
If you've already laid the I-wont-stand-to-be-bullied ground work with the "fight back once" thing he'll get your stuff back and none of them will have any fun.
Same here. My schools days taught me a simple recipe for bully repellent: headlock their neck and pound on their face like a jack hammer. Size doesn't matter. Winning and losing doesn't matter.
But I also learned another interesting bit of bully psychology: they tease EVERYBODY, especially their friends. So tease them back. I discovered sometimes the supposed bully is just goofing around and this is how they relate to people.
Thirdly I discovered a simpler approach thanks to punk rock ethos: Don't even give a fuck about what other people think of you and let them know you don't give a fuck.
I'd say every situation has an escalating set of responses, and I certainly don't believe that violence is always unacceptable, especially when nonviolent means have failed.
I'd suggest that a large part of why MLK succeeded is because Malcolm X was loudly stating the alternative.
I've never been physically bullied, as I've always been both a dork and an athlete, but I was teased relentlessly early on. My dad's advice was always to ignore, and this just didn't work well enough. That's how I discovered the power of personality - the power to fire back is (sadly) what wins respect of children.
The challenge once you've gained the skill is to reign it in - to be intentional in your response, and to sometimes decide that nonviolence, or silence IS actually the way to go.
It's terrible, terrible advice, because it doesn't work with physical violence. I've talked to multiple people who tried this and were bullied mercilessly in response.
Kids (of a certain age) don't know when to stop. They naturally try to establish a pecking order, and woe to whoever's at the bottom.
Note that I'm not saying you should go punch someone who verbally insults you. I'm specifically talking about responding to violence.
As someone who was bullied and ignored it, all I can say is it didn't really help. I did eventually stand up for myself against one bollox who used to be friendly to me at school and voila, all of the bullies stopped.
This is after being bullied from the age of 9 to 14, and boy did I hate school. College was a different matter.
The emphasis should be on "until he puts his hand on you". He's asserting that violence is an appropriate response to violence. If a boy has a reputation for defending himself ferociously, boys will tend to shy away from bullying him. However, I think to be effective in some cases, the boy has to prove that he is willing to go to self-destructive lengths to fight back.
Ender was deliberately put in a position where he was forced to fight back or get killed. His "handlers" wanted a dehumanized person capable of everything, including genocide.
"The task of the training battalions is to crush and completely destroy the individual, however strong a character he may have possessed, and to fashion out of that person a type to fit the standards of spetsnaz, a type who will be filled with an explosive charge of hatred and spite and a craving for revenge."
Source: http://militera.lib.ru/research/suvorov6/index.html
It's a book by Viktor Suvorov "Spetsnaz. The Story Behind the Soviet SAS". A quick and interesting read.
Violence and degradation is a common method of training soldiers. Some (not me) would say the school system is deliberately set in this fashion.
It isn't real love to "talk it out" with them anyway. If it doesn't bless them and yourself it's not love anyway.
Things as they actually are is the only way that they are in truth.
So the teaching that it's loving them is what's false -- not that love itself couldn't help. In this case, it was a kind of love of oneself to fight back and protect oneself.
I would phrase the advice to sound less hair-trigger, but I essentially agree. "Ignore the bully", or "don't fight back" are terrible advice that put the (your) child at risk.
I think where parents get confused is on the individual vs. group distinction. We look at the world, see all the various tribal wars with their counter-attacks and counter-counter-attacks, and erroneously conclude that violence doesn't solve anything.
We're not talking suicide bombs and airstrikes, here. If Alice shoves Billy, and Billy shoves Alice back, there's often no escalation, and no-one else is harmed. The issue is settled, and everyone's still alive and well. This is much better than ongoing bullying.
It's strange how a society supposedly obsessed with safety nonetheless thinks normal to place a child in such an environment, then do everything to prevent them from defending themselves. It's a prison environment, only the inmates did nothing to deserve being there.
The problem could be that kids don't interact much with people outside their age group. They have no reference point of how adults behave. It becomes a sort of Lord of the Flies world.
Our society isn't really obsessed with safety. It's obsessed with being safe from rare, sensational dangers.
If we really cared about safety, we'd focus less on airport security and "stranger danger", and more on getting people to wear seatbelts and never drive while intoxicated. Statistically, automobile accidents are by far the leading cause of accidental death in the US.
As someone who used to be somewhat of a bully, I think this is the best advice. Bullies pick on smaller kids because they're insecure about themselves and bullying a smaller kid is... well, easy. If a smaller kid makes it difficult for bullies to pick on them (by fighting back), the bully will most likely stop (and move on to another victim).
You make a good point (and it takes guts to admit being a bully): the anti-bullying strategy is to make the bully pick a different target.
You don't have to be "un-bullyable", you just have to be less bullyable than the next guy.
However, I still believe it's possible to fight back in a non-physical manner. My experience has always been that wit is sharper than fists, so I plan to teach my kids to fight back with language, not punches.
Believe me, that will make most bullies even more angry. They'll feel more insecure because now they're inferior to the "shrimp" in a way. It's just adding fuel to the fire.
I attended 8 schools between ages 12 and 18 (yes, more than one per year) and was bullied throughout.
And that's why comparing parenting strategies is almost never fruitful -- nearly every decision a parent makes is deeply personal, made with very few data points.
( By the way, if any parents here have NOT read Nurture Shock, buy it right now. Pretty much the only data-driven book on parenting there is. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0446504122 )
How many of us who got picked on would have had the guts to follow this advice anyway? I don't think that many of these kids have anything that they are holding back for lack of better advice, as if they can calmly choose their reaction when the time comes. How do you get rid of paralyzing fear?
Does this advice help at all with girls? Girls seemed to bully socially rather than physically when I was in school. What do you tell a young girl who's in a similar situation? "Punch her in the nose?"
I had a similar experience (and resolution) in middle school and I agree with the author's conclusion. But now I have an 8 month old daughter who may experience this type of bullshit one day, and I'm not sure what advice I'd give her just now.
