Your kid is being Bullied on the bus - Pop him in the nose or talk it out?

[Phlosphr]

I'd like to re-visit the age old question of being bullied...

Peter Brady taught us in the 70's that if you are bullied you can sock the bully in the eye and he will submit and be your friend.

Columbine in the 90's taught us that kids being bullied can and sometimes will take it to extremes and go on a shooting rampage.

Where is the median ground? When is enough enough? I have a nephew who is being bullied - he's a reletively small kid and I'm not wholly convinced he knows what to do. I am on the fence whether or not to tell him to belt the kid doing the bullying or to have mom (my sister) go to the school and have the district take care of the issue by stiffer penalties to the parents and child.

Apparently the bully's parents have already been contacted and still the sh*t continues on the bus. We all know bullys have learned the behavior from some where - and that somewhere could be from the parents. Parents can be bullys too.

Anecdotes would be greatly appreciated...

What does the latest and greatest news say about bullying? Is the intellectual approach better than the physical one always?

Let's hear it -

BTW - The nephew is in Karate and has been for 1 year...would talking to the sensei be a good idea?

[Philster]

The problem is that a kid might in fact be unable to physically defend himself. I'm begging the question, because I have to figure that fighting back is an option you are considering.

Nothing is more important than getting the kid to understand that he is a hero for DOING THE RIGHT THING. Exhalt that, and focus on how tough he is to have to deal with this bully THE RIGHT WAY -- and you know what that is. Stick to the proper procedure, with the school/bus company/whoever.

Even if fighting is the thing you think is somehow right, fact is, people come in all shapes and sizes, and develop at different rates.

My kid started off as a bully, and we didn't know. The other parents did the right thing. Luckilly, we are responsible and responded properly. It might take some effort to get unreasonable parents to react right, but eventually they will succumb, because in this day and age of expulsions and lawsuits, they should be able to get the message.

Do the right thing.

[WhyNot]

Philster, would you mind sharing what you did when you discovered your son was being a bully? Honestly, I'm not sure what I would do as a parent on either side of this equation.

Also, you mention "the right thing" twice, but you don't say what you think that is. Intervene? Tell the kid to ignore it? Drive him to school yourself?

[dmatsch]

I was bullied as a kid in junior high. I listened to my parents when they told me "turn around and walk away and they will get tired of you".

Pure PC bullshit.

It went on for most of 5th and 6th grade and only stopped when I got fed up and broke the bully's nose. I'm a short guy and he was a good two feet taller than me and out weighed me by a good bit.

I got suspended for fighting, but the bullying stopped the day I got back in school.

Don't get me wrong, fighting is not the answer to every conflict. It's just a last resort when all other options have been exhausted. Teach your nephew to stand up for his dignity.

[handsomeharry]

I had a friend that was being bullied. then, one day, he cheap shotted the bully and grabbed his hair and punched, and punched, and kept punching. He then threatened to kill the bully if he ever did that again.
The bully stopped his bullying...then apologized, after he had his face patched up.

food for thought.

hh

[Kalhoun]

The school district is responsible (I assume this is a school bus and not a city bus). Remind them that it's their responsibility to protect your nephew and if they don't the wrath will rain down on them. I'm against advising violence except to protect one's self. It shouldn't get to that, but if it does, your neph has the right to fight back. the next step is to sue the bully's parents.

[THespos]

I agree with dmatsch. I spent years as a kid with my parents pursuing a solution through the usual channels. They would even visit with parents of bullies to explain the situation and ask the parents to put a stop to it. The bullying didn't stop until I started sticking up for myself.

To give you an idea of how the PC crowd tries to solve things, when I was consistently bullied by a kid in my grade, the school psychologist arranged for the two of us to beat on one another in the gym with foam rubber "boppers" until we had supposedly exhausted our aggression. Think that one worked? Ridiculous...

[Ethilrist]

The rules at my kids' high school:

1. Tell somebody about it. If it's happening right now, yell and attract as much attention as possible.

2. If you can get away, run towards a group of people you know, preferably adults.

3. If you can't get away, stand there and get the snot kicked out of you.

4. Prepare to be suspended anyway.

Or, in my son's case:

1. Get grabbed by an older kid on the first day of the last week of school and get slammed into a locker, almost losing an eye in the process.

2. Turn around.

3. Front snap kick to the solar plexus, launching the older kid across the hall. End of fight. Older kid never bothers son again.

4. Get suspended any way, which was the older kids' plan all along.

5. Watch as Mom rips the principal several new ones about their absolutely stoopid rules, pointing out that Mom has been teaching several girls in 7th grade how to fight for the past several years, and they're going to be freshman next year, and very much do not have a victim mentality.

[Jayn_Newell]

Also, you mention "the right thing" twice, but you don't say what you think that is. Intervene? Tell the kid to ignore it? Drive him to school yourself?
I don't think anyone really knows what the right answer is, or at least won't admit it. Because frankly, while it may get the kid in trouble for fighting, a good swift punch might be the best way to get the other kid to back off. He needs to not play the victim here and that's a hard thing to do, especially in the era of trying to solve everything peacefully, and doubly so at a young age. While I normally wouldn't suggest violence, I have to agree with dmatch on this one.

Pure PC bullshit.

[saoirse]

Well, I don't have a tale of gradeschool heroics to share. I fought the bully. I got my ass kicked. The bullying stopped. I eventually had to fight a few other guys, who fought about as well as I did. So I didn't get to be the boss, but I avoided the special hell that awaited boys who opted out of the process.

[Martiju]

I don't think anyone really knows what the right answer is, or at least won't admit it. Because frankly, while it may get the kid in trouble for fighting, a good swift punch might be the best way to get the other kid to back off. He needs to not play the victim here and that's a hard thing to do, especially in the era of trying to solve everything peacefully, and doubly so at a young age. While I normally wouldn't suggest violence, I have to agree with dmatch on this one.

Problem is, this really only works if you are a kid capable of damage. When I was about 13 I decided I'd had enough of 'turning the other cheek', etc. and whacked the guy who was picking on me that day. After looking at me in amazement for a second, he pretty much beat me to a bloody pulp while his friends looked on and laughed... At least by taking the higher moral ground I didn't get the added humiliation of giving up on my principles and still losing...

[Dung Beetle]

Interesting, saoirse. It's all well and good if the victim can bring down a mighty storm of whoop-ass on the bully, but I was wondering how the story turns out if your kid fights back and loses...

[Dinsdale]

How old are the kids in question?

My thinking on this has changed quite a bit. My son was bullied quite a bit in grade school. I initially adamantly said he should not respond with violence. If you cared to search, I’m sure I posted as much on these forums. But I don’t think anything stopped the bullying until one time in 7th grade when he hit back. That fight led to a suspension. We wrote the school the letter below. In retrospect, I would have written such a letter earlier, documenting that we had informed the school of the situation, and told my son to fight back.

One HUGE problem, tho, is IME, grade school kids are horribly unreliable witnesses, for any number of reasons. There were several instances in grade school when my kids would tell me one thing, and as I sprang into action I would learn that the actual events were quite different.

Here’s the letter. I ran across it on my computer the other day. It might have some language you might find useful:

Dear Mr. K:

We are in receipt of your letter dated ***, documenting that Dinsdale Jr. received a one day suspension to be served on ***, for inappropriate behavior. At present we do not wish to appeal the suspension, as we acknowledge that Dinsdale Jr. should not have responded physically when provoked. We do desire, however, that any records of this incident be accompanied by documentation of the facts surrounding this incident, establishing that Dinsdale Jr. was provoked, and was not the sole instigator..

Your letter states that Dinsdale Jr. was "fighting with another student in PE locker room" and that he "pushed student into a locker and hit him in the head with a book." Dinsdale Jr. was suspended for engaging in "inappropriate behavior, including fighting, and profanity." We believe accuracy and fairness requires that extenuating and mitigating circumstances must be reflected in any record of this incident.

Dinsdale Jr. has been regularly harassed by this particular boy on an ongoing basis. In the 2001-02 school year, Dinsdale Jr. asked his PE teacher that he not be required to be on teams with this boy during gym classes. That same year, Mrs. Dinsdale informed Mr. L, your predecessor as Assistant Principal, of this boy's behavior.

Dinsdale Jr. has tried to avoid this student, but he has not been able to because he is required to be in gym class with him. This boy's harassment of Dinsdale Jr. has continued into this school year, with the boy verbally insulting Dinsdale Jr.on nearly a daily basis, calling him various insulting names which are generally considered vulgarities.

Dinsdale Jr. was not an unprovoked instigator of the incident that led to his suspension. Dinsdale Jr. pushed this boy, after he called Dinsdale Jr.’s mother "a dildo, a whore, and a homosexual." Dinsdale Jr. did not hit the child with a book, until after the boy kicked Dinsdale Jr. in the chest hard enough to knock the wind out of him.

We note that Dinsdale Jr. immediately removed himself from the locker room, to end the altercation. We further note that the other boy immediately thereafter instigated another confrontation with another boy, which resulted in that boy having an injured finger placed in a splint. It is our understanding that this version of the situation was corroborated by several witnesses. In fact, all of the witnesses presented a similar version of the events, with the exception of the instigator. Please inform us if this differs from what you have learned of this event.

We question the extent to which this event was the result of inadequate supervision in the school, and inadequate discipline of this individual, despite having been notified of his behavior. There was no adult present in the locker room on the morning of ***, when this child verbally assaulted several boys, and instigated physical conflicts with two of them. Nor are we aware of any school personnel having taken steps to prevent this child from verbally harassing my son and other children on a regular and ongoing basis. We urge the school to take appropriate steps to supervise its students in the future, to ensure that our children will not face the need to protect themselves against an ongoing and escalating series of verbal assaults.

As we stated above, we are not requesting appeal of this suspension so long as a copy of this letter is included within Dinsdale Jr.’s records. If the school is unwilling to accommodate this request, please inform us immediately so that we may evaluate our options, including potential appeal of the suspension.

[QuickSilver]

War may not be the answer but a good short and violent fight sure as hell is. IMHO.

[WhyNot]

Let me run this by y'all and see what kinds of holes you can poke into it. It may or may not help the OP.

In our house, there is no "no-hitting" rule. There is a process by which you are expected to handle conflict, however. It sounds complicated when articulated, but in practice, it's pretty easy. I stole it from a mother of two girls who are 11 months apart, and for whom sibling rivalry is an understatement.

Obviously, if any step resolves the problem, you stop the process.

1. Verbal request. "Hey, stop doing that, please. I don't like it!"
2. Remove yourself from the offender. Walk away.
3. Request adult intervention or peer counseling.
4. Repeat verbal request, and add a warning. "Please stop doing that. If you don't, I will slug you."
5. Slug.

The teaching of a safe and proper punch must accompany this, of course. There's no sense throwing a wimpy or force-less or dangerous (trachea) punch at a bully, as martiju found out.

