dragon What happened?
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…t…bump.
Hey again ! Thanks for asking, I’ve been really busy the last few days.
I went the the principal’s office to discuss this with him. First, I was told that I should be talking to the Guidance Councelor, but I couldn’t because he was out with a shoulder injury. So I told the principal that it was unacceptable to wait for the GC to come back, I wanted it taken care of now.
I showed him everything that I had documented for the last year, and all of the dates. He told me he would look at the video and then get back to me. I told him that I didn’t know how long that would take, but in the meantime I wanted my son separated from the bullies. For now at least that’s been done. The principal will be getting back to me by the end of this week.
I will be following it up and continue writing everything down.
My kid gets along with everyone in his class, our problem is mostly the bus and the driver. I talked to some of the parents in my neighborhood and discovered that most of them are unhappy with the driver also, so I’ve started a petition to try and have him replaced or (we hope) fired all together. This is not a man that should be in charge of children.
Thanks for all the suggestions, dragonkid and I appreciate it all. It’s really nice to be able to get so many great ideas and opinions with the click of a mouse. I’m awfully happy I found this place.
Chimera said:
Chimera, that’s not true. There are some awful principals out there. There are some who don’t take the kids’ problems seriously, and there are some who treat parents like they’re problem kids, but there are a bunch of them out there who work their butts off and do an incredible job.
The principal I work with now comes down on bullies like a ton of bricks. He’s even had the deputy come out on several occasions to explain to bullies the exact consequences of their behaviors. Hey, the bullies may not completely mend their ways, but they have no doubt of just how much shit they’ll catch if they get caught again.
Like any job in any place, there are those who do justice to their work and those who fall short.
Martial arts is good, but a defensive form, such as judo or aikido.
One bully at my son’s school was arrested for assaulting him. My son went to court to testify, but the kid took a plea, and my son got up and told the court he wanted this boy to stay away from him. Very brave of him.
Another time my son got into a tussle with another kid. They both went down to the guidance office, and this genius was so smart he hauled off and smacked my son upside the head IN FRONT OF THE GUIDANCE COUNSELOR.
My son’s school has a deputy sheriff on duty, called the School Resource Officer. Genius was immediately arrested.
They don’t screw around.
Keep us posted, dragongirl. And don’t be afraid to call the police and swear out a complaint if the school doesn’t come through.
dragongirl, my heart goes out to you and dragonkid. One thing I cannot stress to you enough. Love and support your son! I was also ruthlessly bullied and beat up (and I’m female!), but I didn’t have the support of my family. As a result, since even my own parents wouldn’t stick up for me, I wound up feeling like I wasn’t worth defending or looking after.
Like whiterabbit, I understand the mentality of the killers at Columbine, Paducah, and other places far better than I’d like to admit. I also suspect, to my horror, that similar conditions continue to exist at my old school. I think such things may happen when kids figure there’s no one supporting them and there’s nowhere to turn, so they may as well die. Your son, dear lady, has got a wonderful mother supporting him, and it looks like you’ve got other people with you as well.
Keep up the good work, from one dragon to another!
CJ
One last thing, from the perspective of a teacher:
Do not assume that teachers know what’s going on unless you have explicitly told them yourself. Kids,even good kids, are extremely self-focused–this is just a part of growing up. There is a tendency to assume that if a teacher is in the room, the teacher is looking at you all the time–if you are getting bullied right there in the room with the teacher or in the hall where a teacher in standing or on a playground where a teacher is watching nad the teacher dosen’t react, then the teacher must know this and be willfully ignoring it.
The perspective is very different when you are the teacher. With 30 (or 35) kids in the room, it is impossible to be watching all of them all the time while teaching, while doing administative tasks, while dealing with emergencies etc. In my experience bullies can be very good at noticing the 30 seconds when a teacher’shead is down helping another student, and can do a great deal of damage in 30 seconds.
Also, it is not enough for your child to tell the teacher–kids are often pretty inarticulate when talking to their teachers–they are children. Where an adult would know enough to say “Jim over there is making my life a living hell everyday and you must move my seat!”, a kid might get an attack of the timids and come out with “I don’t like Jim. Can I move?” and really, honestly believe that that is enough to get the point across.
Now then, if you tell a teacher tht bullying is occuring and you describe what is happening to your child (do not sugar-coat or use euphimisms–don’t say “some of the kids are giving him a hard time”!) and the teacher blows it off, then raise holy hell. But give the teacher a chance first.