I don't have kids - but id probably tell her the same. Its more about teaching a lesson and giving encouragement and about standing for one self. She probably wont go gorilla on her peers. Girls tend to do it in more subtle form.
What I think is the most important thing to do is to give training by example - live the way of a warrior and kids will pick it up themselves. Be polite, kind, sincere but closely follow the rules of engagement - when someone sets tries to turn tables on you, be sure to let him know that you know the game too.
Put her through martial arts lessons with a good teacher. It's good for self-defense anyway, and I'd never want my daughter to be unprepared to defend herself if she should need to.
Not so that she can beat up the other girls, mind you, but having that sort of discipline, capability, and independence can really provide a good boost to your confidence. You know you're capable, and the taunts of others don't bother you as much.
It's not going to prevent it from bothering her, but it will certainly help her withstand it if it should come to that. If she's not bothered by their initial insults or taunts, they won't enjoy it enough to come back and harass her again.
"... Does this advice help at all with girls? Girls seemed to bully socially rather than physically when I was in school. What do you tell a young girl who's in a similar situation? "Punch her in the nose?" ..."
The asymmetry of this situation is not described much here because the type of bullying attacks used by females are less physical. The mechanics are similar but the techniques are different and can be summarised thus: "Males are paratroopers, females are secret agents". Males rely more on aggression and physicality and are overt while females specailise in covert relational and psychological bullying. If you want to read the mechanics & some citations try here ~ http://seldomlogical.com/2010/06/18/hacking-people
I have the same question. While there were fights between some girls in the high school I went to, all the abuse I dealt with was entirely verbal/social.
No one ever tried to lay a hand on me, so if I'd started anything, it would've been me looking like the 'bad guy'. And somewhere along the way I'd already internalized that as a 'good girl' disappointing authority was the worst thing I could possibly do.
I tried ignoring. I tried preemptively mocking myself to take the wind out of their sails. Nothing really stopped it. I got really lucky that my high school had a surprisingly large 'smart kid' group (6 National Merit scholars in my graduating class of 330) and eventually I was able to keep a large enough peer group to just not have to interact with most of the kids that bullied me.
But despite my small close circle of friends, I still graduated high school feeling like an outcast. Our entire AP history class once deemed me a 'neo-nazi' because I made a comment about the biased language in some video we watched. We had studied rhetoric only a few weeks before in English, and I was wondering why the video seemed to pulling so many of the tricks we'd just learned about in order to make the holocaust look like a bad thing. It seemed unnecessary (in my innocent mind I was thinking, 'Aren't the raw facts enough to convince anyone?').
My one offhand comment (literally just the words, 'That video sure used a lot of biased language.') turned into a full-scale mocking by everyone in the classroom except my two friends (who stayed silent). The teacher never actually joined in the mocking, but he stood by while it happened, encouraged the 'debate' to last longer, and even laughed at some of the hurtful comments made to me by the other students.
The trick is to emasculate them. Show them you don't care. When they insult you or hurt you, laugh at them. You just have to mean it.
I was bullied for years until I realized one day why they bullied me - I smelled of fear, and I didn't react, I just stood there and looked at them. Suddenly it all made sense, they were like braindead sharks to blood.
So I started smiling and laughing at them.
Took the wind right out of their sails, and they weren't able to force me to come down to their level.
I won.
Play their game and they still win on some level, because hurting another person hurts yourself.
"Hurting someone hurts yourself", bullshit. Revenge is sweet. Defending yourself is not a weakness or immoral, it's rather noble.
If you go with the "laugh at them" technique, they will still go around bullying other kids.
But, stand up and fight them, and they learn a lesson that bullying has some serious consequences. You also set an example to other bullies and other kids being bullied.
Unlike probably most people here on HN, I have done real violence to someone else. Over and over, in fact. I had the cops called on me and I've had to live with the consequences. And I don't mean legal consequences.
Beating up on other people kills you inside, slowly, because it shows you exactly what kind of person you are.
It doesn't matter if you're "standing up" to some other kid. Violence is violence.
I'm not saying violence is never required, but if you're resorting to violence when a smile and a chuckle will do, you're weak -- you don't have enough willpower to control yourself, or brains to think up an alternative.
> Beating up on other people kills you inside, slowly, because it shows you exactly what kind of person you are.
I disagree. What kills you inside slowly, is all the authority figures telling you what a horrible person you are for defending yourself.
I mean, by all means if you live in a place where the cops will actually do something if someone hurts, just call the cops. But you have to remember that the world doesn't consist entirely of north america.
It would be inconvenient for them to recognize the difference between provoked and unprovoked violence. The grand unifying theory of bad school administrators can be summed up in one word: indifference. (Not malice, as many assume. They genuinely don't care who started a fight.)
Obviously, this doesn't apply to every single administrator. #include <std_disclaimer.h>
Yeah, and being bullied kills you inside too, only quickly and with much more duration.
If I could go back and do it all again there'd be two or three more swung fists. Probably no more than that, either, because that's all it would take.
In fact I think this debate would be really different if defending yourself against being bullied actually required sustained violence, but instead rather we're in a world where I can ask "How many people have killed themselves that could have been saved by them instead swinging their fists once?" and get a number probably at least in the thousands.
This isn't just a philosophy debating match; children are dying over this, and a lot more are getting badly hurt.
We're not talking about parental or family abuse here. This is bullying, which is not the same thing. Being less bad, it admits of different solutions.
We're not talking about parental or family abuse here. This is bullying, which is not the same thing. Being less bad, it admits of different solutions.
This was my method too. You attack them with words, and it's often just as good as punching them in the face. Another thing that works is to be extremely unpredictable. If they believe you may flip out on them, often that's enough.
Laugh at them, turn them in to a joke whenever they attempt to do something to you, and eventually they'll realize that people are laughing at them, not what they are doing to you.
I did have to get physical a few times but it was only the odd extreme case where this didn't work.
Along the same lines, non-reactiveness can also work and can even be fun. There is this one kid on campus who I've run into a few times. The kid apparently knows every brown kid--except me. The first time we met he asked me if I was a freshman(I'm a senior). I went along and said yes. He went on cracking a few jokes about me. I just sat there with a coy smile on my face, staring at him, without saying a word. It didn't take long before he was the one looking really stupid making fun of a non-reactive guy. He appeared as the unfunny clown.
