What does that have to do with the post? It's stating that people need to man up and stick up for themselves instead of hiding and not talking to anyone about it.
Passing anti-bullying bylaws deals out consequences for the bullies, those who do the harm. To say people need to "man up" is blaming the victim and putting the focus on them, when that falls to counseling or other aspects to handle. Why would you take away the consequences from the perpetrator of the action, the same way you would punish a cheater on a test, a kid caught with cigarettes? Why is it different for bullies?
Because that's not real life. If we only punish the bully in this situation without teaching our children how to cope, we are not giving them the tools they need to deal with real life. I'm thirty years old and you know what happens when someone is mean to me? I have to deal with it. I can't call a teacher or my mom and say someone said something mean to me. There are no consequences for being mean in real life. I could attempt to dialogue with my "bully" or I can have a reasonably healthy sense of self-worth and believe what other people think or say about me is none of my business. There are no consequences and there is no justice. If I go behind my children and make sure every mean kid pays a consequence instead of teaching appropriate skills to my own children, they will be horribly ill-prepared for real life.
If that person who is thirty and is bullying you, that is harassment, and there are absolutely avenues of repercussions and protections you can take. More to the point, an older person who is a bully is likely someone who has not had consequences for their actions, and therefore it has escalated and grown into abusive, psychological, and emotional harassment. You stop bullies when they are young for their own good as well, not just for their targets. While I agree that the programs to empower students to stand up and speak out are important, like I have said, they cannot work alone.
Guest, you have an excellent point! Learning to interact with others in all aspects of society, means learning how to deal with both the good and bad. We are becoming a society of passive victims. I am in no way justifying or condoning the behaviour of bullies, but parents have a responsibility to develop their children's coping skills. It is no different to teaching their children how to eat right, or to look both ways before crossing the street, they are all essential skills for having a safe and well adjusted adulthood.
How is that any different than what Saviourself said? You are all talking about the same think, programs that will empower and show children that are victims of bullying how to stand up for themselves to be taught along side of consequences for the bullies. If anything, guest and Kelly are arguing for *more* anti bullying initiatives, since the programs put into place are lacking.
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You all are saying the same thing. Cheers.
What excuses and lack of confidences are we teaching them? The low income kid who is teased? The Arab kid who is teased for his background? The gay kid who is teased for his sexual identity? What can you teach them to stop the teasing? Or do you think stopping the actual bullies would be more effective?
Teach them stand up for themselves and to be proud of who they are. We should punish bullies of course but we need children who know that bullies don't have any power over them and that they can make a stand and not wait for some adult to handle the problem
I definitely agree in teaching empowerment and acceptance along with anti-bullying bylaws, and as far as I know that is what is being implemented in schools now. I think we need to strengthen both programs to reflect the changes in maturity and access to information that kids have now, but taking the responsibility from the bully and shifting it to the target, saying if they had better confidence and self esteem it would not effect them is not the way to go. Bullying can tear down even strong people.
Except I stood up for myself. And I was the one that got suspended and it caused me to be bullied even more. there need to be consequences for bullying
The most common reason kids dont stand up for themselves is they believe that they are completely alone in their pain, that no one else is going through this, and that they need to 'toughen up' and handle it themselves. Anti-bullying campaigns are not encouraging kids to be victims, they're showing them that it's ok to need help. In a society that seems to value self reliance over everything else, making it socially acceptable to ask for help paramount.
I agree with this puffin that there is a dire need to teach people how to stand up for themselves. Anti bullying laws are great but are sometimes taken way too far. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be regulated consequences for people's actions, there needs to be a proper balance. I used to get bullied in middleschool/early highschool quite a bit. What did I do? I went to the gym, learned how to fight, and over all just grew some thick skin. These things have helped me greatly in life. If I just went to a teacher and didn't try to improve myself at the same time then I would be nowhere near what I am today. I hate to say it but a bit of bullying helps develop you as a person. The world ain't all buttercups and sunshine, so you might as well get ready for it while you're young.
So the kids that have been lead to suicide because of bullying should have just had thicker skins and not been such pansies? That's essentially what you implied, in the last couple of sentances. Or at least thats how it came across, if not them im sorry. Bullying builds up nothing, all it does is tear down. Yeah the world isnt nice or pretty, but physical and psychological abuse on a daily basis isn't going to help. If this weren't talking about bullying but rather abuse from a parent everyone would have a different opinion. Its the same treatment just from a different source.
I meant to say that if all someone does is go straight to a teacher/boss because of bullying without trying to better yourself at least a bit is somewhat counter productive. It may stop once they get reprimanded but it also may not. If it doesn't they have no choice but to stand up for themself in some way. If the person doesn't grow resistant to things then it can grow into a much larger problem. People that have been led to suicide I feel for. The problem grew too large for them to handle alone in many cases. I'm not saying going to the gym or being resilient is the end all answer but it helps immensely. Sorry if I sounded insensitive in my comment. I meant nothing of the sort.
Well I would stand up and fight for myself, and I would be the one to get in trouble, get suspend and all it did was lead to nore bullying, because the bullys would never get in trouble. But I would.
That's sad to hear man. The "zero tolerance" rule needs to be amended to protect those defending themselves. One thing I did forget to touch on is that I started standing up for kids I saw getting picked. Acts like that can have a huge impact on someone's mentality. It's a hard thing to ask of people, especially in a school setting, but I think if more people stood up for others it would change a lot of things for the better. Not only taking focus directly off the person being bullied but making them more likely to stand up for themselves. I came from a pretty rough area though and I'm sure the dynamics are quite different for many other people.
