ozarque ([info]ozarque) wrote,
@ 2008-05-14 07:45:00
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Linguistics; verbal self-defense; kids; part two (final)...
First, I thank you for all your comments and responses. They're interesting, and they're helpful. And then I have just a couple of very brief things to say...


About the thesis stated by [info]raging_tiggy's husband:
"What my experience has taught me, is that some persons will respond ONLY to a direct and aggressive counter-attack, intended to make continued aggression so unpleasant and counter-productive that they will leave you strictly alone in the future. Anything short of that is seen as weakness and an invitation to continue the bullying/improper aggression."

I can say only that I've worked in conflict resolution for more than thirty years, and have had the good fortune never to encounter an individual of that kind. If I did encounter one, my judgment would be that the situation represents illness -- pathology -- and that what's needed in such a case is the attention of a skilled therapist. It would be a situation that I consider to be far beyond the boundaries of my expertise.


And then there is the idea, stated by a number of you, that what's required to control bullying in children is adult intervention. I agree with you wholeheartedly that adults who find themselves witnessing bullying should not just stand there; they should intervene. But I don't believe that adult intervention is a solution to the problem. The usual consequences of adult intervention are (a) that the kids doing the bullying immediately learn to be far more careful to do it where adults can't see it happening, and (b) that the kids doing the bullying will take out their anger about the adult intervention on their targets, making the bullying more intense and more vicious.

What does help is peer intervention. We need children who are skilled at conflict resolution and have been trained in peer mediation.

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[info]archangelbeth
2008-05-14 12:55 pm UTC (link)
Early-early adult intervention would also be a good idea. If Little Lee discovers that hitting Little Leslie gets no real down-side, and has the up-side of Lee getting whatever Leslie had that Lee wanted... Then Little Lee will become First Grader Lee who looks instinctively for smaller/gentler kids who can be bullied.

(Although some kids are, apparently, just mean or have some issue and their parents are unable to figure out how to fix this. I give the benefit of the doubt; stars know that kids are also unique individuals themselves.)

Intermittent adult intervention is probably the bad option that you're pointing out. You've got the assumption -- probably true -- that adults can never manage to be present at all times. However, I've experienced some cases where, for whatever reason, the kid goes to a teacher on the playground and complains about some issue, and I say, "What happened?" And she says, "They didn't do anything!"

That's an intermittent reward to bullies! Will they get in trouble? Will they get away with it? There are studies, I've heard (and will google for upon request), that monkeys will stick with an intermittent reward-for-pulling-lever far longer than they stick with a one-for-one "pull lever, get reward."

And that's no freakin' good either.

Pray pardon the probably tangental rant. It seemed that the only thing that stopped bullying on the schoolbus, of my kid by one who'd been her nemesis for the prior two grades (only once in her class), was reporting to the principal the very first times it showed up again, and implying that I was about to pitch a fit that these two kids should not be around each other, PERIOD. AT ALL. Or I would become one of those really annoying parents who comes in and stomps around and demands to know why bullying is being allowed.

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[info]lovecraftienne
2008-05-14 01:12 pm UTC (link)
It isn't something I'm proud of - quite the contrary, I'm quite desperately ashamed - but I was a bully growing up. I'd learned very quickly, being the smallest (even before I skipped a grade), that my wit was quick enough to be able to lead the bullies, rather than be victimized by them - it seemed to me a clear choice, be a bully, or be a victim. So I joined them.

I led them. I speak below about how we accomplished some of the things we did, not in pride, but in hope of illustrating the thinking from a side we don't hear from very much. I suspect that those who learned how *not* to be bullies are, like me, too ashamed of how they behaved to speak up and give this kind of information, and those who didn't learn are still doing it, and don't want to give away their techniques.

What [info]ozarque is saying is true - I can remember feeling glee when my victim would go to a teacher, knowing the teacher would do nothing or next to it, not having seen anything. I also knew damn well that if it came to my word against the victim's, my superior language skills would see me safe, and half the time, them hauled up for bullying - after all, who could believe a kid as small as me could be bullying kids much larger?

Now, this was in the early 70s, when things were quite different from now; zero-tolerance was but a gleam in educators' eyes, but I think I'd have found a method to carry on my predation: certainly bullying hasn't been stopped by zero-tolerance. Offhand, I can think of several ways to use zero-tolerance to aid in bullying, particularly of the emotionally abusive sort that I was prone to (being smaller, of course, I relied on the others' knowledge of my willingness to fight very, very dirty if ever checked in that manner).

Honestly, I don't know if there's a way it can be stopped, given our current social-science development. I really don't. Anything I've ever heard of as anti-bullying techniques would have been meat-and-potatoes to unreconstructed bullying me: I'd have found a way to turn the technique into a way of further victimizing those I'd selected.