The same thing happend last week when I run into the same guy late night. He was there with a dozen or so friends after a night out. I was there just to grab some pizza and get back to work. So he asks me if I knew anybody here. I just shook my head and said no. He asked me my name. I told him my name. He proceeds to yell out that I am here alone and don't know anyone. Then it came out that I knew several people in his group. He looked stupid and drunk. And I got a laugh at his expense. All by just playing dumb and being non-reactive.
While I do agree you need to emasculate a bully, "smiling and laughing" only works if you're being verbally bullied. In order to emasculate a physical bully, you need to either make them feel fear or pain.
It's a really fine line. This type of response can just as easily backfire on you. One punch back can escalate things well beyond the original infraction, the next thing you know, you are in the hospital. Embarrassing someone who fancies themselves the leader of a pack is never a good idea. Even if you escape unscathed one day, the very next day you may be met with an even larger pack of people.
It is this very mindset that perpetuates violence, it doesn't end it. For Sebastian, the line is clear "as soon as someone puts their hands on you," but everyone has a different line. Taunting someone every day for months can push someone beyond their line, and when they push you away out of desperation they have "put their hands on you."
Being strong and standing up for yourself does not require physical violence. Understanding the reason someone is picking on you is perhaps the best way to actually stop it, and perhaps even address the root cause, making the road better for the next person in line. When complaining about the bully in my elementary school, my parents explained to me the social situation that he was brought up in, and how we were so lucky in comparison. I didn't "love" them, but I understood them much better, and learned how to avoid getting in their way. Hitting back wouldn't have solved anything.
I was with this guy until he started talking about mouthing off to a mafia guy in Japan.
Kid stuff is kid stuff, adult stuff is different. That 9th grader had almost certainly never tortured someone with a car battery. Same with the muggers - who's to say that they're sane in the least? What if they're really strung-out and have knives, now you're going to the hospital.
The reason for shooting a mugger is that the situation is inherently one where your life is at risk. Even if you totally comply, you could be killed.
Shooting an attacker is safer for you. It is usually far more expensive, though -- maybe 1-5k in legal costs even if it doesn't get much followup (and if it goes to trial, could be over 100k), potential civil suits, and of course the cost of firearms and training to even have the choice.
I would definitely toss a $500 wallet and run if it were at the time a safer choice, even with a firearm. But, I would have no problem killing to defend my life, either.
I guess I made my comment as someone who doesn't currently carry a firearm. I suppose the situation changes when you're capable of disabling the attacker outright by shooting him.
I was speaking mainly to a situation where you'd be inciting some sort of a fight or a struggle with someone crazy enough to attempt a mugging. In this case, I still stand by my feeling that you're better off complying.
If you're able, by all means, protect yourself. You'll find no objections from me there.
It definitely doesn't change when you're capable of shooting the person, just as the GP post said -- the first hour of legal fees will be bigger than what you had in your wallet.
Now, a certain feeling of invincibility may be priceless to some people, but they're far less invincible than they think - if you go around expecting violence then it's probably more likely to happen to you. Not to mention that, statistically, you're shortening your lifetime more by owning a gun (I like guns but don't own one) than you're extending it by the small chance that someone's coming for your life and you actually see them coming.
There are a lot of statistics about guns and survival, and it's not 100% conclusive. Most "bad" firearms related deaths which happen to firearms owners are suicides, followed by children and stupid accidents, followed by domestic violence with guns. I'm unlikely to suffer from any of these.
Carrying a concealed weapon (where legal) has a lower benefit than carrying a cellphone and first aid/trauma kit (which I also carry, and will try to get to EMT-I certification again, if not paramedic), but I still think it's a net improvement in your personal safety, assuming you're trained and competent.
The biggest disadvantage is that in some states you can't go into a restaurant where alcohol is served (even if you're going for a meal and don't drink), and of course the fashion compromise of a 1-4 pound hunk of metal/plastic/wood.
I think most gun owners disbelieve "invincibility" even more than non-gun owners when it comes to guns -- handguns especially are fairly non-lethal (at 3', I'd rather have a knife), and give an advantage to he who initiates violence. I'd be very happy to trade a firearm for a Dune-style shield or something.
I think another factor is that a responsible gun owner who is carrying is probably more likely to avoid places where an incident might happen -- aside from bars, I'd also be a lot more likely to be less confrontational in traffic or other situations if I realized there was a potential it could escalate to shooting. I've never been involved in any kind of scuffle or anything while carrying a firearm, and while I actively avoid "bad areas" to the extent possible no matter what, it's another factor. Although I am willing to stop to render aid to stranded motorists when armed, whereas unless it's a very clearcut situation, just drive on (and optionally call 911) otherwise.
so you're worried that the muggers aren't sane, but, hey, they'll be sane enough to honor the ancient mugger code and leave you alone after taking your stuff?
once somebody is threatening you with violence, you don't get to count on anything. especially if you act like an easy target.
It's simple darwinism. It is possible to mug people and escape a number of times before you get caught. Once you start mugging people and murdering them... That won't last very long.
I was mugged in London 4 months ago. In broad daylight, the guy caught me off guard and pushed me to the ground.
When I tell people there's usually someone who tells me I should have fought back, or whatever. And I went through relief, anger, fear it would happen again and the thirst for revenge afterwards, replaying the situation and second-guessing myself, wondering if I should have fought back or done something differently.
But it's not worth the risk. My friend works in public housing in the area, and said the guy was probably a local gang member. These guys fight and carry knives from when they're children. I've never been in a real fight and I have a desk job - odds are that I would have ended up in hospital.
So I handed over the 40 pounds cash I had in my wallet, and he bailed.
A random encounter like this is a totally different situation to a bully at school, where you mostly know who you're dealing with. There's a couple of times I now realise I probably should have stood up for myself at school, but being mugged on the street is not the time to start learning to fight.
