Irony In Bullying

[blas87]

Maybe they never do apologize because they just don't feel they need to.

Either way, I'm trying to be the better person and if someone who used to be an ass to me tries to be civil, I will accept it. It's healthier on my heart and mind that way.

[jackfaire]

Either way, I'm trying to be the better person and if someone who used to be an ass to me tries to be civil, I will accept it. It's healthier on my heart and mind that way.

I totally agree with doing that but I think we need trauma counselors in high schools to prevent things like Columbine. Most of the kids look back on their younger pre high school days fondly but for some of the kids they feel like they just got out of a warzone and are creeping through enemy camp towards freedom. Most just want to get out alive and are thankful when they do.

Others decide to burn the place down.

We are missing the kids in between. We need to catch them and reassure them it's going to be all right before they make bad choices about their futures.

[Andara Bledin]

I totally agree with doing that but I think we need trauma counselors in high schools to prevent things like Columbine.

Even the best trauma counselor in the history of mankind, past, present, and future, wouldn't prevent Columbine; it had little or nothing to do with bullying and everything to do with Harris being a psychopath with a massive superiority complex out to get his name in the history books by becoming infamous. This isn't the first murderous pairing of this particular combination, and likely won't be the last.

However, there are hundreds of suicides and other deaths that could be prevented by access to counselors and those in authority not ignoring the bullying going on around them.

^-.-^

[jackfaire]

and those in authority not ignoring the bullying going on around them.

^-.-^

Or not applauding it, encouraging it and helping create more of it.

[Amanita]

^This. Some of the teachers I had all but handed a blank check to the people who harassed me nonstop. Either smart-aleck comments that the bullies just copied, or telling me right in front of the entire class that YES, I would need a videocamera to prove my innocence, while the bullies would be believed, because they were in a group, and it was my word against theirs.

Fuck, I hated school.

[HYHYBT]

^This. Some of the teachers I had all but handed a blank check to the people who harassed me nonstop. Either smart-aleck comments that the bullies just copied, or telling me right in front of the entire class that YES, I would need a videocamera to prove my innocence, while the bullies would be believed, because they were in a group, and it was my word against theirs.

Fuck, I hated school.

So, practically speaking, what would you suggest the policy be in a case where it's one person's word against several?

[Amanita]

I think the teacher should use their damn brain- if it's known that a bullying situation exists, where the group is made up of individuals with a history of picking on the loner, then the teacher should take what the group says with a grain of salt. Or demand that the group produce the same hard evidence of wrongdoing demanded of the loner.

I have experienced this firsthand- kids WILL lie their asses off, or instigate things just to get another person they don't like in trouble. They will gang up and attack, and when the victim does anything to defend themselves, they cry foul, making like the victim started it.
Ignore what the group is doing? I know from experience that it doesn't fucking work. They just escalate, getting worse and worse. And don't even bother going to tell- most adults can't be arsed to do anything to stop it before it escalates either.

[blas87]

If the bullies are the jocks and popular kids (we called them the preppies), they're already the favorites, especially amongst smaller towns where sports are everything. We don't need no outcast calling harrassment and putting our star running back in suspension from a game!

[Greenday]

If the bullies are the jocks and popular kids (we called them the preppies), they're already the favorites, especially amongst smaller towns where sports are everything. We don't need no outcast calling harrassment and putting our star running back in suspension from a game!

This. Gotta keep our priorities straight. Get your academic shit out of our town.

[Pinecone]

I think a fair amount of bullying is motivated by an instinctive desire (among some people) to punish difference, to force people to conform. That kind of bully is exactly the sort of person I'd expect to be drawn toward k-12 teaching since that level of schooling is mostly about forcing conformity. And it's not surprising so many teachers support bullying; it reflects their own relationship with the students.

[Amanita]

^Yup, pretty much this. I wasn't a nasty person, but because I dared like different music, different clothes, or different interests, I had to be smacked down with extreme prejudice. Junior high was the worst for this.

[BlaqueKatt]

We are missing the kids in between. We need to catch them and reassure them it's going to be all right before they make bad choices about their futures.

except saying "it'll be alright" and "it gets better" is in my experience just a useless platitude. Sometimes it doesn't, sometimes the damage is too deep and the scars so plentiful they can never be erased, and it's never alright again.

[jackfaire]

except saying "it'll be alright" and "it gets better" is in my experience just a useless platitude. Sometimes it doesn't, sometimes the damage is too deep and the scars so plentiful they can never be erased, and it's never alright again.

I don't mean reassure them with platitudes. I mean show them. Truly reassure them by giving them a view of what the world really holds for them out there.

Give them tools to work with and hope for the future not with platitudes but with help.

[XCashier]

If someone is genuinely sorry and apologizes for their behavior towards you, my suggestion is to take the higher ground and accept their apology.

Except in most cases it isn't, "Oh I am so sorry I was like that" It's "Oh I was never like that I am a nice person and always was we were friends it was teasing"

That's what I'm saying. If it's a genuine apology acknowledging that what they did was wrong, by all means accept it. Forgiveness is healthy.

However, if they're trying to manipulate the situation to make you look like the bad guy, to hell with them. You didn't need that crap in your life then and you don't now.

[HYHYBT]

That's what I'm saying. If it's a genuine apology acknowledging that what they did was wrong, by all means accept it. Forgiveness is healthy.

However, if they're trying to manipulate the situation to make you look like the bad guy, to hell with them. You didn't need that crap in your life then and you don't now.

And do you really think those are the only two possibilities?