Thought Of The Day-Bully Wars

Off Topic
1

[quote]According to data collected by the department’s research wing last year, one-third of all students ages 12 to 18 felt that they were being bullied or harassed at school, Ms. Ali said in an interview.

“Folks need to wake up,” Ms. Ali said. “We have a crisis in our schools in which bullying and harassment seems to be a rite of passage, and it doesn’t need to be that way.” [/quote]

I got teased in school as a kid. I wore huge fucking glasses in junior high and that along with being a little smaller than the other kids meant I was a target. I was about a year younger at least than everyone else which is one reason as well.

Looking back, I can’t say much negative about any of it. Things like that are why I pushed harder. People telling me what I can’t do is one reason I am doing those things right now.

Where will kids be without any of that?

Do you really strive to be your best when you are constantly told that you are already your best right now?

How many of those kids in school that everyone thought were the coolest are the most interesting people right now years after high school?

Doesn’t that situation actually flip considerably around college?

Those “nerds” are the ones owning the companies (and your girls) 15-20 years later.

2

Bunch of spoiled spawn from asshole parents. The “bullies” need more discipline and the “victims” need actual guidance instead of coddling.

3

Too much emphasis is still put on building kids self esteem, which is pointless, and not on building self worth. I was picked on brutally through JH and into HS. Self esteem was shot to hell, but it made me get out and try things in life and realize I had talents and had worth and pushed me to do more and more. I look back and the guys that bullied me, they’re in dead end jobs, or been in prison or living next door to their parents.

4

[quote]Doug Adams wrote:
Bunch of spoiled spawn from asshole parents. The “bullies” need more discipline and the “victims” need actual guidance instead of coddling. [/quote]
this pretty much sums it up.

5

Some kids do come out stronger after being bullied. The problem is you have kids that are 10, 11, 12 years old committing suicide because of bullying. Obviously something is wrong with the parent(s) there if a kid that young doesn’t have enough self-worth to feel that suicide is their only option. But still, I’d rather see those kids live than do nothing at all and tell the kid to simply deal with it.

6

[quote]super saiyan wrote:
Some kids do come out stronger after being bullied. The problem is you have kids that are 10, 11, 12 years old committing suicide because of bullying. Obviously something is wrong with the parent(s) there if a kid that young doesn’t have enough self-worth to feel that suicide is their only option. But still, I’d rather see those kids live than do nothing at all and tell the kid to simply deal with it.[/quote]

SS, you’re assuming that the parents know about the bullying.

Many kids keep it to themselves, because the parents might do something that could very well possibly make it WORSE for the kids.

My parents knew very little about being bullied at school. Now, in the neighborhood, she knew a little more… but, not much.

7

[quote]imhungry wrote:

[quote]super saiyan wrote:
Some kids do come out stronger after being bullied. The problem is you have kids that are 10, 11, 12 years old committing suicide because of bullying. Obviously something is wrong with the parent(s) there if a kid that young doesn’t have enough self-worth to feel that suicide is their only option. But still, I’d rather see those kids live than do nothing at all and tell the kid to simply deal with it.[/quote]

SS, you’re assuming that the parents know about the bullying.

Many kids keep it to themselves, because the parents might do something that could very well possibly make it WORSE for the kids.

My parents knew very little about being bullied at school. Now, in the neighborhood, she knew a little more… but, not much. [/quote]

I never told my parents anything. But then, I wasn’t raised to think acting like a victim was a good thing.

8

[quote]super saiyan wrote:
Some kids do come out stronger after being bullied. The problem is you have kids that are 10, 11, 12 years old committing suicide because of bullying. Obviously something is wrong with the parent(s) there if a kid that young doesn’t have enough self-worth to feel that suicide is their only option. But still, I’d rather see those kids live than do nothing at all and tell the kid to simply deal with it.[/quote]

My bullying started very young, possibly 1st or 2nd grade. Continued through senior year of high school. I was not attractive, had an overbite that needed braces to be corrected, had glasses, was smart, non-athletic. My bullying took the form of emotional and verbal bullying. I cannot remember a time when I did not think about killing myself. I never told my parents, what could they do? If I told my parents, then I would be a tattle-tale. Life was bad enough, I didn’t need that too. I had horrible self-esteem, it’s still kind of low.

There was nothing wrong with my parents or how they parented me, but I was of the mind that parents are supposed to tell you you’re awesome, you’re pretty, etc. But it’s the kids at school who really matter. When you’re told almost every day how ugly you are and how worthless you are, you start to believe it. The only thing I had keeping me alive was that I was my parents only child and my death would devastate them and they wouldn’t be able to have another kid to replace me (my parents were 40/39 when I was born). I took pleasure in that I was smart and that when all the other “cool” kids were fat and working at gas stations because they were dumb as a rock, I would have a phD or a masters degree and making loads of money.

9

Also:

Do you really just blame the “bullies” for this? This was an 18 year old man in college who was gay. I am not sure what “streamed over the internet” means but if it involves video he recorded himself on the internet, who do you blame?