Why don't parents do something? I'd have no problem, as an adult, confronting a kid and telling them that if they touched my son again I'd personally deliver them to juvy where I can make accomodations for buddies they don't appreciate.
And unless they're already hardened gang members, this should work pretty well, and probably breaks no laws. And if they do do it again, live up to your promise, to the extent possible.
If they are hardened gang members, you should probably get your child out of the situation, because fighting back is a losing proposition.
I moved around a lot as a kid, so I was the convenient target, too. My 10 yr old is in martial arts and has a green-brown belt. He absolutely loves it. I've told him to only use it as a last resort, but to use it.
I recall being bullied by a rather dull kid when in elementary school. I remember him relentlessly telling me he would kick my ass. I told my Dad and he recommended that if it push came to shove, to just punch him in the face. So, one day the kid came at me and I hit him (don't even remember where). I was never bothered again at that school.
I really don't want to sound like some drive by detractor on the Internet, so let me explain where I'm coming from.
I was that 10 year old kid. I had a junior black belt in karate at around 12 years old. My dad really kind of enjoyed it vicariously and was proud of my accomplishments. He also, like you, believed that I had attained some skills that could be used for real self defense. He told me that it should be used only as a last resort, as if it were a secret weapon. The fact is, it was nothing of the sort. I could never handle myself in a fight, and I never had the confidence that I could, either.
There are many martial arts dojos out there that sell exactly what kung fu movies sell: fantasy. These are the dojos that every kind of kid goes to and they all just love love love it, and their parents just think it's so great and fun. These are the dojos where you will see people lined up in rows to repeatedly kick and punch and block the air while yelling "kyah!" or something to that effect. Sometimes they'll kick and punch pads that instructors are holding, and sometimes they'll be paired off to "spar" really lightly with one another, where the mere soft contact of a gloved hand on the chest represents a hit. Memorization of fight/dance moves is a major part of progressing from each belt. The one thing that these dojos will not do is have your son or daughter fight anybody.
The simple fact is that you cannot learn to fight without fighting. Punching the air or a pad does not prepare you physically, emotionally, or mentally for punching a person. Totally dominating imaginary attackers in an elaborate dance may have something to do with arts, but absolutely nothing to do with martial. Not even a false sense of confidence is given to these kids, because when faced with a real threat, they know very well that they're not prepared. The false sense of confidence is sold to the parents.
It certainly doesn't hurt to take your kid to a dojo like this, because at least they have fun and get a decent workout. But the real reason I wanted to go as a kid was to learn how to fight, and my dad thought that was exactly what I was learning, and it ultimately proved to be a great disappointment because of these mismatched expectations.
I don't know what kind of dojo you take your kid to, but the advice from this random guy on the Internet is to make sure your expectations are being matched. A fun workout with a group of peers is good for a kid, but if you (and him) really want to develop fighting skills, I strongly recommend trying something like wrestling or Jiu-Jitsu. It needs to be a place where the kids are pitted against each other in a well-controlled environment, where the goal is to physically overpower your opponent.
You're right that many martial arts teachers/schools are like this. But there are some that aren't. I've taken had the good fortune to learn from three or four instructors, and there is no doubt in my mind that every one of them has a very high level of skill and is able to apply that skill in real-world situations. The problem is how to find these people and distinguish them from the fakes.
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 270 ms ] threadBe peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery.
These are children and their judgement is not always the best. Do you really want to risk that your child kills another child by accident while following your advice?
Will your child know how far is far enough? Is there a chance he or she might over-react to a situation that is not truly threatening?
"Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, hurt him just enough so that he leaves you alone - but don't kill him."
I hope this is mainly internet posturing and bravado.
I'm not sure every child has the perspective to recognize hyperbole. There are times when violence may be necessary, but that doesn't make it any less horrible, whether justified or not.
One thing I actually disliked about the post is the way he has de-humanised bullies. When in reality the correct approach is to feel sorry for them - because they have all manner of deep seated issues. Not in a lovey-dovey way (which, he is right, is silly) but in an adult comprehending way.
The act of your violence is a potential learning experience for them too. Too much vitriol and anger and they may come away harbouring deep resentment, and later come back at you with escalating violence. But a short sharp shock could teach them some important truths.
For the most part, the really bad bullies I suffered at school are already failures in adult life. With the one exception of another bully who also got beaten up (not by me) late in the school system - he was dramatically changed after that and is currently one of the nicest and most successful adults I know (although there were other factors swinging in his favour).
So sympathy, but not hippy-love. Violence, but not retribution.
It is a tough balance.
It's unfortunate that violence is sometimes necessary in school, but it is because bullying isn't taken seriously by the administration. Bullies spend all their time making trouble, so they get good at doing psychological damage and flying under the radar of authority. But the damage they are doing is potentially severe. Bullies usually have severe problems at home, and I feel bad for them, but they mustn't be allowed to spread their self-loathing virally by means of systematic low-grade abuse to anyone who is an easy target (ie. the weird ones, the free thinkers, the people who don't conform, and thus are more likely to bring something new to the world when they grow up).
If administrators took this more seriously and started expelling these kids, then that would get the attention of their deadbeat parents, and violence would not be necessary. However in reality, school is like prison, and sometimes violence is the answer.
Bullying escalates. If you don't trust your kid to make a judgment at some point, it's basically a matter of time before they get seriously injured themselves.
I'd rather teach my kid to stick up for himself and have the mistakes happen at the level of "knocked out tooth/broken finger" than letting things escalate in the first place.
Bullying does escalate. Therefore, teaching your kid to escalate on their side as well just makes it happen faster. The solution to escalating warfare is to break the cycle.
That is not true. MAD worked in the cold war. The solution is to let the other side know you will not go gentle into that good night.
If your kid just gives the bully a few bruises but ultimately loses the fight then they've sent the message that they're not an easy target, and the bully has saved face.
Bullying is typified by a victim being picked-on mercilessly because he never fights back. Because the bullying tears him down. Because the bullied is a victim.