I think it's the best I've seen balancing peaceful resolution with not being a victim. The offending party has been given ample opportunity to stop offending before physical force is resorted to.

I also suspect that if I were being bullied, knowing that I had a safe and allowable procedure to follow would make me not feel so powerless. I might still get in trouble with school, but if I followed the procedure, I'd know my parents would back me up, and that's what's important.

As a parent, I'd support my kid if he followed the procedure, even if it means he gets suspended or expelled. I'd be less likely to support him if he hauled off and starting hitting without trying to resolve it peacefully first.

[Hey, It's That Guy!]

Being a quiet, shy, nonconfrontational kid, I dealt with a few bullies in middle school and high school. The only fight I ever got in was in 7th grade, where this guy was hassling me and talking shit and pushing me in the bathroom. After a few days of trying to ignore him and laugh it off, I got fed up, punched him, and pushed him forcefully into a floor-length urinal, holding him and flushing quickly a few times with the hand lever, drenching the front of his clothes with water. Nobody got in trouble -- the band director heard there was a "water fight" in the bathroom (what the hell would that involve, kids splashing each other?) and told our class to quit water-fighting or there would be hell to pay. The kid stopped busting my chops, and we later became acquaintances, although never friends. The incident was never mentioned again.

In high school, luckily bullies were more interested in humiliating and making their victims feel small, at least in my case. When real fights broke out in my high school, people ended up hospitalized, like one poor kid who got piledrivered head-first into the pavement by a bully and ended up with irreversible brain damage. A guy I knew got beaten up by a jock-type who was on metal crutches at the time, and used them as a weapon to hit my friend repeatedly. Often a bunch of people would jump in and take cheap shots on the victim. The worst thing that ever happened to me was waiting to be picked up after school one day when four huge weightlifters (all school football players) pushed me down, grabbed my saxophone case out of my hands, and ran away with it. They stood around on the outer steps where I could see them, tossing it to each other and laughing hysterically, and there was no way I could have overpowered any of them to get it back. I was more concerned about the cost of my instrument at the time, and what would happen if they smashed it or just decided to steal it, but the whole incident was terrifying and humiliating, and even thinking back about it makes my stomach feel queasy.

[saoirse]

Interesting, saoirse. It's all well and good if the victim can bring down a mighty storm of whoop-ass on the bully, but I was wondering how the story turns out if your kid fights back and loses...

I think one of the most pernicious bits of nonsense to have entered our culture is the idea that the bully is actually a big pussy and will crumple up and start crying as soon as he is hit.
I would really admire bullies if that were the case. That kind of bluff would take a real pair of stones.

[Phlosphr]

This is a difficult situation. That is exactly why I posted it here... There seems to be quite a bit of info on the subject and I thank everyone for sharing.

The nephew is riding a school bus not a city bus. And I am not condoning hitting the bully - but I am conserned that PC Bullshit will adversly affect the young lad. The middle ground is what I am looking for, and I believe if he speaks with his Karate teacher and say's something like... "I don't want to learn how to kick the bully's ass, I just want to be able to defend myself with dignity..." I think he will learn very well... Anyone agree?

[Dinsdale]

I think one of the most pernicious bits of nonsense to have entered our culture is the idea that the bully is actually a big pussy and will crumple up and start crying as soon as he is hit.

Yeah, I think that image is definitely BS, but my WAG is that there is some truth to the idea that - like many/most predators - bullies prefer easier victims. It might be worth 1 grade school tussle, in order to lessen the likelihood of continual hassles.

[Phlosphr]

The nephew is 7 years old.


I'm worried he will become tormented and this bullying will follow him for the rest of his life ad nauseam.

[QuickSilver]

... and I believe if he speaks with his Karate teacher and say's something like... "I don't want to learn how to kick the bully's ass, I just want to be able to defend myself with dignity..." I think he will learn very well... Anyone agree?

Nope. Kick the bully's ass.

Short of nuking him out of orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

[Dinsdale]

Another aspect is to try to figure out why this kid in particular is getting bullied, and see what you can do to change that.

My understanding is that often the bullied kid has difficulty interpreting and responding appropriately to various behavioral clues, expressions, etc.

We attended some social services classes and read several books that - I think - increased my son's and our awareness about such things. There is a ton of literature and other resources out there on this topic.

[Clothahump]

BTW - The nephew is in Karate and has been for 1 year...would talking to the sensei be a good idea?

Absolutely. The fact that your nephew hasn't tied the bully into a knot shows that he is listening to his instructor when they talk about self-control. Some positive reinforcement from the instructor will go a long way right about now.

[Dinsdale]

Oh yeah - just about any decent kids' MA instructor will be extremely hesitant to instruct a kid how to beat up another kid.

[Nanoda]

Punch him in the nose. And punch him in the nose again if he even looks at you wrong, 'cause it's the psycological stuff assholes will say 'but I wasn't doing anything!' about that is the most insidious.

You don't want this person to be your friend, you want them to stay the fuck away from you. Unfortunately, there's a good possibility that your nephew would get suspended from this, as bullies play the teachers and school system far more that you ever could, and teachers seem to ignore things right up until well-deserved retaliation is finally meted out. It's also reason that 'talking it out' with anyone involved isn't going to work.

I spent way too many years of my childhood putting up with that crap, and I'm convinced I could have spared myself a lot of that with a well executed palm to the face.

I'm worried he will become tormented and this bullying will follow him for the rest of his life ad nauseam.I had problems with this until high school - I like to think I'm as any of us are, but it's still a regret of mine that I never made it physical.

[KGS]

One thing that earned me respect was striking a teacher who stepped in to break up the fight...though I wouldn't recommend that course of action.

Somehow, your nephew needs to conquer his fear of the bullies. They torment him because he's afraid of them. And it's not so simple as pretending to not be afraid (although it can help) -- bullies can smell fear, even if it's hidden or repressed, and the fear empowers them. Once your nephew learns to get over his fear, the bullies will find another target.

How does that work? Well...that's the tricky part, I haven't got a clue. But forget about talking to the teachers or the bully's parents -- that method just makes things worse.

[Clothahump]

Or, in my son's case:

1. Get grabbed by an older kid on the first day of the last week of school and get slammed into a locker, almost losing an eye in the process.

2. Turn around.

3. Front snap kick to the solar plexus, launching the older kid across the hall. End of fight. Older kid never bothers son again.

4. Get suspended any way, which was the older kids' plan all along.

5. Watch as Mom rips the principal several new ones about their absolutely stoopid rules, pointing out that Mom has been teaching several girls in 7th grade how to fight for the past several years, and they're going to be freshman next year, and very much do not have a victim mentality.

If step 5 did not result in reinstatement with a clean record, then

6. Watch as Mom and Dad sue the school board and the principal, as well as having the principal arrested as an accessory to the original assault. Also listen as they call every radio and TV station in town and spread the word about this story. Laugh your ass off watching the principal and the school board scuttle like cockroaches away from the people with microphones.

These idiotic ZT rules will stay in effect until we, as parents and taxpayers, do something about them. You gotta absolutely walk it to them with everything you possibly can.

[Dung Beetle]

1. Verbal request. "Hey, stop doing that, please. I don't like it!"
2. Remove yourself from the offender. Walk away.
3. Request adult intervention or peer counseling.
4. Repeat verbal request, and add a warning. "Please stop doing that. If you don't, I will slug you."
5. Slug.


I like it.

[Shagnasty]

I agree that "ignore them and they will go away" and "turn the other cheek" or possibly the worst pieces of advice that you can give a kid. I had a very scary experience with that my senior year of high school. It wasn't pure bullying so much as very sincere death threats from a local Crips gang member. He and his friends kept telling me over and over that they were going to kill me and they set a date for a showdown. The told me to meet them right after school in a wooded area and if I wasn't there, horrible things would ensue. I couldn't get many people to go with me for obvious reasons but I still went and when I broke into the clearing, there were about 20 black guys up to age thirty standing in a rough circle. My aggressor was standing in the middle and I just walked up and tried to punch him but basically missed. We fell to the ground and started wrestling and beating. The circle closed in and I started getting kicked and beaten from them. The few friends that went with me were getting beaten as well even though they were putting up a good fight. Suddenly, the Sheriff's Department burst in and started making arrest. One of my female friends tipped them off. Some of the older guys did indeed have pipes and pistols and everything else it turns out. It could have been really bad news They let me go. The principle and football coach called me in the next day and told me how proud they were of me. Those guys never even spoke to me again.

[saoirse]

Yeah, I think that image is definitely BS, but my WAG is that there is some truth to the idea that - like many/most predators - bullies prefer easier victims. It might be worth 1 grade school tussle, in order to lessen the likelihood of continual hassles.

My experience was in a small town with a strictly enforced social order. The stuff that Big Bad Voodoo Lou was dealing with is completely foreign to me. A bully who did something like beating an injured kid with his own crutches would have gotten his ass kicked by other bullies, if not by an adult. So I'm not sure how much relavance it has to dealing with bullies today.

[Jurph]

I had experience with four bullies in elementary and junior high. In all four cases I was the kid being picked on. In three of the four cases, the bully stopped because of violence on my part. The pattern for these three is the same: the bully engaged in a predictable pattern of petty humiliation. For as long as they were only humiliating me, I smiled, laughed it off, and said things like (for example) "Wow, I wish I could be as cool as you," or "I bet I'd be really popular if I could find someone to pick on, too!" but as soon as anything they did crossed the line to causing me physical pain, I opened up on them.

The "one punch in the nose" canard is not true, by the way. You never hit a bully just once. Read the first chapter of Ender's Game; the way you deal with a bully is to spaz out on him. Go big, go violent, and escalate. If you're going to get suspended for fighting, make it worthwhile. Don't teach "one good punch" to a kid who can't put anything behind it. The three fights I ended up in were all over in a few seconds because the bully was surprised as hell that I had done anything, and before he could even try to fight back he was already on the defensive. I generally ended up with a bloodied nose (but I get those just flying on planes) and the bully with scrapes and bruises on his face and neck. I only knocked one of them to the ground with one punch, but he started to scramble to get up and so I had to kick him a few times.

The fourth bully, by the way, was one of the scary ones -- the kind you can tell are mentally unstable. He was using drugs in 7th grade, he came to school drunk occasionally, and there was no telling what he was going to do. He got caught with a knife at one point, and my dad heard about it. He told me if the kid was bullying me to just get away; don't be near him, ever. He would give me shit now and again but generally ignored me. One day he started throwing bars of soap at me in the gym shower. The gym teacher heard one of the other kids hollering about it, came into the shower room and cleared us all out back into the gym except this guy. Silence for about three minutes, then hollering like the Voice Of God for twenty seconds, and then a crack like a gunshot... and the kid screamed like a little girl as the sound repeated over and over. In my middle school the teachers were permitted to use corporal punishment, and Mr. Bunting sentenced the kid on the spot to one lick of the paddle for every bar of soap he had thrown. I think he got something like twelve strokes before he lost his voice from squealing. So I'm basically in favor of corporal punishment now. :eek:

[handsomeharry]

I just noticed that many of the punch the bully scenarios where the victim got a severe reprisal only consisted of one punch. perhaps the old wives tale could be vindicated if it were amended to something like "Punch the bully in the face until your arms are tired, or if you leave a severe scar, he will crumple like a rag doll."