I was also bullied a LOT on the bus in kindergarten through 1st grade (being a head shorter than others my age and having some weird habits), and kids would taunt me and pull my backpack. The bus driver did nothing. My friend’s mom came on the bus to yell at the bullies, and my mom made one of the boys come over and apologize, but nothing worked.
Maybe take your son to karate lessons. I also managed to ward off a potential bully in high school by scaring her. She was on 20/20 in junior high for being part of a gang that terrorized several girls, and in 10th grade gym class she decided to pick on me. Well, I pretended to be evil and gave her bizarre answers to her “insulting” questions, and she left me alone after that. I overheard her telling another girl, “she scares me.” I don’t know if that’s necessarily the best idea, but it was really the only thing that worked for me.
Bullies are inhale fucking scabrous slime molds encrusting the shit-stained sanitary napkin embarassingly stuck to the sole of humanity’s shoe because humanity’s been walking in a bad neighbourhood. exhale I feel better.
It is not easy to know what to do. I was verbally harrassed, teased, and generally made to feel like shit all the way through all of school until I got to cegep (duh - withdrawn effeminate unathletic fat geek bookworm.) And the bizarre thing is that I, personally, have no idea what I would have wanted my parents to do about it. Good luck to you and dragonjr. navigating this treacherous area. Give em hell. And keep us posted as to the results of going to the principal!
My kid said the day he returned after his suspension, the kid he fought with was back at it again. Just verbal insults, but I really don’t think my son should have to hear some moron saying, “Your mother is a whore. You fuck her dry” on a daily basis. Call me a prude…
Then we get a registered letter from the school, documenting my son’s suspension. It says simply that he was suspended for fighting and swearing. No mention of the other kid being the instigator of 2 fights the same day, or any other of what we consider extenuating and mitigating facts.
We have 5 days to appeal the suspension (which has already been served.) We drafted a letter we will request to be included in my son’s file, mentioning that we had previously notified the school of this particular asshole, and noting the apparent lack of supervision in the locker room, and asking what the school intends to do to resolve this problem. If they refuse to append this letter to my kid’s file, we’ll definitely consider further action.
Right now I find myself wishing my son had beat the crap out of this jerk, instead of stopping after getting in a couple of shots.
Good for you!!! And you’ve done THE single most important thing: document the crap out of everything! It’ll look much worse for the Principal when you pull out all your documentation.
One minor suggestion, in case more pressure is needed: never underestimate the power of the cc’d Certified Letter. For example:
Dear Mr. State Attorney General,
I realize that election time is a busy time for you, but I need to let you know about a situation in a school in our state that is intolerable.
< blah blah blah >
Following the tragic events of Columbine, I’d hpoed our awareness was raised regarding the issue of bullying and the destructive “boys will be boys” attitude, but Principal Smith was apparently not so moved.
< blah blah blah >
I would like this issue resolved as quickly as possible.
Sincerely,
Dragongirl
cc: Your local paper
cc: Head of the school board
cc: the principal
cc: your various TV news stations
Unfortunately for us guys, one of the things that you have to do sometimes in grades school is fight back.
I was harassed constantly up until about 6th grade. I was small. I was intelligent. I was kinda poor. I was chased around the playground and smacked around. This all stopped when I beat the bejezzus out of the ringleader.
My parents had always advised me to not get into fights and to let them handle it or to “talk it through with <so-and-so.>” This was bullshit and finally my parents said “fine, fight back.” I did and it worked.
This is not necessarily the best response for your son, he may not be able to. Don’t eliminate it as an option based on the “he’ll get into trouble” rationale. He’s in trouble already. His psyche and body are being beaten down every day and he needs to find his own legs if he can.
It worked for me.
–==Mike==–
I was constantly bullied all through junior high school (but not beaten up, thank heavens). High school was better–less contact with the cretins–but it didn’t really stop until college.
My kid is not currently being bullied. This is a small miracle, as he is short for his age, good at math, totally unathletic, and wears glasses.
He’s only in third grade now, so I guess it won’t start for another year or two. His school has a no-tolerance bully policy and lots of playground supervision, but I haven’t seen the system tested yet.
So far so good. In another year or so, he’ll have his black belt in Tae Kwon Do. I’m counting on body confidence to help him. Wish I’d had some of that going into 7th grade…sigh
Please keep us posted, Dragongirl. I especially like Fenris’s advice: document everything! Good luck to your son!
Back when I was a wee lad I was picked on constantly, probably because I was always the smallest and easiest target.
I used to hit the door running so that I could avoid my tormentors and this usually worked. When I was in Jr. high I got jumped by a couple of these assclowns on my way home and it was the ass kicking of a lifetime… for them. I had pretty well had enough.