Sorry to be a downer on the topic...I honestly don't know how I'd've been stopped, if I'd not somewhere along the line developed empathy. Empathy is the worst thing that can happen to a bully: understanding what the other person is feeling is not pleasant, when you've been the one making them feel horrible.

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(no subject) - [info]archangelbeth, 2008-05-14 01:19 pm UTC (Expand)
Response to lovecraftienne... - [info]ozarque, 2008-05-14 01:29 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Response to lovecraftienne... - [info]gipsieee, 2008-05-14 05:19 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Response to lovecraftienne... - [info]indefatigable42, 2008-05-14 06:23 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Response to lovecraftienne... - [info]gipsieee, 2008-05-14 06:27 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]lilairen, 2008-05-14 07:38 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-14 08:09 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]indefatigable42, 2008-05-14 08:24 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]leora, 2008-05-15 09:33 am UTC (Expand)

[info]lilairen
2008-05-14 07:32 pm UTC (link)
I was bullied through junior high school, mostly in the form of sexual harassment.

When my parents approached the school principal with this, the official response was, "Well, boys will be boys."

The only thing that stopped the physical part of the harassment was violence. It wasn't safe for the bullies to try copping a feel on the bus, because they knew I'd dump them on their asses; they had a free pass for all the sexual harassment they could speak (on the bus and in classes) and emotional abuse they could muster, though.

I wound up doing the stubborn will-not-be-moved thing about it, and wound up so emotionally blocked up I'm still not readily able to cry.

The only redeeming thing about the whole situation was The Bully At The Back, who always read to me as going along with it because ... it was what one did, rather than any enjoyment. Like he recognised that they were causing pain and damage, and didn't have any understanding of how to remove himself from the situation. He was the only one who came across as remotely human to me; thus, he's the only one I can forgive.

I think one of the things that matters most in the sense of making a difference is getting the tools to stop into the hands of The Bully At The Back.

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[info]indefatigable42
2008-05-14 01:31 pm UTC (link)
I can say only that I've worked in conflict resolution for more than thirty years, and have had the good fortune never to encounter an individual of that kind.

I think it's far more common among children and teens than it is among adults who are mature enough to seek out professional help in conflict resolution. Maybe it's pathological for a kid to not grow out of it, because an awful lot of kids act that way.

Adult intervention in bullying only helps when the bullies don't understand that it's wrong or that there will be consequences. Again, if the behaviour continues beyond a certain age there's probably something pathological going on, or some key bit of parenting that they didn't get at an early age.

Kids learn so much of this kind of behaviour from the adults around them. I'm convinced that the bullying epidemic is partly caused by the fact that kids in school are raised in herds of their own age peers, and don't have anyone teaching them by example on a constant daily basis. We're trying to teach natural social skills in a completely unnatural environment with unnatural methods, and it doesn't work. Even the best teachers, purely because of their job requirements and time constraints, can't do for a kid what a full-time parent can do.

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[info]kelsied
2008-05-14 02:32 pm UTC (link)
yeah. I think the reason I'm not sold on the idea that adult intervention doesn't work is that... if adults never intervene, there's nobody to set the good example. I don't mean jumping in and immediately punishing kids... just a simple statement like "dude, that's so not cool." can have a significant impact. Or "Oh, I don't like being around people who make fun of others." Followed by taking the victim off and spending dedicated time with them, if appropriate.

Ozarque is right that we need kids to be willing to stand up for each other... but I never saw kids modeling that kind of behavior, so my guess is they'll have to learn from someone else. Besides, as a victim, it's so much WORSE if nobody will take your side... even if adult intervention is ineffective, it says that you are a person who is worthy of good treatment, and that you aren't wrong for expecting to be treated well.

I think it's also helpful to know that the rest of the world isn't like that. People spend so long telling us that school (especially high school) was to prepare us for the "real world." HAH! NOTHING LIKE. Thank god.....

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(no subject) - [info]archangelbeth, 2008-05-15 01:00 am UTC (Expand)

(Anonymous)
2008-05-14 03:43 pm UTC (link)
*I'm convinced that the bullying epidemic is partly caused by the fact that kids in school are raised in herds of their own age peers, and don't have anyone teaching them by example on a constant daily basis. We're trying to teach natural social skills in a completely unnatural environment with unnatural methods, and it doesn't work.* Yes! Google "Why Nerds Are Unpopular" -- fascinating essay. The author says the environment in which middle-class Americans raise our kids is "as fake as a Twinkie" and the school subculture "has no function for its form to follow"; hence the artificial hierarchy of popularity based on criteria that seem insane to adults. He compares schools to prisons, in which the inmates are mostly left alone to create their own society. RE school and real life: He also proposes that the reason "nerds" do so poorly at the social game is that they've already moved on to the interests that will serve them in adult life -- interests in real things such as science rather than the teen popularity rituals. And being popular at that stage of life is, he says, a full-time job. Which makes a lot of sense to me. I was never bullied, thank goodness, because I had the luck to be "normal" in appearance. However, as a bookish and rather socially inept kid, I was never "popular" either. Nor did I have any great desire to be; my small group of friends was plenty. The sphere of the school superstars was not only remote from me but completely mysterious and baffling.