I believe that a parent should let the principal know that he will hold said principal accountable for failure to force immediate compliance by bully. After all, this is how 'the system' would deal with parents for such willful omissions as not forcing attendance at school.

Just a thought...can't a child inform the police of a physical assault on himself from another student? Just because a school doesn't want that to happen is no reason to say that a crime hasn't been committed.

hh

[phall0106]

We've gone through a bit of this with Hallboy (who is a complete and utter pacivist--he simply will not fight back).

For Hallboy, the solution is to be aware of a potential bully and stay the hell away from him/her. In his situation, frequently, it isn't simply one bully, but a bully idiot who is backed up by three or four of his closest friends, who are more than happy to jump in after the first punch is thrown. Four against one, with the odd stacked against Hallboy. I have attempted to get Hallboy to learn to stay away from stupid people doing stupid things, regardless of the situation. (Bullies, as we all know, and often a known entity. Other kids know immediately who is the bully.) When I was a kid, I was the one who would step up for the other kids being bullied. There were many scuffles in the dirt, with me pounding on someone because they dared to bully one of my friends, or a younger kid. Hallboy, though...he's having none of it. Won't defend himself, even when hit.

Another thing is that if bullying is happening on school property, or on the school bus, then let an adult know! As a former school bus driver, I couldn't do anything about behavior I didn't know about! There are several options a driver has (and the school district has), but if it's not known, there's not a whole lot anyone can do about it. Many schools have a no bullying stance and won't tolerate any of it.

[Hey, It's That Guy!]

My experience was in a small town with a strictly enforced social order. The stuff that Big Bad Voodoo Lou was dealing with is completely foreign to me. A bully who did something like beating an injured kid with his own crutches would have gotten his ass kicked by other bullies, if not by an adult. So I'm not sure how much relavance it has to dealing with bullies today.
I probably didn't explain clearly enough -- my friend was a normal (not huge) kid, and the bully was a gigantic football thug who was on crutches from a game-related injury. However, it didn't stop him from using them as weapons to beat my friend with.

FWIW, I went to a very racially-mixed high school in Miami in the mid-'90s, probably over half Hispanic, with the rest an uneasy mix of whites and blacks. There were plenty of gangs, and we even had a few mini-race riots. Whenever fights broke out, the same situation occurred: Person A would push Person B and the fight started, and everyone else would go crazy and start running around, until Person C inevitably pushed or crashed into Person D, in which case another satellite fight would start, and more people would start running around.

[Grossbottom]

Another vote to fight it out. I got chased down by a pair when I was in the sixth grade, I waited for the dumber one to touch me and then I put a fist in his eye. He went down like a punk, and his friend was just standing there gaping at me. I was a superhero at school for months, and my dad was gleaming with quiet pride while making a token effort to tell me that fighting wasn't the best solution. When the bully's parents came in to whine about it, the principal told them to fuck right off. The bully didn't become my friend, and still tried to talk big, but he never did it within fifteen feet of me again. And if he can't hit the guy in the face, there's always the balls.

[Hentor the Barbarian]

We just had to deal with this very situation this past year. My son had experienced some problems with one particular child from time to time through elementary school. Last year, they switched to middle school (5th grade), and my son began being picked on more regularly on the school bus by this kid. We weren't aware of it until my son was really clearly upset one day after school. The harrassment had escalated to tripping and pushing him down the stairwell of the bus.

I absolutely advocated fighting back, but my son just would not do so. We communicated our concerns to the principal, noting the explicit rules the school district has in place about bullying. Her initial attempts to place the child in a specific seat on the school bus seem to have been subverted by the bus driver, who let the kid continue to move around the bus, and apparently allowed stuff like tripping my son and pushing him down the stairwell to go unremarked upon.

We documented everything, particularly our correspondence with the principal, and I amped up the degree to which I referred to our need to have this stopped or we would be pursuing further recourse through whatever means we could. I also noted that the school bus driver was both failing to enforce the standing rules of the school district as well as the principal's attempted intervention.

I was fairly surprised, but the bullying stopped after that.

I think in general that the idea of turning the other cheek is a good one, but it really doesn't help in the bullying situation. I think that the effects of bullying are incredibly long lasting, particularly if they aren't resolved by the child sticking up for him or herself.

[Count Blucher]

My pre-college school days were never fun, as I had a parent who was a teacer in the same school system teaching a very un-hip subject. Every bad grade she gave out meant some kind of confrontation to me. Like Billy Joel says, it taught me to fight and to lose 'ok', but I tell every teacher I meet the same thing: Never have your kid in the same school where you work. Working out 'vacation schedule differences' is a whole lot better than having poor grades taken out of your kid's hide.

When my eldest son came to me and said he'd been picked on repeatedly, I finally gave in on something he had wanted but was expensive: Karate classes. He's been in it less than a year, but he has earned a belt and his self-confidence has improved tremendously. Also, those 'being picked on' incidents seem to have almost gone away. No, he isn't playing Bully, its just that the Bullies from before have moved on to easier pickings.

[Hey, It's That Guy!]

My pre-college school days were never fun, as I had a parent who was a teacer in the same school system teaching a very un-hip subject. Every bad grade she gave out meant some kind of confrontation to me. Like Billy Joel says, it taught me to fight and to lose 'ok', but I tell every teacher I meet the same thing: Never have your kid in the same school where you work. Working out 'vacation schedule differences' is a whole lot better than having poor grades taken out of your kid's hide.
My parents are both teachers in Miami-Dade County's public schools -- my father in a middle school and my mother in a high school. For this very reason, they didn't allow my brother and I to go to the same schools they taught at (even though they are both generally very popular and well-liked teachers).

[Honey]

I was a shy petite girl. I think I was in 6th grade when this boy started bullying me. His friends wanted nothing to do with it so I don't know what his motivation was. After a couple weeks of his harassment, I finally hauled off and punched him in the face. It stopped right there. For years he was known as the dude who got beat up by a girl.

My principals response? "Good for you Jill!!"

Once in a great while you've got to do something that's wrong in order to set things right.

[grayhairedmomma]

My daughter is 9 and has been the target of bullying at least in some part for the past two years. She had a lazy eye and really crooked front teeth, plus she's a little bit of a bookworm. (She has lots of friends and spends lots of time playing with other kids - but will sometime just sit by the wall and read.) She had surgery which corrected her lazy eye a year ago and she got braces this summer which have already had a huge impact on her appearance - you can barely even tell that her teeth were misshappen. But she also began wearing glasses this summer (although I've picked the most stylish ones I could get.)

Anyway - I said all that to say that there were/are clear reasons that she was being picked on (not excusing the kids for doing so). I do believe that parents have the responsibility to minimize the number of issues that their kid could be picked on for. Poor parents need to make sure that their kid is at least clean and well groomed. If you have the means to get your kid clothes that are stylish (not necessarily designer clothes) than you should do that. Teach your kids how to behave in socially appropriate ways. Make sure your kid has some knowledge of the current fads (toys, books, cartoons, sport thing, etc) so that they'll have some way to connect with other kids.

This is what I've been teaching her:

Physical violence (she's been the target of a few instances)
If someone hits her she is to tell them ONCE not to do that again and walk away if possible (under no circumstances is she to run*). If they hit her again she is to hit them back and harder than they hit her (we practiced punching). The point is to deter them from hitting her again. If it turns into a full-on fight then her goal is to hit the person as much and as hard as it takes so that she can get away. I told her that I will ALWAYS back her up on this as long as she is not the aggressor. She could expect to get in trouble from the principal but she would not get in trouble at home.

The first time she felt confident enough to implement this (and really the first time I gave up on the pc nonsense and really pushed her to respond physically) was this spring shortly before school let out. There was this girl who would just walk up to her at recess and hit her. And my kid would do nothing except tell the teacher (which was effectively worthless**). Finally after complaining about it a few times to me, I made her practice hitting me in the arm so she could get over being nervous about hitting someone. The next day she went to school and saw the other girl coming towards her at recess. My kid hit the other girl really hard before the girl had a chance to do anything. She cried and went running to the teacher and of course they both got hauled down to the principal's office. My kid told her side of the story and the other girl confessed to hitting her (surprisingly). The end result was that the bully lost all recess priviledges for the remainder of the school year after being suspended for a few days. No punishment for my kid and the bully left her alone. :)

Teasing
The big, big goal here is to not let on that you're bothered by the teasing. I do believe that if the bully isn't getting the desired reaction he/she is less likely to bother you the next time. I've been giving her stock responses, scenarios to act out and we practice by teasing each other lightheartedly. She isn't good with stinging retorts yet, but luckily the teasing she gets is easy enough to respond too. For instance some little brat kept calling her "brace face" so she would say to him (in a condescending way) "Noooo, my braces are on my teeth, not all over my face. See, teeth (points to teeth) face (points to face). Geez, even my baby sister knows the difference." And for the few times she was called "four eyes" she would say "No, no, no. I have two eyes, lets count them, see 1....2. Do you need to go to kindergarten and learn to count again?" She's had great success with the smart ass comments - gets the other kids laughing at the bully instead of her***.



*This will change as her ability to read situations and the possibility of life threatening ones increases.
**In general, the teachers at her school are fantastic and the principal is very hard-nosed and strict about bullying. But there will always be teachers who's reaction to something is that if they didn't see it then it didn't happen. Fair or not.
***This will need to change also in the coming years as she will need to learn when saying something instead of walking away will cause more trouble than it's worth. But for now it's building her confidence and making her less of a target.

I think, like KGS said, the key is to not be afraid. Realistic roleplaying & practice helps bigtime, especially with grade school kids. When you know what to do in a specific situation you're less afraid of that situation.

[Hey, It's That Guy!]

My parents always promised that if I got in a fight at school and it was justified (self-defense, or standing up to a bully), they would not only defend me if I got in trouble, but I'd get some kind of present for being awesome.

[msmith537]

I would say if your kid feels he can take the guy, beat the ever living crap out of him. Then again, that's my solution to everything.

[ZipperJJ]

The middle ground is what I am looking for, and I believe if he speaks with his Karate teacher and say's something like... "I don't want to learn how to kick the bully's ass, I just want to be able to defend myself with dignity..." I think he will learn very well... Anyone agree?

Absolutely have him speak with his karate teacher. And if the karate teacher doesn't help him learn to defend himself with confidence, it's time to find the kid a new karate school.

In my school, I think out of about 90 moves we're taught by the time you're an adult brown belt, three are offensive. All the rest show you how to move out of the way, control the offender's hand/weapon/body and get a quick jab in where needed.