Bullying isn't a contest for the bully. They do it precisely because it isn't. They're not trying to 'win', they're trying to make someone else feel as bad as they feel. If they can't do that, because the victim refuses to be victimized, they find a new victim or find a new outlet.
The second one no, but the second one is mostly an exaggeration for "don't be the one who starts fights, but be the one who ends them". Cemetery is probably a bad idea as it'll breed revenge, but going at it until they are physically unable to fight back is probably a good idea.
If you don't want the other side to escalate, take it there first and do it fast. If you are truly worried about escalation, then by induction, all fights are fights to the death because beating the bully "just enough" will lead to the bully coming back with more firepower. Lather, rinse, repeat until firearms are involved.
So, you over-compensate. You do everything within your power to kill him and hope someone can stop you or they run away. If you don't take shit from anybody, people will stop trying to give it to you.
Malcolm X, the supremacist dude who had Nazis at his conventions, is a really bad role model for your children.
Edit: why the downvote? He was supremacist, and Nazi connection is well documented: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_supremacy#Alliances_with_...
From the Wikipedia article:
"In 1965, after breaking with the Nation of Islam and denouncing its separatist doctrine, Malcolm X told his followers that the Nation of Islam under Elijah Muhammad had made agreements with the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan that 'were not in the interest of Negros.'"
Now, notice the "after break-up" part. Have a look at this photo:
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/collection/online_az/4:322/...
She was doing an essay on Malcolm X, these fellas attended one of his conventions. The one in the middle threatened to make a lantern out of her (Arnold is Jewish).
In her later interviews she mentioned that many people get really upset when they see this photo, and exhibition curators often objected to its inclusion.
Um ...
She was doing an essay on Malcolm X, these fellas attended one of his conventions.
While remaining agnostic to your point, it's troubling that you keep citing references that don't support it. The caption on that photo makes no reference to these Nazis being in attendance at a Malcolm X rally.
But I now took an effort to find a reference for you:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features...
Grep the text for "Rockwell".
So as you see my initial point stands. A person who is a supremacist and hangs out with Nazis is a bad role model for children. Would you agree?I'm sold on the fight back attitude, but not with that level of danger. And that is the problem with the whole fight back attitude in general. You can teach it, but you must also teach respect for human life and how easy it can be to seriously damage somebody permanently.
No not really. It will perhaps offend the bizarre establishment that has invaded school administration. However, this is bully repulsion 101.
If the system doesn't protect you, you must find a technique that does. Would we avoid school shootings,etc, if we taught our kids to stand up for themselves, don't let yourself get bullied? Real self respect vs the artificial "everyone's special" of today's thinking?
Sidenote: Why is this behavior (bullying) tolerated in school? What other part of our culture accepts bullying as "part of growing up" or "just the way it is?"
Earlier, ragging led to a few suicides, which in turn prompted the passing of the law. It does occur however; I have been ragged myself. Personally though, it didn't affect me as much as I feared it would.
If we accept that "loving the bullies" is a sign of weakness that encourages more bullying, allowing the school to intervene is a sign of extreme weakness that encourages even more bullying whenever kids are out of sight of authority figures.
I agree that children should learn to handle confrontation for themselves, but at the same time when there are chronic offenders there needs to be repercussions. If a bully picks on a kid and they fight back, the bully will move on to the next kid. If he keeps doing it, take him out of the system, expel him from school, or (optimally) find him some way of acting out his aggression, anger, etc. in a more productive manner.
'Fighting back' would soon reduce the school to anarchy outside of the presence of a teacher, but telling kids to deal with it and shrugging it off as 'part of growing up' just encourages the bullies by teaching them that they can do whatever they want, as long as they don't get caught.
At the very least, my shit quit disappearing.
If there was actually unequal punishment then you'll get a lot more "he started it!" kind of arguments, kids will lie to get whatever they want.
And at the same time, I realize looking back on school is that the teachers & admins in public school aren't that bright. As a group they're the poorest-performing college students.
When I'm a father, maybe I would rather have equal & consistent punishment for both parties, rather than some crappy teachers trying to decide who did what.
They're just children. They're not going to pay you. They're not going to vote. Their parents aren't actually the ones getting kicked (WOW would you see a different scenario in that case). It's easier to write it off as "childish" and do nothing. And if you actually sided with a child, there would be loss of status from affiliating with such a low-prestige person.
Same reason society tolerates rape in juvenile prisons. Same reason textbooks and teaching are so uniformly awful. Children have no power, and there's nothing to be gained politically or socially from siding with someone who can't side back.
My theory is denial. Parents of bullies don't want to admit that their kids are doing wrong, and the parents of victims don't want to face the fact that they need to get involved.
That was my situation, at least -- even with known bullies... when I finally fought back, I got dragged to the principal's office... and I let him have it. Another rarity is that my parents actually backed me on that one.
Only time things ever came to blows, the other guy (who struck first) was 8-10 years older than me, muscular and a good 2-3 feet taller, and that is a fight you do NOT fight.
Fighting as an adult is pretty stupid and a good way to get a felony record.
But like for kids, the other guy can be just too big for you to fight back.
Even captured warrior. In WW1 and WW2 many captured pilots were treated with dignity - one of such stories: http://www.campking.net/WORLDWAR.html
Or the notorious Douglas Bader escape: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Bader#Prisoner_of_War
Not so much in the business world (and especially tech); while you're busy engaging in a dogfight with Joe Competitor, some third company is kicking your trash by spending money on R&D rather than winning a marketing/feature war. So it generally makes sense to avoid direct confrontation, because it slows you down.
I guess that can also apply to bullies in some American schools nowadays. What if the bully wants to prove how badass he is by taking it to a level that involves guns and knives?
Thank goodness I graduated before that kind of stuff started.
Why can't we change the culture of school such that, at least while you're actually _in_ school, you're focused on being the smartest person you can be and not looking over your shoulder?
At least, I think that might have something to do with it.
I suffered 5 years of bullying at school; and tried everything to get it to stop, without success.