As a child, I was mercilessly bullied for having red hair, glasses, and being way taller than the other kids in my class. When I told my teacher, she said she couldn't do anything unless the the bullying was witnessed by a faculty member. I was beaten and one time left in a bathroom stall filled with feces and urine. I brought a knife to school with the intention of killing him and myself afterwards. I ended up sticking it in a light socket and electrocuting myself. The bully's dad was later arrested outside the school for child molestation, the bully being one of the kids who was a victim. In the 4th grade, my teacher bullied me for being too dumb, not speaking in class, and hugging my friends, which she saw as sissy behavior. Bullying is a multifaceted problem that cannot be solved by telling kids to nut up and deal with it. If I had the chance to "deal with it" I would not be here today.
See, the thing with standing up against it is that it makes you just as bad as the bully. I used to get pushed down the stairs everyday, called mean names because of my race, and told that I was going to get killed. One day I stood up and beat them up and called them names, I got suspended while they got detention. Then I realized I was just as bad as them by fighting back instead of telling someone and solving the problem. The thing with wearing pink I don't understand, but the laws, the laws created by our government make it better and make a safer environment for the students. We aren't creating a society of victims, we are creating a society of better people who know what's wrong and what to do when that happens instead of fighting back and becoming just as bad as the other person.
When I was bullied the main kid got more than half of the school to make fun of me, just because of how I talk (I speak normally, but I say my R's as if I were from Boston because of family ), and the school did nothing to punish the first guy, however the school was sending me to the speech program to "fix" how I speak, even though how I speak would be normal to the Boston area, and my school only suspended the kid when he flipped off a teacher, and he got a 3 day suspension when there was 2 days left of school.
I feel how suspension isn't good enough of a punishment because you get to be out of school. Most parents would punish their child for getting suspended, but there are still some parents who really don't care, so those kids would just be rewarded with a small break for bullying. Instead I think kids who would have got suspended should be given a LOT of work to complete and only give them about a week, and have them come in for Saturday detentions to work on the work.
(Same guest as above) So basically my main point is how schools need to file out punishments better so there will actually be a true punishment instead of just getting out of school, and actually stop bullying at the root, not try to "fix" the victim.
I agree with this. I mean, obviously there should be consequences for bullying, but it's not going away. My parents knew that, and instead helped me to make strategies to deal with it and helped me to understand when to stand up for myself and when to maybe just ignore it. That definitely the best thing they could've done.
Since kinder i was bullied and abused by my class up to middle school. I come home covered in bruises and cuts and even whipping marks made by jump ropes. My older sister ask and i just cry and say nothing, my mother and father along with my other sister talked to my school and my school turned a blind eye and said unless I am direct line of their sight (which i was a few times) they could not help. After some time by 4th grade I told my main bully "No" and stood up for myself and was punished by the administration for causing a "riot". Later in middle school I became violent and started to hit my bullies back (metal binder clips, pencils, books, anything was a weapon...) when I took the what I felt was the next extreme to defend myself I was no different to them beating me up like back in elementary. My point to my story is there is no point in telling a child to stand up for themselves if you don't try to stop the bullies as well or at the very least show them how to stand up
without violence or dropping to their level. Continuing the bully cycle will not solve anything, I feel like the first step is for adults to teach kids not to bully. Set the punishments. Second teach the abused to stand up in a positive way. I know this may be a repeat to some of the previous comments but there were some parts i agreed with and disagreed with. I could go on about this topic but i already wrote 2 comments just to fill this much.
I remember when ten years ago bullying was just a part of school and helped build character. Now everything is all bubble wrapped. And you get suspended for fighting back.
No idea why you got downthumbed, but yeah, in grade school I was always being sent to the principle's office because the kids who tried to bully me would be the ones that ended up on their asses, or the dumbass old lady "yard dutys" were never paying attention to who started anything, and since I was bigger than everyone else, assumed I was the bully.
I fucking hated grade school because of that.
I remember those days. I was picked on by some bitch because I was bigger and yard officers thought I started the fight even though I was a coward and shy!!!
Pink shirt day saved a friend of mines life he was on the Verge of suicide and I was the only person who knew. I went to the school nothing happened. We got all of my friend to wear a pink shirt on pink shirt day that week and another friend of mine told a popular friend and he spread it. Almost everyone in our classes (except the bullies) wore a pink shirt. Seeing people care about him kept him from committing suicide that weekend. so yeah I guess wearing a pink shirt has no effect on anybody except saving a life.
So fighting back makes people just as bad?
The Axis
Soviets
Vietcong
Confederacy
Spanish Slavers
Somalian Pirates
Al Qaeda
Taliban
=
USA
Britain
Underground Railroad
Australia
The Allies
Etcetera?
.
That's the impression I'm getting from some of these comments.
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You all are saying the same thing. Cheers.
I feel how suspension isn't good enough of a punishment because you get to be out of school. Most parents would punish their child for getting suspended, but there are still some parents who really don't care, so those kids would just be rewarded with a small break for bullying. Instead I think kids who would have got suspended should be given a LOT of work to complete and only give them about a week, and have them come in for Saturday detentions to work on the work.
I fucking hated grade school because of that.
The Axis
Soviets
Vietcong
Confederacy
Spanish Slavers
Somalian Pirates
Al Qaeda
Taliban
=
USA
Britain
Underground Railroad
Australia
The Allies
Etcetera?
.
That's the impression I'm getting from some of these comments.