With the younger kids they really stress shouting and confidence when confronted, and being able to walk away when possible. I think this is great.

[Cluricaun]

Oh god, I was bullied mercilessly in high school. We were another school where “tough guys” traveled in packs and beat downs could end up as hospital stays, and I was a punk rock kid and a skater with a real smart mouth about insults and the audacity to talk to girls like normal human beings, and I got endless amounts of shit about it from jocks and burnouts. My parents went for the PC thing at first, and then immediately shifted to the fight back mentality when they saw how futile that was. As often as not I got my ass handed to me, but there is definitely more respect given to guys who go down swinging and lands a few good punches. After a while you learn that most guys don’t really know how to fight and a kick to the nuts and a good couple of face shots could take care of most bullies.

I wish I had learned that earlier and that I would have stood up for myself at a younger age. There is never any shame in sticking up for yourself, and sometimes that means fighting for it. Good life lesson to learn as soon as possible.

[934spe]

I vote for a Pre-emptive first strike. This always works with any potential conflict. :)

[KGS]

I vote for a Pre-emptive first strike. This always works with any potential conflict. :) In most cases, perhaps. But I don't think the bullies are hiding any WMD's...

[Indygrrl]

If he punches the kid and wins the fight it will give him confidence that will last a long, long time. If he punches the kid and gets his butt whooped, he's still going to have more confidence than if he just stood there and took the bullying time after time.

[Beware of Doug]

If my kid is being Bullied on the bus, I'd pop him in the nose. It's a tough world out there, and the bullies of today will be the bosses of tomorrow. Wouldn't want him to be a problem employee, now, would we? So. Better learn the lesson early.

:rolleyes:

[Draax]

IME, the only thing a bully understands is peace through superior firepower. You don't have to even win the fight against the bully. If you hurt him, he'll go after easier prey.

Story time!!!

I was in kindergarten. After the first couple of months, I started riding the bus instead of having Mom drive me. There was an 8th grader named Michael Keel that was a total dick. Constantly in trouble, raised hell every day, etc. Anyway he sat next to me one afternoon and made me cry by taking out his pocket knife and telling me he was going to cut out my asshole.

The next afternoon, I walked up to Mrs. Beason the bus driver, and told her that I'd heard Michael calling her "a b-i-c-h." Was a complete lie, but I'd seen another little bastard get his ass tore up for it. So she took me to Mr. Logan's office (he was the highschool principal) and had me tell him what I heard Michael say. I was *really* intimidated but I knew I had to go through with it. He thanked me and Mrs. Beason sent me back to the bus.

When I got back, Michael wasn't on the bus. Mrs. Beason came back a few minutes later. After a few more minutes, Mr. Logan came out and threw Michael onto the bus. I'll never forget it. He'd removed his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves. Both their faces were really red and were screaming at one another. "I didn't do anything!" "Don't LIE to me boy or I'll bust you again! Now go sit down!" Michael was almost in tears from the frustration and embarassment.

As Michael walked to the back of the bus to sit down, he looked me straight in the eye. We locked eyes for a second and it was one of those weird situations where both people understand each other perfectly without saying a word. Michael was friendly to me from that day on. He even beat the piss out of another guy that was picking on me. I gave him a fruit rollup for that.

[Faruiza]

Wow. I didn't realize how many similar stories there are out there. The one and only time I got in a fight it was all self defense and brought two years of bullying to a screeching ass halt.
The games began in 6th grade with a couple of the serious white trash girls in my class. They used to call me names in front of people, threaten me, grab my bag or my books and spill them as much as possible, but the physical violence didn't start until one Friday when school was letting out.
The big one and her friend were walking behind me in front of the school as close as possible, stepping on my heels and yelling in my ears. When this failed to get the response they wanted, (I kept walking, hoping that they would get bored and knock it off.) the big one hauled off as hard as she could, and with a closed fist, hit me right between my shoulder blades. This was enough to knock the wind out of me and make me drop my books, but I didn't fight back because back then I was TERRIFIED of authority and didn't want to get in trouble for fighting on school grounds. Seeing me gasp for air must have been the reaction the bitch was looking for, because she turned to walk away. Her parting remark to me was, "You'd better not even try to come here on Monday you little bitch, because I'm going to make sure you don't make it."

I went home and told my Dad what had happened and what was going to happen on Monday. Dad took me out in the front yard and proceeded to find out if I could defend myself. He must have been satisfied with what he saw, because he told me that if they showed up on Monday, to give her what she had coming to her and he would back me up.

Monday morning came and as I was walking down my driveway to walk to school, I saw the big one and her jackass friend waiting for me a little ways up the street. I heard them yelling at me immediately. I kept walking, praying that they weren't serious, but they were escalating. They caught up with me right before I got out on the main street in the church parking lot by the school. The little one violently ripped my bag off my shoulder as the big one came at me with a roundhouse. That punch never connected. When it was all said and done a few seconds later, one had a broken nose, and the other had a broken arm. They left and got to school before me and tried to act like nothing had happened. I walked very slowly and cried while my scrapes stung and worried that I was going to get IT when the school found out what I had done. Turns out, my Dad had called the Vice Principal first thing in the morning to let them know what was about to drag in. I got called out of class first thing and went to the Vice Principal's office where the other two were already waiting. They got suspended and I didn't, because they had a reputation for this kind of thing and I didn't, but the thing that always bothered the shit out of me was that the V.P. made me endure her yelling and carrying on and calling all three of us, "fatheads". She threatened to suspend me, which terrified me, but she didn't. The other two had to have someone (I don't know who, because to this day I still have seen no evidence that these two were raised by actual people) pick them up and take them to a doctor to get patched up. I don't really recall ever seeing either one of them much again. That day developed for me a reputation that nobody has ever bothered to challenge. Which was nice.
Damn. Sorry. Didn't mean for that story to go on forever, but that was cathartic. As for the original question, the only thing I can say is that it is invaluable to let your kid know that you are ON THEIR SIDE. If they're too small to defend themselves, try to find a way to circumvent a showdown. If they're big enough and can get the job done, and all other reasonable behavior hasn't stopped it, then teach 'em to dish it out. YMMV and all that. Experience is a fickle teacher sometimes.

[monstro]

grayhairedmomma, I wish you were my mother. You rawk!

I don't know about fighting or snappy retorts, but one thing that helps a lot is making friends on the schoolbus. A bully is more likely to target a singleton. And even if a bully does sneak in a stupid comment or two, the friends will mollify the situation.

When I was in middle school, school bus bullies tried to make my life miserable. They were led by the ugliest, meanest girl in the whole school. Seriously, she looked like Jaba the Hut's little sister. And she and her equally ugly friends were always picking on me and my sister. They had the "premium" seats in the back of the bus--relegating the rest of us to the less cool seats close to the front. If it hadn't been for the friends we had on that bus, the two of us would have been miserable.

When we got to the eighth grade, the group of us decided we were fully entitled to the backseats. The bullies has expanded to include lowly seventh graders...and it just didn't seem fair that they could push us out of what was rightfully ours. So we staged a sit-in. We filled the backseats before the Bullies got on the bus. They were so pissed off when they discovered us in "their"seats that they sat their fat asses in our laps, thinking they would kill us with their weight. But eventually, because they were stupid and lazy, they gave up and surrendered. We got their seats and they moved to the less cool seats. Never again were my sister and I bullied or harrassed, and we were able to enjoy the victory of defeating evil without adult intervention.

[saoirse]

In most cases, perhaps. But I don't think the bullies are hiding any WMD's...


I don't know. I think the bully would welcome the kid as a liberator.

[JohnT]

I fought bullies. I was a little nerd with horn-rimmed glasses who looked like an easy target.

I probably was, but they didn't see how anger affected me... until they pissed me off.

I didn't win them all, but they all stopped after the fight.

I also didn't fight fair: what's fair to a bully? "Fair", to me, was anything I could do to get my point across. And if you lost an earlobe to my teeth in the process... well, Mr Bully, you should've thought about "fairness" before you started teasing me.

[BwanaBob]

Man it was great to have a much bigger older brother.

One solution, granted not available to all, is to put your kid in private school.
They don't tolerate this shit one bit; the bully is usually out of there before he knows what hit him.

I think public schools should also have this policy. I feel no obligation for my tax money to educate "incorrigible bastards".

[Shirley Ujest]

You can do what my MIL did.

Some one was bullying my husband ( Mr. Non-Confrontation) when he was 8 or so and he came home crying. His mom took him to the bully's house and told the other mom what was going on. That stopped that right there.

[XaMcQ]

Another vote for going balistic on the bullies. I was never popular in school; I was bookish, wore braces and glasses and was generally geeky. I was teased a lot, but only from a distance after I pushed one S.O.B. down a flight of stairs a beat the crap out of another. Surprise is a great element. The bullies seldom expect smaller, weaker kids to snap, scream like demons and come at them with a will and fury to kill them if at all possible. The important thing to convey, imoh, is that you are not going to take it, even if you get hurt.

Still, things are different for boys. Girls are not often subjected to the same level of phyiscal abuse, just endless snubbing, taunting and humilation.

[bouv]

Some one was bullying my husband ( Mr. Non-Confrontation) when he was 8 or so and he came home crying. His mom took him to the bully's house and told the other mom what was going on. That stopped that right there.

Well, that only works if the parents of the bully care.

I have some quotes from a couple of pieces of pop culture. First off, The Simpsons:

Homer: Son, there's only one thing punks like that understand: squealing. You've got to squeal to every teacher and every grown-up you can find. Coming to me was a good start.

Bart: But then they'll just beat me up even worse!

Homer: Yes, they are a clever bunch.

The second is from Babylon 5:

John Sheridan (quoting his father): Never start a fight, but always finish one.

[kunilou]

Much as I'd love to provide an always-effective "no fight back" scenario to bullying, I have exactly one instance where it worked.

When my daughter started high school, her route home crossed that of a very large, very aggressive kid still in middle school. Changing routes and varying her timetable didn't work. Anytime the other kid saw her, he went after her.

Finally we talked to the police officer assigned to the high school. The next day, as my daughter walked home, the bully actually crossed the street to get her. The officer, who was down the block watching, drove up with lights on and threatened the kid with every law he could think of. The bully never came close to my daughter again.

Now, not everyone has the advantage of a police officer looking out for them. But, like monstro suggests, having a few friends with you - even nerdy, geeky friends - may be intimidating enough to have the bully go after someone else. The next day, you can invite that victim to join you.

[don't ask]

An earlier thread provocatively titled Ways to deal with bullying (that work) (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=306089).

[msmith537]

...having a few friends with you - even nerdy, geeky friends - may be intimidating enough to have the bully go after someone else. The next day, you can invite that victim to join you.

You don't have to run faster than the bully..just faster than the slowest of your nerdy friends! :D


Seriously, that's what you want. To bond with a bunch of social outcasts and bully magnets.

