Bullshit. Kid fought back, and will likely not have to deal with being bullied again. Good for him. Sometimes violence IS the answer…particularly where, as here, there were no teachers in sight. What’s he supposed to do…stand there and get his ass kicked on video? As soon as the other kid punched him, Casey was well within his rights to open up a can of whoop ass. Frankly, I think he showed remarkable restraint considering the provocation.
What did he do that was illegal? Why is telling teachers a guarantee of no retaliation?
Casey did something productive. Running and telling is not always an option. He had been bullied for years. Sometimes you have to stand up for yourself.
Not only is it not a guarantee, it’s likely to invite more bullying. No one likes a snitch.
I once knew a guy who stood up to his bully. He got the shit beaten out of him, and then the next day the bully and his friends grabbed him after school and rode their bikes over him. Sometimes violence is the answer, but if you’re outnumbered then you’ve got to be damn sure you know which battles to pick.
Nothing happened to the bully, by the way.
I totally agree. It’s not like he went all Ender on the little ex-bully. Still, he demonstrated quite amply that fucking with him will have serious consequences. I doubt anyone will fuck with him again for quite some time.
In a nutshell:
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The bully, Richard Gale, didn’t start it. Casey mouthed off to him and that’s when Richard responded by punching him.
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He’s not sorry about what happened (until dad shoots him a glance)…yes, he’s sorry…wait, maybe he’s not.
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Richard has been bullied his entire life and he was just standing up to Casey.
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He “probably” won’t bully again.
Violence is not always the best answer. It worked pretty well here, but Casey had no guarantee that it would.
The better way to handle things would be to tell the bully that if he touches you that you’ll tell a teacher or the police. I know that sounds lame, but it can stop people from hurting you. If that doesn’t work, then you should defend yourself, but not before trying the non-violent and cleaner solution first.
Maybe it’s that we had different experiences with retaliation. A friend of mine fought back and found about 10 kids waiting to beat the shit out of him after school. So, YMMV.
If there was no video, and the bully suffered more injuries, then Casey could have been charged and convicted of using excessive force.
Telling a teacher isn’t a guarantee, but it’s something that should be done before you resort to violence. Apparently Casey never told anyone about the bullying and he should learn that he should have.
I wasn’t talking about Casey, just the reaction to Casey’s video. Everyone (including Casey’s parents) just wants to treat him like a hero. Instead, he need to be treated like a child, and taught the proper way to handle himself when it comes to bullies.
Only if the teacher doesn’t do anything. If the teacher takes appropriate action, the bullying usually stops.*
*Unless they threaten the teacher and the teacher backs down - which is a pretty shitty situation to find yourself in.
Absolutely correct. The proper followup is a footstomp.
Nothing about that video was believable in any way.
Exactly what I was thinking. Does the original video really look like Richard is acting in anger to anyone? I don’t like basing stuff like this on a vibe, but the way he’s jumping around in mockery of Casey while his friends are shouting encouragement seems to me to paint a pretty clear picture. Plus, if a bully is shouting abuse at you and you react by punching him (fairly ineffectually) in the face, I can’t imagine him reacting with the (initial) restraint seen with Casey. That whole interview just seems like a kid who has not-too-intelligently concluded that he can just lie about everything and it’ll be fine.
So he’ll have a future in politics then?
This is bullshit.
When I was in year 8 there was a big fat kid who was quite smart but a bit different and he got teased and bullied. His name was Andrew.
One day Andrew snapped and grabbed his tormentor* in a headlock with one arm and punched him repeatedly in the face with the other. Nothing much was done about it: the teachers knew Andrew got teased and probably felt his tormentor had got his comeuppance. He was given a certain amount more respect and notoriety and he clearly liked that.
The teasing didn’t stop altogether however. The next time Andrew snapped he grabbed one of his tormentors and in his rage smashed the kid’s face into the corner of a concrete block wall, several times. There was a lot of blood, facial scarring, police, compensation payouts, and we never saw Andrew again. He was rumoured to have ended up in some sort of reform school.
But I’m rambling. Please do please carry on telling us how what Casey did was the right thing to do and the best response in the circumstances.
*His tormentor is someone I’m still in touch with and you couldn’t find a nicer guy. Sometimes kids to stoopid things before they mature.
This is a great post because everybody that sticks up for themselves are psycho.
Remember kids, never fight back or else you’re no better than Eric Harris or Dylan Klebold.
Maybe it took him getting the shit beat out of him for him to stop tormenting people.
I’m guessing your experience was different than mine?
I’ve known some teachers who were really good at dealing with bullies. Whenever they took action, the bullying stopped.
Why are arguing against a straw man? No one is saying you should never defend yourself.
Teachers aren’t always around, parents aren’t always around, and even if they were they don’t always care.
True. He just said that since he once knew a psycho, that means that this one time a kid fought back was a bad thing.
It seems there is an unspoken assumption running through many of the replies in this thread, that bullies are secretly cowards and if you stand up to them you will emerge triumphant. While this may often be true, it certainly isn’t a universal rule. Sometimes, your bully really is stronger than you. Sometimes, your bully will torment you, not because is immature or has “issues”, but because he really is a genuinely nasty piece of work. And sometimes, your bully will pound the everloving fuck out of you for standing up to him because he’s stronger than you and he can.
In this particular instance, there wasn’t any real danger of that happening. The bully was a runt, and got justly pummeled. But there’s no catch-all solution to dealing with bullies. It’s a situational thing. Sometimes, the best thing to do is let slip the dogs of war and cave their fucking heads in. Other times, the best thing to do is tell a teacher or parent. There’s no shame in either approach. You should just do what the situation dictates.
Way to illustrate my point.
Andrew wasn’t a psycho. I knew him passably well and he was actually a big, smart, socially unskilled geek with a bad temper.
It’s pretty easy to get yourself labelled a psycho: body slamming a kid half your size is a very good way to go about it. Casey’s lucky that the other guy didn’t hit his head on the way down, and lucky the setup illustrating the provocation was on video. You think that what Casey was generally the right thing to do, even though if it came out very slightly different, it would have got people like you calling him a psycho.
You are your own worst argument.
No, the other kid is lucky he didn’t hit his head. When you physically attack someone and end up the injured one, that’s your own fault.
Take away the age of these kids. If it was a group of adult men, videoing themselves assaulting some guy and the guy turns the tables and someone gets a busted head, oh well.