Until one day I just got fed up, walked up to the main tormentor in class and, unprovoked, hit him really hard in the mouth (I think I broke his nose, I'm not sure). Was in weeks of trouble (with the staff) :) but once that was out of the way no one touched me again.
I've never outright recommended this approach to anyone; and indeed it's probably not the right thing to do all the time. But some sort of short-sharp-shock can work just as well (so... barging them to the ground etc.) as long as it is sufficiently hard.
From my observation, every adult knows this is the solution. But not all of them has the balls to tell their kid :)
I. flipped. out.
All I remember was walking very calmly towards the quarterback and punching him in the face repeatedly, he tried to hit me but I grabbed his arm and bent him over backwards and just kept punching until he started bleeding from his eyebrow. His friends pulled me off and then threw me down and started to kick me, but it was broken up. Sure I got suspended, but that group never picked on me again.
One of them straight up asked me: "I'm coming at your base with two rockvees and an ambo - you've got a Jarmen, two scorps, and a quad. What do you do?"
In fact, most are just nerds about lifting and football, sometimes more traditional subjects like gaming, comics and math. (Yes, math.)
It's certainly true that our offensive lines were usually at least half national honor society members -- there was always significant overlap with the quiz bowl team -- and we had at least one hard core geek each year. It wasn't at all unusual to find two of us trying out the latest RPG or swapping indie B&W comics.
Nothing changed until I started fighting back in 10th grade. A few fights later, along with a suspension I actually earned this time, and I never had anymore problems.
Come to think of it, shit, he really wasn't tough at all. Going down on the second punch and coming back up dazed? Good thing (for him) I didn't know how to throw a punch...
It's nice being nice, but sometimes it does not work.
If you've already laid the I-wont-stand-to-be-bullied ground work with the "fight back once" thing he'll get your stuff back and none of them will have any fun.
But I also learned another interesting bit of bully psychology: they tease EVERYBODY, especially their friends. So tease them back. I discovered sometimes the supposed bully is just goofing around and this is how they relate to people.
Thirdly I discovered a simpler approach thanks to punk rock ethos: Don't even give a fuck about what other people think of you and let them know you don't give a fuck.
So I'd stick with the hitting. I don't think people understand much else until they mature a little past grade 8-ish mentality.
Folks who do have experience pretty much all agree.
I'd suggest that a large part of why MLK succeeded is because Malcolm X was loudly stating the alternative.
I've never been physically bullied, as I've always been both a dork and an athlete, but I was teased relentlessly early on. My dad's advice was always to ignore, and this just didn't work well enough. That's how I discovered the power of personality - the power to fire back is (sadly) what wins respect of children.
The challenge once you've gained the skill is to reign it in - to be intentional in your response, and to sometimes decide that nonviolence, or silence IS actually the way to go.
http://www.boingboing.net/201011111141.jpg
Also can work well in business. If someone is being a pain, just ignore them and don't give them the publicity they're seeking.
Kids (of a certain age) don't know when to stop. They naturally try to establish a pecking order, and woe to whoever's at the bottom.
Note that I'm not saying you should go punch someone who verbally insults you. I'm specifically talking about responding to violence.
This is after being bullied from the age of 9 to 14, and boy did I hate school. College was a different matter.
For me, it worked fine. (As well as obviously telling teachers and getting them involved if needed).
I absolutely detest parents who tell their kids "If someone hits you, hit them back harder"
Why? Do you believe this makes society more violent?
By the way, I don't agree with the "harder" bit. I.e. I would advocate a more-or-less proportional response in non-life-threating circumstances.
If you hit back, it makes you just as bad, if not worse as the original perpetrator.
"The task of the training battalions is to crush and completely destroy the individual, however strong a character he may have possessed, and to fashion out of that person a type to fit the standards of spetsnaz, a type who will be filled with an explosive charge of hatred and spite and a craving for revenge." Source: http://militera.lib.ru/research/suvorov6/index.html
It's a book by Viktor Suvorov "Spetsnaz. The Story Behind the Soviet SAS". A quick and interesting read.
Violence and degradation is a common method of training soldiers. Some (not me) would say the school system is deliberately set in this fashion.
Things as they actually are is the only way that they are in truth.
So the teaching that it's loving them is what's false -- not that love itself couldn't help. In this case, it was a kind of love of oneself to fight back and protect oneself.
I think where parents get confused is on the individual vs. group distinction. We look at the world, see all the various tribal wars with their counter-attacks and counter-counter-attacks, and erroneously conclude that violence doesn't solve anything.
We're not talking suicide bombs and airstrikes, here. If Alice shoves Billy, and Billy shoves Alice back, there's often no escalation, and no-one else is harmed. The issue is settled, and everyone's still alive and well. This is much better than ongoing bullying.
The problem could be that kids don't interact much with people outside their age group. They have no reference point of how adults behave. It becomes a sort of Lord of the Flies world.
If we really cared about safety, we'd focus less on airport security and "stranger danger", and more on getting people to wear seatbelts and never drive while intoxicated. Statistically, automobile accidents are by far the leading cause of accidental death in the US.
You don't have to be "un-bullyable", you just have to be less bullyable than the next guy.
However, I still believe it's possible to fight back in a non-physical manner. My experience has always been that wit is sharper than fists, so I plan to teach my kids to fight back with language, not punches.
I attended 8 schools between ages 12 and 18 (yes, more than one per year) and was bullied throughout.
And that's why comparing parenting strategies is almost never fruitful -- nearly every decision a parent makes is deeply personal, made with very few data points.
( By the way, if any parents here have NOT read Nurture Shock, buy it right now. Pretty much the only data-driven book on parenting there is. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0446504122 )
My dad gave me this very advice at the time, but I was too cowardly to follow it...
I had a similar experience (and resolution) in middle school and I agree with the author's conclusion. But now I have an 8 month old daughter who may experience this type of bullshit one day, and I'm not sure what advice I'd give her just now.
I don't have kids - but id probably tell her the same. Its more about teaching a lesson and giving encouragement and about standing for one self. She probably wont go gorilla on her peers. Girls tend to do it in more subtle form.