Or, a better idea is to learn to connect with people who aren't social outcasts. As I pointed out in the thread don't ask linked to, bullies go after people they identify as not fitting in.

[WhyNot]

You can do what my MIL did.

Some one was bullying my husband ( Mr. Non-Confrontation) when he was 8 or so and he came home crying. His mom took him to the bully's house and told the other mom what was going on. That stopped that right there.
Again, how did she stop it? I'm at a loss for how I would handle it if another parent or someone for the school came to me and told me my kid was being a bully. What do I do? Ground him? Lecture him? Take away his Gameboy? Hit him? None of those sound very effective, frankly. Luckily, this hasn't come up for me, because I have no idea what I'd do on that end of things.

[dropzone]

This is IMHO, where I normally don't tread and doesn't require cites, right? Excuse me, since I'm new at this.

(ahem)

When I was six I socked the neighborhood a good one that left him crying for Mama. When we were in high school he petioned to be the first boy allowed in a Home Economics class.

Do the math, though I think he was just looking for what he expected to be an easy A. He obviously never heard all the cuts of beef he'd be expected to memorize.

[Rilchiam]

I also didn't fight fair: what's fair to a bully? "Fair", to me, was anything I could do to get my point across. And if you lost an earlobe to my teeth in the process... well, Mr Bully, you should've thought about "fairness" before you started teasing me.

I didn't fight fair either, but the thing is, my elementary school didn't have a problem with boys hitting girls. They did have a problem with girls hitting back. Because girls were supposed to be little ladies, and the only acceptable response to being hit by a boy was to cry and run to the teacher. If a boy hit a girl with his fist, well, boys will be boys. If the girl bit the boy's finger, or slung a plastic jumprope at him, or hit him in the eye with the corner of her book, that was a problem child.

I hope things have changed since then.

[sturmhauke]

Being perceived as slightly insane will get bullies to leave you alone. I was always the skinny, nerdy type, but what people who didn't know me failed to realize was that I was also in pretty good shape from bicycling everywhere. One elementary school I went to was an occasional hangout for older kids in the evenings and summer. Once an older boy decided to shove me around, so I managed to jump on his back and squeeze his ribs with my legs. I wasn't strong enough to cause any major damage, but he was pretty bruised afterwards. Another time I wailed on the much larger bully with my bookbag full of books.

However, there are also situations where you have to learn to get away. In 8th grade I went to Denman Middle School in San Francisco, which was next to Balboa High. These were two of the worst schools in the city, and I was one of only a handful of "white" kids there. (I'm actually half Filipino but don't really look it.) I had a few friends, but I also got mobbed pretty frequently. I got away if i could and fought back if I was cornered. One time I was ambushed and surrounded by about 10 or 20 guys a block away from school. They gave me a black eye and some cuts on my face and broke my glasses. I had to go back to the school and have my mom pick me up. We actually filed a police report, but I couldn't identify anyone well enough so I don't know if anything came of it.

[Whifton_Polekitty]

Being perceived as slightly insane will get bullies to leave you alone.

Worked for me, too.

Elementary school, I was the Weird Kid. I got some teasing but no bullying because being teased made me grin and stare at their throats.

Intermediate/Middle school worked aboutt he same, although minor bullying occurred until I was observed that I was unfazed by walking on a foot-wide ledge 8 stories up to get to a phone switch room. (The phact that it was a phone switch room impressed other kids, too).

High school was trickier, as I didn't end up at the same school as most of my friends who respected my... colorful nature. I was the odd one no doubt, but had to prove myself. Early in my freshman year, when the football players were starting to make menacing faces and cracking their knuckles at me, another freshman set off a pretty sizable pipe bomb in a bathroom across the hall from where I was waiting for class. I knew who had done it as he'd left the bathroom with a grin and made a "Shush!" motion, and tracked him down later. Told him I wanted to learn how to do that.

We became good friends, and once people realized I was running with that crew, I never got bothered (except by the do-gooders, but they were more interested in turning me away from my life of crime and getting in touch with smoe guy they knew named Haysoos or something).

And before anyone freaks out, I've never made a bomb, nor blown up a bathroom. But they were good friends to have.

[Baffle]

I was observed that I was unfazed by walking on a foot-wide ledge 8 stories up to get to a phone switch room. How does a twelve-year-old get into this situation where others of his age can see? I want to hear some more details, it sounds like an interesting story.

My solution was to grow to be 6'5" and start dressing in all black. Then Columbine came and nobody bothered me any more. :o

[Whifton_Polekitty]

How does a twelve-year-old get into this situation where others of his age can see? I want to hear some more details, it sounds like an interesting story.

There were a pair of skater fscks in my school that alternated between tormenting me and tolerating me.


Detail 1: My father taught at the local University, and I spent virtually all of my spare time lurking there... You know, hanging out reading in the research library, building hacking, social engineering at the computer center... Good healthy geek education.

Detail 2: Said Uni was ripe for skaters. I don't think campus security did anything other than harrass skaters.

Detail 3: Tropical climate, so many of the buildings had open/semi-open air construction.


So I bumped into, we'll call them "Phil" and "Matt" one day. They were feeling friendly that particular day, and in effect asked me to get them into trouble. So, knowing where the phone switch room for the campus was (for some reason on top of the chemistry building... It was a very old NorTel switch IIRC) I figured that would be a good place to start.

The staircase for the building was external, so at the top floor I was able to squeeze through the narrow concrete slats that made up the external stairway wall, around the locked switch room outside door via the building ledge, back through onto the... external switch room access room, I guess you'd call it, and then open the door from the inside.

No, security really wasn't this campus' big goal.

Yes, this scored me major brownie points with Phil and Matt. I also took them into the chem building's store rooms, the geophysical sciences crypts, and... Geeze, I thikn I taught them how to get free food from the cafeteria.

[Eleusis]

I think it's a lot like (what I've heard and read about) being in prison.

There's no shame in getting your ass kicked, as long as you fight back. To the contrary, I think. Back down, and you'll get "turned out" and be somebody's "punk" forever.

Regardless, you just might get in a "lucky shot" and bloody the nose of someone twice your size, and by the second or third time, it won't be worth it for the bully, regardless.

[Shirley Ujest]

Again, how did she stop it? I'm at a loss for how I would handle it if another parent or someone for the school came to me and told me my kid was being a bully. What do I do? Ground him? Lecture him? Take away his Gameboy? Hit him? None of those sound very effective, frankly. Luckily, this hasn't come up for me, because I have no idea what I'd do on that end of things.



I strongly suspect that the shock of a heavily accented german woman at your door step with a little boy that probably wanted to die on the spot didn't make you say, " son, I don't want that large german woman at my door again. Stop punching her kid or I'm gonna punch you one."

[Shakes]

IMO; A kid needs to learn to not be affraid of an ass kick'n.


I'd say he should chanllenge him at least once. Then take it from there.

If the bully winds up beating him to a pulp; it will be all that much more easier to convince the authorities to get that kid out of there.

[Nawth Chucka]

I pity the child who ever hits any child that is ever in my charge. I won't bore you w/ the details of my ten years' worth of daily beatings at the hands of my brother and the neighbor kids. I was a tall skinny girl and lived my life in fear of my dad and brother at home and the kids at school. My parents did nothing to stop it; mom knew and didn't care to do anything more than a phone call while my dad didn't know and I wasn't allowed by mom to tell him. There was one girl who played a game of "I'm your friend today! No, actually, I'm not and I beat you up!" with me pretty often from 3rd grade through high school. She was in my bible study all that time, too.
Tell your nephew to hit back and don't stop until the other kid flees.

[monstro]

You don't have to run faster than the bully..just faster than the slowest of your nerdy friends! :D


Seriously, that's what you want. To bond with a bunch of social outcasts and bully magnets.

Or, a better idea is to learn to connect with people who aren't social outcasts. As I pointed out in the thread don't ask linked to, bullies go after people they identify as not fitting in.

See, my schoolbus friends weren't nerds. They were actually more popular and cooler than the bullies. But the thing was that they were NICE and didn't care that I was clumsy and goofy. Bullies are not always cool or popular. The victims of bullying are not always social outcasts. I was actually more popular than the bullies were...perhaps that's why I was always on their radar. Perhaps they were jealous.

Even when I was teased at my worst, I had friends. Not a ton of them, but I had some. Making friends, not just learning how to fight, is the best way to prevent and mitigate the cruelty of bullies. It really doesn't matter how "cool" your friends are. They are still friends.

Even if your friends ARE nerds, it's still better than being a lone victim. A friend will convince you that the bullies are jerks and that all that name-calling is a bunch of malarky. If your friend gets beat up along with you, at least you can go home and lick each others wounds. And if it ever comes down to a fight, you can have each other's backs. You'll suffer through in-school suspension together, if it comes to that. And after that, no one will fuck with ya'll again. You'll be known as Those Guys Who Will Fuck You Up. And the two of you will have memories that will last a lifetime.

I know I still carry with me the memory of me and my friends outsmarting the bullies on the bus.

[Sam Stone]

I wonder if bullying has gotten worse since corporal punishment was abolished in school?

I went to school in the 70's, when corporal punishment was allowed. Each school I went to had a designated 'scary male' teacher, who's job was to put the fear of God into bullies. And it worked. I remember in particular a bully who used to walk around and hit kids in the chest with a 'spear hand' (fingers outstretched). One day the scary vice principle saw him do it and make another kid cry, and he marched over to him, grabbed him by the shirt, threw him up against the lockers, and gave him a taste of his own medicine three or four times, with a promise to do it harder next time if he even heard a hint of the kid bullying anyone else. I don't recall that bully bothering anyone again.

Back then, teachers were our protectors. They kept order and made us feel safer. Now, they've been defanged and the bullies know it. And since many bullies don't care about grades, the only tools the teachers have (threats of poor grades, suspension, etc) are useless. So all we've done by abolishing corporal punishment is give the bullies free reign to pick on the little kids.

We still had bullying, but it was almost always off the school grounds. Bullies would try to get you on the walk home or in some other place where there was no supervision.


Other than that observation, I'd say that the best defense against a bully is to present a confident attitude and not shrink away from the bully. Teasing should be met by a confident, possibly amused attitude, like you think the bully is just an idiot. Don't show that it bothers you. Threats of violence should be met with an aggressive attitude. Stare the bully down, and let him know that he can try, and maybe he'll win, but he'll pay a price. If you do that well, hopefully it will never go any further.

[msmith537]

See, my schoolbus friends weren't nerds. They were actually more popular and cooler than the bullies. But the thing was that they were NICE and didn't care that I was clumsy and goofy. Bullies are not always cool or popular. The victims of bullying are not always social outcasts. I was actually more popular than the bullies were...perhaps that's why I was always on their radar. Perhaps they were jealous.


No, you are right of course. Bullies are themselves often social outsiders who like to throw their weight around.