10

[quote]Professor X wrote:
Also:

Do you really just blame the “bullies” for this? This was an 18 year old man in college who was gay. I am not sure what “streamed over the internet” means but if it involves video he recorded himself on the internet, who do you blame?[/quote]

It actually sounds like the roommate taped Tyler Clementi and his partner, not that Tyler Clementi taped himself. If you were insecure to begin with, especially about being gay, that would be quite humiliating.

EDIT: If he did tape himself, expect that stuff to become public, especially in today’s world. Nothing is “private” anymore.

11

[quote]Professor X wrote:
Also:

Do you really just blame the ‘‘bullies’’ for this? This was an 18 year old man in college who was gay. I am not sure what ‘‘streamed over the internet’’ means but if it involves video he recorded himself on the internet, who do you blame?[/quote]

I read about this.

Apparently the roommate hid a webcam in the kid’s room and broadcast live an encounter the dude had with another guy. It wasn’t recorded by the guy himself. Also, I seem to remember that the guy hadn’t come out either, so it had to be a fairly embarrassing situation for him.

Not that I am saying that he handled it well, or that the roommate should be charged with murder or anything, just clearing up the facts of the case for discussion.

12

The funny thing is that these kids that are bitching about being bullied are probably from time-to-time not so nice to other kids for no reason. Most people love to give but can rarely take.

13

I got my ass kicked because I was one of the few Asian kids riding the bus in a Mexican Majority neighborhood. I got things thrown at me,gum put in my hair,and have been subjected some pretty harsh taunts. This led to play football,take boxing lessons,wrestle in highschool,and ultimately led me to lift weights. Ill be the first to admit,Im not the biggest and strongest (especially on this site) but the years of harassment has led to become tougher and less likely to take shit.

I believe if kids are more subjected to bullying (to a certain extent) they’ll either grow a backbone or get walked all over in life. Feels good now that whenever I talk my small dog around the neighborhood,I see a group of Mexican guys posted up on the street and theyre overweight and bitter but they dont say shit to me even if im wearing capris. THATS RIGHT MUTHA FUCKER,CAPRIS.

14

I was the fat kid in school, back when there was only one or two but I remember getting teased for years, then in Jr. high a couple of the older popular kids started to really torment me. Everyday they’d hit me in the shoulder as hard as they could, I never cried or ran to a teacher, sometimes my shoulders would be purple and black from them hitting me constantly. I always stood my ground finally they figured out they could break me and we became friends which ended all teasing and bullying from everyone.

Kids need to sack up and stop being a bunch a candy asses, don’t let people pick on them, dot some eyes if you have to. The real world is a MF’r, learn young how to survive our you’ll get walked on forever.

15

When I was a kid, if anyone bullied me, I’d hit them with my violin case.

16

was picked on all through middle school by a group of jewish kids… eventually transferred back to my home high school… in some ways re-invented who i was… kids that “bullied” me made me push harder in everything i did… so it kinda worked out…

its tru what professor x says… its not about self esteem its about self worth… parents didn’t always tell me i was the best looking kid or the strongest or the most talented… but they were proud of me and my achievements no matter how small or large… to me thats more important than being told “little jimmy ure the smartest 8th grader ever!” repeatedly…

17

When I was 12 I lived in New Mexico. I was bullied a lot until I befriended a strange girl who didn’t wear shoes who turned out to be a 200 year-old vampire and she decapitated all the boys who picked on me. Anybody else go through that?

18

Where I grew up, the only difference between a bully and not a bully was who won the fight.

It seems that a lot of the kids now are all ego though. They understand humiliation but not humility eg. “you win some, you lose some.”. I learned that in 4th grade when I started wrestling. You give it your best and occasionally still get beat, then go to practice and try again next week.

That held true through the school system too. In middle school you go from being a big 6th grader to a twerpy 7th grader, and in our district, you also had 3 boroughs in the mix. At that point there was all kinds of boundary testing and peck order getting hashed out on a regular basis. Eventually it settles down and everybody moves on.

Then came high school, and I had to switch out of one district and into another. Thats when everybody in the district figures they have to check out the new guy and see what he is made of. They found out. By then though, my perspective was that they were doing just that, testing. So we’d fight, and it never went well for the other guy, and after a while word gets around to not fuck with the new guy.

So was that bullying? I don’t think so. It’s just basic human behavior. Guys push and shove with their hands, girls do it with their tongues. It’s territorial pissing 101.

Then comes the real world. There is always some pushy, blustery asshole who will try to buffalo people into getting his (or her) way. I have never been anywhere that there was not, but that is one of the things that people learn how to handle in grade school that is not on the curriculum.

This next generation of whiny kids are going to be the ones who are running to the HR department or their attorneys office to claim a hostile work environment because they are being bullied “AGAIN!” because they never figured out how to handle it when they were kids.

Dragging some kid who killed himself into it doesn’t help. What his room mate did was thoughtless, and how he responded to it was completely irrational, but for christ sake, that is not bullying. If anything, the attempt to make the connection of that to anything else is just a blatant seizure of opportunity to push a pet agenda.

19

Preach it, Prof X!

I’d say that bullying made me stronger. My bullies have taught me a lot about toughening up and some became good friends with me.