What I think is the most important thing to do is to give training by example - live the way of a warrior and kids will pick it up themselves. Be polite, kind, sincere but closely follow the rules of engagement - when someone sets tries to turn tables on you, be sure to let him know that you know the game too.
Not so that she can beat up the other girls, mind you, but having that sort of discipline, capability, and independence can really provide a good boost to your confidence. You know you're capable, and the taunts of others don't bother you as much.
It's not going to prevent it from bothering her, but it will certainly help her withstand it if it should come to that. If she's not bothered by their initial insults or taunts, they won't enjoy it enough to come back and harass her again.
The asymmetry of this situation is not described much here because the type of bullying attacks used by females are less physical. The mechanics are similar but the techniques are different and can be summarised thus: "Males are paratroopers, females are secret agents". Males rely more on aggression and physicality and are overt while females specailise in covert relational and psychological bullying. If you want to read the mechanics & some citations try here ~ http://seldomlogical.com/2010/06/18/hacking-people
The best article I've read on bulling is "Big Bad Bully" ~ http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200910/big-bad-bully and the best references specifically for dealing with female bullying I've seen is by "Rosalind Wiseman" ~ http://www.amazon.com/Rosalind-Wiseman/e/B001IOH8ZW/ref=sr_n...
No one ever tried to lay a hand on me, so if I'd started anything, it would've been me looking like the 'bad guy'. And somewhere along the way I'd already internalized that as a 'good girl' disappointing authority was the worst thing I could possibly do.
I tried ignoring. I tried preemptively mocking myself to take the wind out of their sails. Nothing really stopped it. I got really lucky that my high school had a surprisingly large 'smart kid' group (6 National Merit scholars in my graduating class of 330) and eventually I was able to keep a large enough peer group to just not have to interact with most of the kids that bullied me.
But despite my small close circle of friends, I still graduated high school feeling like an outcast. Our entire AP history class once deemed me a 'neo-nazi' because I made a comment about the biased language in some video we watched. We had studied rhetoric only a few weeks before in English, and I was wondering why the video seemed to pulling so many of the tricks we'd just learned about in order to make the holocaust look like a bad thing. It seemed unnecessary (in my innocent mind I was thinking, 'Aren't the raw facts enough to convince anyone?').
My one offhand comment (literally just the words, 'That video sure used a lot of biased language.') turned into a full-scale mocking by everyone in the classroom except my two friends (who stayed silent). The teacher never actually joined in the mocking, but he stood by while it happened, encouraged the 'debate' to last longer, and even laughed at some of the hurtful comments made to me by the other students.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1764236
The trick is to emasculate them. Show them you don't care. When they insult you or hurt you, laugh at them. You just have to mean it.
I was bullied for years until I realized one day why they bullied me - I smelled of fear, and I didn't react, I just stood there and looked at them. Suddenly it all made sense, they were like braindead sharks to blood.
So I started smiling and laughing at them.
Took the wind right out of their sails, and they weren't able to force me to come down to their level.
I won.
Play their game and they still win on some level, because hurting another person hurts yourself.
"Hurting someone hurts yourself", bullshit. Revenge is sweet. Defending yourself is not a weakness or immoral, it's rather noble.
If you go with the "laugh at them" technique, they will still go around bullying other kids.
But, stand up and fight them, and they learn a lesson that bullying has some serious consequences. You also set an example to other bullies and other kids being bullied.
Beating up on other people kills you inside, slowly, because it shows you exactly what kind of person you are.
It doesn't matter if you're "standing up" to some other kid. Violence is violence.
I'm not saying violence is never required, but if you're resorting to violence when a smile and a chuckle will do, you're weak -- you don't have enough willpower to control yourself, or brains to think up an alternative.
I disagree. What kills you inside slowly, is all the authority figures telling you what a horrible person you are for defending yourself.
I mean, by all means if you live in a place where the cops will actually do something if someone hurts, just call the cops. But you have to remember that the world doesn't consist entirely of north america.
Self-defense and unprovoked violence are two entirely different things. The law recognizes this and so do most sentient beings.
Sadly, this does not include most school administrators.
Obviously, this doesn't apply to every single administrator. #include <std_disclaimer.h>
If I could go back and do it all again there'd be two or three more swung fists. Probably no more than that, either, because that's all it would take.
In fact I think this debate would be really different if defending yourself against being bullied actually required sustained violence, but instead rather we're in a world where I can ask "How many people have killed themselves that could have been saved by them instead swinging their fists once?" and get a number probably at least in the thousands.
This isn't just a philosophy debating match; children are dying over this, and a lot more are getting badly hurt.
Her abuse of me doesn't weigh on me nearly as much as mine of her, because in the latter I had a choice. So there you go.
No. They'll just learn that bullying you has serious consequences, and that they should find an other target.
"An armed society is a polite society." -- RAH
Where "armed" just means where people are willing and able to defend themselves.
Revenge has nothing to do with self-defense.
Laugh at them, turn them in to a joke whenever they attempt to do something to you, and eventually they'll realize that people are laughing at them, not what they are doing to you.
I did have to get physical a few times but it was only the odd extreme case where this didn't work.
The same thing happend last week when I run into the same guy late night. He was there with a dozen or so friends after a night out. I was there just to grab some pizza and get back to work. So he asks me if I knew anybody here. I just shook my head and said no. He asked me my name. I told him my name. He proceeds to yell out that I am here alone and don't know anyone. Then it came out that I knew several people in his group. He looked stupid and drunk. And I got a laugh at his expense. All by just playing dumb and being non-reactive.
It is this very mindset that perpetuates violence, it doesn't end it. For Sebastian, the line is clear "as soon as someone puts their hands on you," but everyone has a different line. Taunting someone every day for months can push someone beyond their line, and when they push you away out of desperation they have "put their hands on you."
Being strong and standing up for yourself does not require physical violence. Understanding the reason someone is picking on you is perhaps the best way to actually stop it, and perhaps even address the root cause, making the road better for the next person in line. When complaining about the bully in my elementary school, my parents explained to me the social situation that he was brought up in, and how we were so lucky in comparison. I didn't "love" them, but I understood them much better, and learned how to avoid getting in their way. Hitting back wouldn't have solved anything.