The essence of people who are douchebags is that they feel inferrior in some way - socially, academically, financially, whatever. So when they achieve some success and power or if they happen to be physically larger, they lash out with it.




Back then, teachers were our protectors. They kept order and made us feel safer.


Unles they themselves became the bullies.

[Tamerlane]

Back then, teachers were our protectors. They kept order and made us feel safer. Now, they've been defanged and the bullies know it. And since many bullies don't care about grades, the only tools the teachers have (threats of poor grades, suspension, etc) are useless. So all we've done by abolishing corporal punishment is give the bullies free reign to pick on the little kids.

We still had bullying, but it was almost always off the school grounds. Bullies would try to get you on the walk home or in some other place where there was no supervision.

Hmmm...dunno. I think it was more situational than that and I'll offer a counter anecdote from the early 80's.

In one of my junior highs, which I attended one year ( in Michigan, in a suburb of Detroit ) our large, bald, intimidating principal had the nickname 'Terrible Ivan' and acted the part with troublemakers and bullies. He actually used a hockey stick to break up fights ( not walloping anybody necessarily, but levering them apart and pinning them against a wall ). He was an active bully hunter ( and quite gentle with the 'good kids' ) and I saw him throw many a young rowdy up hard against the lockers.

Despite that, that school was rife was bullying - in hallways, schoolyards and locker rooms. Indeed it's the only school I ever attended where physical initiations of incoming freshmen was accepted custom. It was also the only year I was ever bullied to a worrying extent, though thankfully he was an equal opportunity thug who terrified everyone and I was no higher on his radar than anyone else.

So I'm not sure that things are any better, but barring more concrete evidence I'd question if they're any worse.

And for the record I'm generally not a fan of corporal punishment in schools ( or anywhere, really ).

- Tamerlane

[Boyo Jim]

Is the nephew being physically hit and/or pushed around, or humilitated and made fun of.

Your nephew has a right to respond with force if force is being used against him. He does not have that right if some jackass is verbally tormenting him.

Give us more details if you can.

[saoirse]

In one of my junior highs, which I attended one year ( in Michigan, in a suburb of Detroit ) our large, bald, intimidating principal had the nickname 'Terrible Ivan' and acted the part with troublemakers and bullies. He actually used a hockey stick to break up fights ( not walloping anybody necessarily, but levering them apart and pinning them against a wall ). He was an active bully hunter ( and quite gentle with the 'good kids' ) and I saw him throw many a young rowdy up hard against the lockers.

Despite that, that school was rife was bullying - in hallways, schoolyards and locker rooms. Indeed it's the only school I ever attended where physical initiations of incoming freshmen was accepted custom. It was also the only year I was ever bullied to a worrying extent, though thankfully he was an equal opportunity thug who terrified everyone and I was no higher on his radar than anyone else.

Which is no surprise, of course: bullying the bullies doesn't make them stop bullying.

[DanBlather]

I was bullied in grade school. In Jr High it pretty much stopped because I bulked up a bit. In High School I ran into someone who was in grade school with me but went to a different Jr High. He started telling someone he was with the humilaiting name they used to call me. I turned and looked at him with such a murderous glance that he stopped in mid-sentence and never bothered me again. There is a body language that you need to develop. I think the MA training will help. At age 7 getting into a fight is not too dangerous and I think if it continues he should slug the bully hard enough to hurt him. Any beating he gets will hurt less than the humiliation.

[Leaper]

It's interesting that threads like this always concentrate on physical harassment. Maybe because it's more immediate and brutal, and maybe because recommending physical retaliation is more clear in that case. I doubt anyone on this thread would recommend it for harassment that does not involve any physical component at all, and is thus much harder to deal with. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)

[Zebra]

I have had to deal with bullies quite a few times in my life. Half way through my 5th grade year I was transfered to a private Catholic school. Up to this point in my schooling, I only had to deal with some occasional bullies. Nothing on a day in and day out basis. Actually, I was kind of popular.

So, I was really suprised that at the Catholic school, taught by Nuns, I would be subjected to the nastiest kids I would ever know.

So, from the middle of 5th grade through 8th grade, I had to put up with one particular bully by the name of Billy Wolf. That is a perfect bully name. God I hated that kid. Tough and mean and he had great hair so the girls thought he was cute. Somedays were my days. Some days he went after Candy, the fat girl, or Mark, the mostly deaf kid who talked funny. Sweet guy that Billy. Most of his stuff was emotional mistreatment, not the physical kind.

I wish I could say that I had planned this but I didn't. On the last day we had class, we only had a half day. So the last thing we did, was recess. We all knew that next year we would be in HS and we wouldn't have 'recess' anymore. So, we played kickball. I was picked last. (yes, after the fat girl and even the deaf kid were considered preferable kickball players) Of Billy was one of the captains and his toady was the other.

It is getting near the end of recess. Billy is pitching. I come up to kick. He rolled it to me. I kicked it hard, out to center. I don't know if the ball was caught. I didn't run to first. I ran straight at Billy. He had turned to watch the play. He turned back when I was a few feet from him as I had started my war cry. The look on his face, that mixture of suprise and ,yes, fear, thrilled me. I leapt upon him and in a flash he was on his back and I was on him, punching his face. Four guys tore me off him. Then, just as it was over, my mom drove up to pick me up. The teacher, Sister Denise, told me to go sit in my mom's car. My mom went to the office. My classmates all went inside. A bit later, mom came out and took me home. She said that she told them she was sure Billy deserved what he got and better and that they deserved the same as he had been bullying me for 3 and a half years and they never did anything about it. She asked each the two teachers and the princepal if they Billy was a bully and they all stammered out some excuse and she said 'Shame on you", to the sisters. TO NUNS! God my mom had a set of brass ones.

So, I never had saw Billy again.

And of all the bullies I've had in my life, he is the only one I don't talk about in thearpy.

[sturmhauke]

It's interesting that threads like this always concentrate on physical harassment. Maybe because it's more immediate and brutal, and maybe because recommending physical retaliation is more clear in that case. I doubt anyone on this thread would recommend it for harassment that does not involve any physical component at all, and is thus much harder to deal with. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)
Well, I wouldn't call verbal harrasment bullying, I would call it verbal harrasment. It can be just as bad, of course. For that, you just have to develop a thick skin. Laugh it off, turn it around on the harrasser if you can, or learn to truly ignore it - not just pretending you didn't hear, but really not allowing it to bother you at your core. Basically, this is part of developing a strong sense of self. Other people can only affect you if you allow it.

[scotandrsn]

I usually was not on the bullies' radar much. I knew how to avoid them, and didn't give much of a shit what people who kowtowed to the bullies' physical prowess thought about it.

Then there was the time, in JH or HS, I forget, that my usually unlocked house was locked, and I didn't have the key with me. I sat on my front porch, believing someone was coming home soon. The local degenerate inmate-to-be, who lived down the street, walked by, and came up my driveway. He stood there making threats. He noticed my hand clenched by my side, and dared me to hit him. As he was easily twice my size or larger, and my only MA at the time was judo, I didn't. I simpky stared at him, making no move whatsoever, with a complete poker face, and he eventually went away without incident. That's the last I ever was bothered by anyone, other than people calling me weird, which, as I mentioned, I didn't give a shit about from people whose brains only worked that well.

The amount and type of MA that the nephew has learned by age seven is likely too limited and too formalized to do him much good in a street fight.

Any key to deflecting a bully is to make the result of their bullying some other, less desirable outcome than the result they expected. The expected outcome is for the victim to be scared, which somehow satisfies the miserable shit, or for the victim to seek higher authority, which invites the bully to turn to ridicule. Hitting back is always a fallback, but the drawbacks to that are a) that the nephew may get beat up, or b) the nephew may beat up the bully, leading the bully to seek weaker prey, increasing the likelihood of a) for the next victim to try and fight back, with the result that the fight back option's usefulness peters out in a closed system, and you don't know where this particular bully is at in the cycle. Still it's an option, and definitely one whose preparation will give the nephew the sort of self-confidence that may turn bullies' attention elsewhere.

Another option is to pre-emptively bring ridicule on the bully. Think of the setting: a public school bus, which means the bully is attempting to some extent to not attract the attention of the bus driver or other students. So the next time the bully sidles up to the nephew, he can feign surpise and shout out for all to hear: "Eeew! Why are you touching your dinky like that?"

My wife suggests bringing a bag of dogshit on board one day and smashing it in the bully's face.

Just a thought.

[TheLoadedDog]

This is going to sound almost like trolling, so let me give a disclaimer first...

DISCLAIMER: The following won't always work in the real world. Other options are often better (particularly running to an adult).


Now then...

I taught my son never to throw the first punch, but to defend himself with an adequate level of violence if he is in danger. I further told him that if he gets in trouble for it, I'd be up at the school tearing the teachers new arseholes. Anyway, school is a nasty, violent place that is in many ways amazing that our society subjects children to. Contrary to what kids are tols, adult life is MUCH easier than school life. Imagine, for example, going to work in an office job and being tripped up as you walk down the hall. You can't, right? You'd have the cops on them ASAP. School is like prison. And just like prison, the best advice is: YOU ARE GOING TO BE HERE FOR YEARS, SO THE FIRST TIME YOU ARE BULLIED, BELT THE SNOT OUT OF THE GUY. Even if you come off worse, a bloody nose will heal, and you won't have years of misery and being pushed around.

Fight back and fight back hard.

[Jayn_Newell]

It's interesting that threads like this always concentrate on physical harassment. Maybe because it's more immediate and brutal, and maybe because recommending physical retaliation is more clear in that case. I doubt anyone on this thread would recommend it for harassment that does not involve any physical component at all, and is thus much harder to deal with. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.)

I think the general answer to any sort of harassment is to stand up for yourself and show that you're not having any of it. But that's a lot easier done by physical violence. I also feel that most kids who are at the age that they're being bullied probably aren't mature enough to reach the 'screw you, I don't care' stage. I started being picked on when I was ten, and I probably hit that stage around the age of 14, by which point most of it had stopped (although I still have no idea what caused the bantam girls' softball team to dub me 'Superstar').

[don't ask]

And just like prison, the best advice is: YOU ARE GOING TO BE HERE FOR YEARS, SO THE FIRST TIME YOU ARE BULLIED, BELT THE SNOT OUT OF THE GUY. Even if you come off worse, a bloody nose will heal, and you won't have years of misery and being pushed around.

Fight back and fight back hard.

I have always shied away from the using prison as an example but I have heard that you are right. The only two people I know who have served time told me that you attack the first person who looks at you the wrong way or says the wrong thing to you. Both concede that they didn't get off scott free but they were never seen as potential targets.

[Caprese]

I think the general answer to any sort of harassment is to stand up for yourself and show that you're not having any of it. But that's a lot easier done by physical violence. I also feel that most kids who are at the age that they're being bullied probably aren't mature enough to reach the 'screw you, I don't care' stage. I started being picked on when I was ten, and I probably hit that stage around the age of 14, by which point most of it had stopped .
What you describe was similar to my older son's experience.
For him it was sort of a "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" situation.