After that I sailed right on into high school where it all started again. Much ass were kicked… by me.
This is not the way your son should have to spend his school years. Get the authorities involved and make sure something gets done to stop the bullying.
Besides that, having your son learn to defend himself well is a good idea as there will be times when there won’t be anyone there to help him and he might have to hold his own.
My kids had to deal with a neighbourhood bully this past summer, the kid’s parents were unresponsive and my 9 year old was afraid that if he retaliated he would get into trouble. This is a kid who weighs 120 pounds, hits like a mack truck, and has quite the fiery temper. He is also one of the most loving little guys you would ever want to meet.
I told him that if he could avoid the bully that was the way to go but if he was ever in a position where escape wasn’t an option he was to treat that bully like he does his brother… with no mercy. 
So my son was on his way home from the park one day and the bully found him. My son tuned him up with a slap upside the head and sent him home crying.
Eventually, most of the kids in the neighbourhood turned on the bully and let him know he wasn’t welcome around here as my son wasn’t his only victim.
That was the end of that.
I’m going to side with Urban Ranger on this. Look into soft martial arts. That way, dragonkid can honestly say, “I never hit em. I broke the bully’s choke hold (and perhaps arm) and threw em to the ground, but I never hit em.”
Violence is never an effective answer. But controlled violence, properly applied, can keep people off your back while you think of what to do next. Which has been adequately covered by other posts.
Well…that is certainly one of the worst things I have ever heard. You would rather your kid get beaten than…God forbid!:eek: …get suspended for a couple days for defending himself? Hes NINE years old. Who the hell cares if he was suspended in elementary school? What is it going to do? Ruin his chances of getting into Harvard in ten years?
and scuba_ben…
what kind of stupid advice is that? “Controlled violence”? Yes here’s controlled violence…if you touche me, i will jam my forearm into your nose so hard, you’ll be smelling your own farts until you graduate high school. If the situation has deteriorated into violent confrontation, the solution is overwhelming violence. General rule of thumb: Protect yourself first and worry about the deuchebag principal later.
Now I am not a violent person and I’m not very big. But I did learn a couple of lessons growing up that I will pass on to you:
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Fighting is not bad - There is nothing wrong with fighting to defend yourself or even someone else if you are so inclined. Make it clear (like my Dad did) that you son will never get in trouble with you as long as he didn’t start the fight.
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Do not expect teachers, cops, parents, or Superman to come to your rescue. Bullies have a knack for finding you when they aren’t around.
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There are people who do stuff and people who worry about stuff getting done to them. In other words, don’t teach your kid to think like a victim (ohh no I hope Billy isn’t going to kick my ass) teach him to think in terms of controlling the situation (maybe today I will wait until Billy steps to me and then knock out his teeth with a Mag-Lite…or whatever works).
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Don’t be the type of kid bullies like to pick on - in other words, if no one likes you, ya might want to do a little self-analysis to figure out why.
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Stop being so timid - Bullies don’t want to fight you, they want to beat you up with impunity. Fight back, stand up to them. At the very least, even if its 10 to 1 against you and the guy is built like a tank, don’t whimper and cower like a little girl. There is something a little intimidating about someone who appears to not care that the odds are not in his favor. (and personally, I am more afraid of a crazy little guy than some big lumbering oaf)
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Learn how to fight - Take Karate or kickboxing or whatever but make sures its at a school (or what you might call a dojo) where you can actually spar against other students. Confidence comes from learning how to take a punch and still fight back, not from learning some mystical Jackie Chan choreographed BS.
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Use your head (and not as a punching bag or for headbutting)- God put that stupid shaped thing on your sholders for a reason.
Well, that’s all I got. Good luck with that bully problem and all.
I wasn’t bullied, but girls can be the most vindictive little bitches ever. I used to pal around with some chums, and every so often, they would treat me as if I were invisible. I would say something, they would look around and say, “Did you hear something?” I would be looking at some class work, and they would pull it out of my hands and say, “How did this get over here?” They would look at me while they were whispering amongst themselves.
I put up with it, I think, because of low self-esteem. If I’d been more secure, I would have told the little brats off and found some new friends.
This, I know, is not exactly the same thing as a bully, but it just goes to show that early education is a horror show and people carry the scars through adulthood.
Hey msmith537 I’m feeling the need to defend myself now. It wouldn’t bother me at all if he got suspended for defending himself, in fact I’ve told him to fight back if he feels it’s neccesary. My son does not want to be suspended. He’s in a youth program where he is expected to do well in school and it’s important to him to do so. I support my kids and respect their feelings.