Kid stuff is kid stuff, adult stuff is different. That 9th grader had almost certainly never tortured someone with a car battery. Same with the muggers - who's to say that they're sane in the least? What if they're really strung-out and have knives, now you're going to the hospital.
In my view, it's never worth risking your life to protect your belongings. Be like Roger Sterling in Mad Men and give up your money & your jewelry.
Shooting an attacker is safer for you. It is usually far more expensive, though -- maybe 1-5k in legal costs even if it doesn't get much followup (and if it goes to trial, could be over 100k), potential civil suits, and of course the cost of firearms and training to even have the choice.
I would definitely toss a $500 wallet and run if it were at the time a safer choice, even with a firearm. But, I would have no problem killing to defend my life, either.
I was speaking mainly to a situation where you'd be inciting some sort of a fight or a struggle with someone crazy enough to attempt a mugging. In this case, I still stand by my feeling that you're better off complying.
If you're able, by all means, protect yourself. You'll find no objections from me there.
Now, a certain feeling of invincibility may be priceless to some people, but they're far less invincible than they think - if you go around expecting violence then it's probably more likely to happen to you. Not to mention that, statistically, you're shortening your lifetime more by owning a gun (I like guns but don't own one) than you're extending it by the small chance that someone's coming for your life and you actually see them coming.
Carrying a concealed weapon (where legal) has a lower benefit than carrying a cellphone and first aid/trauma kit (which I also carry, and will try to get to EMT-I certification again, if not paramedic), but I still think it's a net improvement in your personal safety, assuming you're trained and competent.
The biggest disadvantage is that in some states you can't go into a restaurant where alcohol is served (even if you're going for a meal and don't drink), and of course the fashion compromise of a 1-4 pound hunk of metal/plastic/wood.
I think most gun owners disbelieve "invincibility" even more than non-gun owners when it comes to guns -- handguns especially are fairly non-lethal (at 3', I'd rather have a knife), and give an advantage to he who initiates violence. I'd be very happy to trade a firearm for a Dune-style shield or something.
I think another factor is that a responsible gun owner who is carrying is probably more likely to avoid places where an incident might happen -- aside from bars, I'd also be a lot more likely to be less confrontational in traffic or other situations if I realized there was a potential it could escalate to shooting. I've never been involved in any kind of scuffle or anything while carrying a firearm, and while I actively avoid "bad areas" to the extent possible no matter what, it's another factor. Although I am willing to stop to render aid to stranded motorists when armed, whereas unless it's a very clearcut situation, just drive on (and optionally call 911) otherwise.
once somebody is threatening you with violence, you don't get to count on anything. especially if you act like an easy target.
When I tell people there's usually someone who tells me I should have fought back, or whatever. And I went through relief, anger, fear it would happen again and the thirst for revenge afterwards, replaying the situation and second-guessing myself, wondering if I should have fought back or done something differently.
But it's not worth the risk. My friend works in public housing in the area, and said the guy was probably a local gang member. These guys fight and carry knives from when they're children. I've never been in a real fight and I have a desk job - odds are that I would have ended up in hospital.
So I handed over the 40 pounds cash I had in my wallet, and he bailed.
A random encounter like this is a totally different situation to a bully at school, where you mostly know who you're dealing with. There's a couple of times I now realise I probably should have stood up for myself at school, but being mugged on the street is not the time to start learning to fight.
And unless they're already hardened gang members, this should work pretty well, and probably breaks no laws. And if they do do it again, live up to your promise, to the extent possible.
If they are hardened gang members, you should probably get your child out of the situation, because fighting back is a losing proposition.
I recall being bullied by a rather dull kid when in elementary school. I remember him relentlessly telling me he would kick my ass. I told my Dad and he recommended that if it push came to shove, to just punch him in the face. So, one day the kid came at me and I hit him (don't even remember where). I was never bothered again at that school.
Bullies reign when no one stands up to them.
I was that 10 year old kid. I had a junior black belt in karate at around 12 years old. My dad really kind of enjoyed it vicariously and was proud of my accomplishments. He also, like you, believed that I had attained some skills that could be used for real self defense. He told me that it should be used only as a last resort, as if it were a secret weapon. The fact is, it was nothing of the sort. I could never handle myself in a fight, and I never had the confidence that I could, either.
There are many martial arts dojos out there that sell exactly what kung fu movies sell: fantasy. These are the dojos that every kind of kid goes to and they all just love love love it, and their parents just think it's so great and fun. These are the dojos where you will see people lined up in rows to repeatedly kick and punch and block the air while yelling "kyah!" or something to that effect. Sometimes they'll kick and punch pads that instructors are holding, and sometimes they'll be paired off to "spar" really lightly with one another, where the mere soft contact of a gloved hand on the chest represents a hit. Memorization of fight/dance moves is a major part of progressing from each belt. The one thing that these dojos will not do is have your son or daughter fight anybody.
The simple fact is that you cannot learn to fight without fighting. Punching the air or a pad does not prepare you physically, emotionally, or mentally for punching a person. Totally dominating imaginary attackers in an elaborate dance may have something to do with arts, but absolutely nothing to do with martial. Not even a false sense of confidence is given to these kids, because when faced with a real threat, they know very well that they're not prepared. The false sense of confidence is sold to the parents.
It certainly doesn't hurt to take your kid to a dojo like this, because at least they have fun and get a decent workout. But the real reason I wanted to go as a kid was to learn how to fight, and my dad thought that was exactly what I was learning, and it ultimately proved to be a great disappointment because of these mismatched expectations.
I don't know what kind of dojo you take your kid to, but the advice from this random guy on the Internet is to make sure your expectations are being matched. A fun workout with a group of peers is good for a kid, but if you (and him) really want to develop fighting skills, I strongly recommend trying something like wrestling or Jiu-Jitsu. It needs to be a place where the kids are pitted against each other in a well-controlled environment, where the goal is to physically overpower your opponent.