Everything was fine with him until about 5th grade, the kids he'd hung out with since kindergarten turned on him, and the verbal harassment began, peaking at around age 12. I think it began as competition for the attentions of the coolest, most popular boy, then simply became habit, then a feud. They would throw stuff at him on the school bus and alternately exclude him and harrass him.
There were about 5 of them, with two guys being the worst offenders.
It escalated into shoving matches; it got to the point where I contacted one boy's parents (with the full cooperation of my own son).
Interestingly, during our talk, the parents reminded their son of how he used to feel when So-and-So (another boy we knew) used to pick on him.
The situation was briefly neutralized but was still there.
This is partly why my son chose a different high school to attend--all the golden boys went to our neighborhood school, my son chose another.
The verbal harrassment continued sporadically at rival soccer games, and in a way, that was almost uglier. During free kicks at more than one game, they chanted his name with "Sucks" after it.
These were children of the movers and shakers of our city. :rolleyes:
However, my son grew physically and emotionally, made new friends and while I am sure there are scars, the worst was over by sophomore year.
He mentioned seeing some of these guys at college parties, and how they were friendly and polite, as if nothing had ever happened.
"They grew up," he said.

[robertliguori]

Don't react with violence, be proactive with it. If you announce "Stop or I'll slug you!" every single time, you are putting the ball precisely in the bully's court. What you need to do is respond in kind. If the bully has a history of physically harassing you, the next time you sit next to him, elbow him in the solar plexus. If he is engaging in generalized social harassment, snatch his backpack and throw it into the dumpster.

In short, the simplest way to deal with bullies is to be a better bully. Bullies do what they do because it is effective at getting to someone. You can either try to ignore it (which doesn't provide them any incentive to stop), or you can use this effective tool on one who richly deserves it.

Also, I'd advise avoiding blows to the head as a general rule. Not only is there much increased risk of permanent injury, you'll be more likely to leave marks, which is a bad thing when it comes to comparing notes in front of authority.

I have one situation-specific piece of advice dealing with social bullying. Had to deal with one particularly odious boy in high school who called me gay incessantly.
The teacher was useless, so I decided that if harassment was accepted behavior, I wanted in on this. And the next time he called me gay, I walked up and kissed him full on the lips. Needless to say, he didn't talk to me or look at me ever again.

[look!ninjas]

It would be wonderful to say that all these problems can be solved by talking it out and everything. But in my experience... it never did. What worked for me was kicking the bully in the nuts, then climbing on his back and just pounding him as he flailed around trying to get me off. We both got suspended, and he learned not to pick on little girls, because we fight dirty.

No matter what, you can't tell a kid to get one good punch in and the fight will be over. Even if you can't fight really well, you've got to surprise them with your first hit, and then follow it up by flailing so hard that they can't get near you without bruises. You just keep swinging until they stop trying to hit you or someone pulls you off.

[Sleel]

Sorry to jump on the "pound the little shit" bandwagon but talking it out doesn't do anything most of the time. You need a modicum of maturity for that to work. The kid's seven. Fights at that age are rarely that dangerous. It's better to get a handle on confrontation now than have no idea how to deal with it when he gets older. Sometimes, the simple act of confronting a bully will finish it.

Most of these things have no real reason for starting, so there's nothing to fix through conversation. Getting a conference together does nothing except make the adults feel better about themselves while the kids haven't resolved the core issue: social standing. Often, all that happens from that point is that the bullied kid gets a reputation for calling in the authorities, which makes him or her weak, which makes for a bigger target.

The "pecking order" is behavior that's partly hardwired. Bullies don't have to use violence to enforce their place in the hierarchy, they choose to use it in lieu of other avenues to standing. I like the five-step escalating response posted earlier. Following through on step 5 is essential. Never bluff. Always do what you say you will or the escalation is useless.

I agree with an earlier poster; most of the time you shouldn't start a fight, but if you fight, you finish it. Violence does not lend itself well to half measures. You hurt them and you keep hurting them until they stop fighting, submit, or run away. The shoving matches are often a way to feel out how you'll respond to actual violence. They're working up to more. Don't let them. The very first attempt to shove you or make any kind of physical contact should be your cue to go absolutely ape-shit. With luck, the element of surprise will allow you to make them feel dominated without much need for causing real harm.

If you do have to seriously hurt one or more of them to make them stop, the surprise still works to your advantage, especially if there is a group of bullies and not just one or two. Group situations are always dangerous, as in someone is probably going to the hospital dangerous. Sturmhauke, for example, was very lucky. I was lucky in one of my first serious fights, when it was three future juvie-bound gang-bangers and one undersized me. I was also blessed with good reaction time and a young gymnast's physique, or I might have gotten seriously pounded even before a teacher could break it up.

I'm probably making this sound a little more serious than most because I've been in a couple of life-threatening confrontations in my life. It changes your perspective on violence a little. Those times were mostly not related to bullying, but it colors the way I think about all violent encounters now. Handling a fight in the way I described above increases your chances of not having a serious problem, and paradoxically might even reduce the level of violence you need to use to finish it.

I will definitely be teaching my kids both how to defuse confrontations before they turn into physical violence, and how to make sure that if it does come to any kind of serious fighting, the other kid will need a trip to the hospital before mine will.

[Clothahump]

When my eldest son came to me and said he'd been picked on repeatedly, I finally gave in on something he had wanted but was expensive: Karate classes. He's been in it less than a year, but he has earned a belt and his self-confidence has improved tremendously. Also, those 'being picked on' incidents seem to have almost gone away. No, he isn't playing Bully, its just that the Bullies from before have moved on to easier pickings.

And that is the biggest benefit of martial arts training: self-confidence. Bullies profile for potential targets. They choose the ones to pick on where they think they can get away with it. They don't target confident people.

And if they do, the student has the skills to enforce his telling the bully to lay off.

[Philster]

I chimed in earlier (first response, do the right thing and all that). I was away from my PC for the weekend - sorry for the delay. I was out kicking some asses in my neighborhood . I was arrested and jailed for homicide. I am out on bail now. My wife and mother had to put the homes up as bail and clear out my savings for a retainer to get a lawyer. Hey, I was just defending myself!!

I added the first response to this thread. I suggested doing the right thing. I was vague. I also said my son was a bully when he started school. He was a kindergartner kicking the ass of a second grader. Said second grader thought his job as a second grader was to torture my son.

My son was labeled a bully when he was in fact defending himself. My son was smashing the second grader's head into the gym floor repeatedly after the second grader taunted him and headbutted him.

Imagining my son killing this second grader was NOT a stretch by ANY MEANS. Further, the other parents were considering filing suit, but the school principal (Catholic School) convinced them not to, but they scurried off to a doctor and were concerned about nueroligical problems and such. Waiting for the lawsuit that never came: Stress on levels I care not to discuss.

I am one of the least PC people around. Many of you, I would actually like to kick your asses, and could probably kill quite a few of you. My son could have killed that little boy. Because I actually act civily and got my son to understand that even though he was taunted/headbutted, he still should not have done something physical, we are all safe and happy in our home. My son shows great restraint, and has done the right thing ever since: Tell an adult and such.

So, PC sucks, and defending one's self is necessary at times, but I might have been less than 30-seconds from having a son accused of murder, labeled a bully and spotlighted on numerous news programs.

It is a dangerously thin line.

[Zoe]

Philster, you are the last hope that public education has. I understand the feelings of the others, but they are tearing the system apart. The violence, disempowered teachers, irrational requirements and ineffective administrators have produced one overwhelming sucking sound that drowns out everything else.

Don't tell the seven year old nephew to fight back, for heaven's sake. Tell him to tell the bus driver. Tell his parents to tell the principal. If they've done this already, tell them to tell the principal that the problem continues and that if the school cannot protect their son while he is under their care, there will be consequences.

Also, principals hate bad publicity for their schools. Threaten to go to the next level above the principal -- or even worse, threaten to go to the police with assault charges or to talk to the newspapers about a story on school bus assaults for this school.

As a general rule, the teachers and the parents need to present a united front. That is best for the student. Any disagreements with the teachers or the principals should be handled without the child knowing about it. I never knew how many battles my parents fought for me until long after I graduated. If I had known, the teachers would have had little control over me.

So if you tell you children that you'll "tear those teachers a new arsehole" under any circumstances, you have lowered the respect that your child might have for that teacher. You could say instead, "Don't worry about it. I will take care of it."

Sam Stone: Back then, teachers were our protectors. They kept order and made us feel safer. Now, they've been defanged and the bullies know it.

That's why you're educated and they're not.

KGS: One thing that earned me respect was striking a teacher who stepped in to break up the fight...though I wouldn't recommend that course of action.

:rolleyes:

TheLoadedDog: Contrary to what kids are tols, adult life is MUCH easier than school life.

...unless you're a teacher expected to break up a fight, to enforce school rules against fighting, and to deal with parents who want "to tear you a new arsehole" for enforcing those rules.

[Frylock]

Is there evidence that being bullied is really as big a deal in the long run as some here are saying?

I was bullied a bit all throughout my school years. (Probably not as severely as many of the stories here, though.) I never faught back.

I wasn't happy about this, of course. But still, I had plenty of friends, plenty of self respect, and I never give it a second thought today (ten years later).

I've got a 1.5 year old kid, and I sometimes worry about what to tell him if he gets bullied. I think I ended up kind of lucky--Being a softspoken, pretty wimpy, kind of socially unintelligent kid, I should have been severely targeted. But as it turned out, most of the bullying that happened to me was pretty minor. That means if my kid is actually bullied, I have no idea what it's like for him and this makes any advice I might give feel (to me) suspect.

I've comforted myself by telling myself being bullied isn't that big a deal. But are there studies that show otherwise?

I should note that I will never allow my kid(s) to be trapped in a school in which real violence occurs with any frequency. So that may have some effect on the likelihood and severity of any possible bullying he may have to experience, for all I know.

-FrL-

[Frylock]

One more concern:

It seems to me every post here advising that the victim should fight back assumes that the victim will win the fight. That can't be right. If I had fought any of my bullies, I am certain I would have been killed. (In one case, I'm not even sure I'm exaggerating that claim.)

So do the "fight back" people think that those of us who simply can't hold our end in a fight are just hopeless?

-FrL-

[dmatsch]

I just noticed that many of the punch the bully scenarios where the victim got a severe reprisal only consisted of one punch. perhaps the old wives tale could be vindicated if it were amended to something like "Punch the bully in the face until your arms are tired, or if you leave a severe scar, he will crumple like a rag doll."

Three prior years of Karate taught me to end fights quickly, then get away. Otherwise, who's the bully when you can pound a weaker kid senseless? Whereas, one well-placed ridgehand to the nose was all the psychological deterrent that was needed.

From that day forward, the bully knew I could drop him with a single punch.

[Carlyjay]

I was bullied in junior high school. Pretty badly, too. It damaged me socially and emotionally for a number of years.

I told my teachers and my parents about it. My parents contacted the teachers, and even had a meeting about it. The main bully's parents were contacted. They didn't care. The teachers actually said "Well, he's moving away next year, so just survive this year and it'll be over".

Yeah, right.

As a result of "just surviving it", I was bullied by the other students for the next two years as well, and was very much a socially and emotionally stunted person for a number of years thereafter.

TRUST ME: "ignoring" the bully does not stop them. It makes them more determined. Do not tell your children to ignore and the problem will go away, because it isn't true.

Talk to the teachers and see if something can't be done about it. Bullying is better dealt with these days than it was 15-18 years ago when I was dealing with it. If the teacher doesn't deal with the issue to the extent that you'd like, speak to the principal. If that doesn't work, call the school board. If that doesn't work, use any other safe means to get your kid out of the situation. Even if it means switching schools.

But don't forget to find out WHY your kid is being bullied. Ask your kid what the bully teases them about. Is it something fixable? Does your kid chew with his mouth open, or dress oddly, or act in a socially unacceptable way? Never hurts to check. If your kid is being a jerk at school and THAT'S why they're bullied, make sure you fix that problem, too. Or he'll get bullied everywhere.

Obviously, if it's something that can't be fixed, like his name is "Reginald Butt", you better teach him some snappy comebacks to the inevitable comments.

[control-z]

At least in most younger kids, ignoring them really does seem to help. The bullys bully for attention. If you don't acknowledge them, they get bored and start picking on someone else. That may or not work with older, more senselessly violent bullies.

I never had much trouble with bullies (and I'm not a big guy), but the few times I did just keeping calm did the trick. Don't let them get to you, they're doing it for a reaction. But don't look meek and scared either, more like bored is what you're looking for. Stand up to them. They don't impress you, you're not scared of them.

Philosophically I'm not opposed to punching the bully, but that just gets kids in so much trouble these days, a lot of schools punish both kids in the fight no matter who "started it."

[smiling bandit]

Well, I wouldn't call verbal harrasment bullying, I would call it verbal harrasment. It can be just as bad, of course. For that, you just have to develop a thick skin. Laugh it off, turn it around on the harrasser if you can, or learn to truly ignore it - not just pretending you didn't hear, but really not allowing it to bother you at your core. Basically, this is part of developing a strong sense of self. Other people can only affect you if you allow it.

This statement ignores the fact that it is extremely hard to develop a sense of self if you're being insulted, demeaned, and degraded. Peaople don't "get" thick skin after being harassed or bullied. They tend to get weaker. The only way to change that is to find value in yourself elsewhere. WHich is often difficult, as school takes up so much of your young life.

I was the subject of constant isolation and harassment at school. I hated myself, quite literally. Success was everything, because it was the only thing they could steal away. Actually, they did anyway, but I didn't have much else. And I hated myself worse every time I failed, anything, anywhere, anytime, because it made me afraid they were right.

I still have emotional sore spots from it. I am still sensitive about the matter. However, these days I simply accept that anyone who fails to treat me with the proper respect is not worth thinking of, and properly belongs in the "scum" category. But turning that self-hatred in properly-directed contempt (and hopefully, one day into pity) took four years of college.

[Ghanima]

I think humiliation works pretty well. If you humiliate the bully they will leave you alone, usually. That's how my sister stopped her bully (around third grade). My brother stopped his by punching him (kindergarten). Both were very effective. I never got bullied, I guess I was known as a pretty physical kid so no one wanted to take the chance.

The only time anyone ever tried it with me was the high school "tough girl" when I was freshman. I didn't back down one inch during that first confrontation (no hitting, just intimidation tactics), so then she resorted to grabbing and shoving me from behind one day. But after that, she left me alone. I had already damaged her "tough girl" reputation enough, just by being unaffected by her crap.

[Sleel]

One more concern:

It seems to me every post here advising that the victim should fight back assumes that the victim will win the fight. That can't be right. If I had fought any of my bullies, I am certain I would have been killed. (In one case, I'm not even sure I'm exaggerating that claim.)

So do the "fight back" people think that those of us who simply can't hold our end in a fight are just hopeless?

I don't assume you'd win the fight. I gave some suggestions that would make it more likely though. I didn't win my first serious fight in high school, the one I mentioned earlier with the three guys who were all bigger than me, I just didn't get hurt badly.

At the time, I didn't know most of the things I'm telling you about now. I didn't know how to fight any more than any kid who has seen a couple of Bruce Lee movies. I just knew at some level that sooner or later they were going to get me and if I kept running away it was going to be worse. When they caught up to me in the hall (I ran at first) I realized that I was going to have to face them right then. I stopped trying to get away and dealt with that encounter. I was fast enough, and probably more than a little lucky, to dodge most of the attacks, keep them from getting behind me, and to keep any of them from catching me and holding me for the others.

I stayed on my feet, which I later found out is very, very important in a group fight, and didn't panic. The crying and shaking came later when I was safe in my next class. I basically didn't lay a hand on them, just dodged and pushed to get them off balance, until a teacher showed up. I think I threw maybe two punches, neither of which were very effective because I didn't know how to punch properly and I was aiming at the faces of guys who were a head taller than me.

I think the main reason I didn't have more trouble with later bullies (and I did have some minor encounters in the future) was that people saw me face these guys and come out of it with only a couple of scrapes and a minor bruise. I showed that I was afraid but that I would stand up to them if I had to. If I'd known then what I know now, I would have gone after and hurt the leader as much as possible, before he expected it, instead of running. I'm pretty sure I would have had zero trouble with bullies after that. The main guy and his cronies had a history already. The administrators expelled him for that fight and suspended the other two, without even any need to ask for my side of the story. I doubt I would have gotten in much trouble even if I'd hurt him back, and it would have helped with future problems.

I now know that getting into a fight always dangerous, so you go all out; you don't hold back at all. Something as "non-threatening" as poking a finger into your chest can turn into getting your head pounded against a wall in seconds, so you don't give him a chance to start. Even a bully who's significantly larger than you is going to have second thoughts about trying you again if you go from zero to Wolverine in less time than it takes to read this sentence. If you don't fight on your terms, you've made the choice to give him or her time to prepare, plan how to hurt you, and to pick the time and place for it to happen. You're giving the bully all the tactical advantages. That makes it much more dangerous for you in the long run.

I don't suggest that you technically start the fight most of the time. You can probably force them to start it by standing up to them. If insults and other social barbs aren't cutting it, the bully will have to escalate to regain respect. If he or she is at all the physical type, the bully will—more often than not—initiate the fight by starting a shoving match, which is a way of both trying to intimidate you and to get a sense of how you'll handle an escalation. As soon as a bully tries to touch you, it's an attempted physical assault, both in my terms and in the eyes of the law in most places. Time to end the fight as quickly as possible.

Unless they're very experienced with real violence, like they grew up in a gang neighborhood or something, they're not going to be psychologically ready for skipping the usual preliminaries. You've forced the timing, you know what's coming next, but the bullies don't. By jumping directly to the end, you can catch them unprepared. Your goal is to surprise and hurt them. Even if you also get hurt (and you probably will; be ready for it) you'll reduce your risk by doing it this way, and there will be a much lower chance of having to fight that bully ever again. Other potential bullies will be deterred also. With luck, you'll only ever have to fight once.

[sturmhauke]

However, these days I simply accept that anyone who fails to treat me with the proper respect is not worth thinking of, and properly belongs in the "scum" category.
I dunno, I developed that trait fairly early, sometime before middle school. Maybe I was lucky. On the other hand, I often came across as an arrogant bastard. Still do, sometimes, although I don't (usually) mean to.

[Der Trihs]

However, these days I simply accept that anyone who fails to treat me with the proper respect is not worth thinking of, and properly belongs in the "scum" category.I had that attitude from the beginning; it didn't make being bullied much fun.

While they never stopped bullying me, I noticed they stopped most of the close up physical attacks because I escalated faster than they did. They hit me with a spitball, I kicked them in the ankle and drew blood. They shoved me, I picked up a plastic chair and hit them with it. I also used improvised weapons like a padlock on a string, to keep them from getting in arms reach; they weren't crazy enogh to get closer when I swung it at their head. That didn't keep the bullies from throwing rocks or kicking me in the crotch and running, but it helped.

Going to the teachers or principle assumes they care; I can't recall one who did, and quite a few who took the bullies side or even encouraged them. For the obvious legal reason you should at least try, but sometimes force is all you have.

I will say that this sort of garbage is a major reason I don't want children; I don't want to inflict on them what happened to me.

[Zoe]

And what do you do when you teach your kid to fight back and the other kid has a gun? I know of such a case in recent times -- only it was the bus driver who was killed. This was in a small town in the South. He was tired of being humiliated.

How much are you willing to risk?

I'm with Carlyjay. Keep making noise until somebody listens.

Teachers do care. They just don't have any authority anymore. Teachers can't usually suspend anyone. (Hell, we had a student who rigged explosives over a teacher's head and the principal wanted to suspend the student for only three days!)

Take a camera or a cell phone with a camera or video camera. Get an unknown older brother or sister to ride the bus and make a secret video. It would be worth it just for that one day.

[Mellivora capensis]

I'm with Carlyjay. Keep making noise until somebody listens.



I strongly disagree. Personal safety and well being is no-one's responsibility except your own. The philosophy of "if I shout, somebody must listen and take action on my behalf" is dangerous at best, and disempowering at worst.

It is dangerous in that we begin to expect a ubiquitous authority ready to step in and solve all our problems for us, from bullies to flat tyres. We become dependent on The System. The problem is, however, The System might work in your town, but in the middle of the Kalahari the only authority is a hungry hyena. And he doesn't speak English.

It is disempowering in that we continue to be the victim, we continue to cower, we continue to hide, we continue to abdicate our responsibility to take care of ourselves. We walk around being scared.

We need to stand up for ourselves. It is not about winning the fight with the bully, it is about standing up to him. The mere standing up is good enough. You might go down the first time, or the second time, but along the way you start to learn to duck the punches, and land some of your own. And eventually the bully either goes down, or backs down.

And if he fetches a gun? I think that is more the exception than the rule. There will always be the extreme, but by and large the schoolyard bully problem does not involve guns.

[Der Trihs]

And what do you do when you teach your kid to fight back and the other kid has a gun? Then either the cops should be brought in, or you get your kid out of that school.

I'm with Carlyjay. Keep making noise until somebody listens.They'll probably just punish the kid who makes the noise, and ignore the bully. That was my experience.

Teachers do care. Some do, no doubt. I never ran into one. I had teachers call me a tattletale for telling them a kid hit me, stand by and ignore a kid who kicked me in the crotch, deny that fights ever happened at school, and in one case make a speech in front of the assembled PE class that the big kids should keep the little kids in our place.