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[info]beckyzoole
2008-05-14 02:03 pm UTC (link)
I can say only that I've worked in conflict resolution for more than thirty years, and have had the good fortune never to encounter an individual of that kind.

I've worked with children, and I've encountered many of them.

Children are not small adults. It's not just that they have not yet developed social skills -- they have different social skills, they think differently, different areas of their brains are more active.

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[info]rosalux
2008-05-14 02:23 pm UTC (link)
One thing adults definitely have the power to do is change the situation, though - put the kid in a different school, home school, let the kid go live with a relative or friend in a different town or neighborhood for a while - when you say that things change, you'll get older and it can be different, you're right. But things can change *now*, too.

I think there are definitely situations when people grow into their role over time and a sudden shift in location and peer group makes it a lot easier to learn/practice new behavior.

I've been wondering if this is harder now that so many preteens have an online self as well - it makes it harder to start over in a new place when your "place" includes a large virtual component. (That said, as "the new kid" every few years, having a virtual community of old friends would have helped me *tremendously*. I think.)

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[info]leora
2008-05-15 09:42 am UTC (link)
True, another big thing they can do is tell the victim that it is wrong. Too often they blame the victim.

I know a lot of people who have been abused. The individual cases vary a lot. But there seems to be a big difference in how it affects them and how they come out of it based on whether they thought they were abused because they did something wrong or because someone else did something wrong. If they blame themself, it hurts more. If they think they were the victim of someone who was simply wrong and acting inappropriatetely, then it doesn't tend to hurt as much.

The adults will often be the ones the children look to for help in interpreting what they are going through. And they can affect this. Often they send the message that this is normal. Not that the child is bad or wrong so much as that the child shouldn't really be upset, because it's not that big a deal. So, then the child is wrong for being hurt when attacked and feels like they don't have a right to complain. Sometimes they blame the victim, which is really bad. Sometimes they actually do send the message that the bully is the one who is in the wrong. It matters.

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intervention - [info]rosalux, 2008-05-15 10:27 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]dawnd
2008-05-14 03:26 pm UTC (link)
Agreed about the peer intervention. My daughter's school has n anti-bullying program, with which I am just thrilled. I hope that this continues into middle school (she's graduating elemntary school this year).

I was myself a bullied child. The school could do next to nothing about it, since it always happened on the way to and from school. The only thing that broke the cycle was the girls moving on to Jr. High. That gave me one year of relief before I had to face them again. By then, they'd found other ways to be mean (mostly).

Regarding the direct and aggressive counter-attack, [info]beckyzoole says she has encountered many of those amongst children. [info]lovecraftienne says that the only thing that changed her bullying was to develop empathy. It may indeed be that the worst bullies are ones that are simply without developed empathy. For some, they will grow out of it. For others, they won't. But I can tell you that the adults that I've encountered who believe in counter-attacks like this do indeed seem to lack empathy. They're still working on a "retribution" model, rather than an "understanding" model. (Which brings to mind the Old Testament vs. New Testament approaches--sort of "human development on a Biblical scale" I suppose. :^)

I don't know enough about child psychology and development to know whether or not it's really possible to develop empathy in children. I would certainly hope so. Without that, though, "turning the other cheek" just results in more bullying, as the bullies understand that they have a clear advantage. They don't care, they don't have to, and unless you can find a consequence that even they can't "rationalize away as not mattering," there is pretty much nothing you can do to stop them. Which, I suppose, is how peer mediation helps: the consequence of social ostracization is one of the few that will penetrate this sort of behavior.

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[info]ysabetwordsmith
2008-05-14 04:34 pm UTC (link)
Oh ... yeah. That was another devastating parry: projective empathy. It's a very effective way to take down a bully, but it's also risky, because there's a high chance that it'll make the bully cry. (Either verbal or energetic methods seemed to have a similar effect.) That does tend to attract adult attention. So those techniques are better left on the last-resort list.

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Projective empathy - [info]deepstarrysky, 2008-05-14 06:25 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]beckyzoole
2008-05-14 04:40 pm UTC (link)
Children are not born with empathy -- they need to develop a sense of self, then a sense of "other", before they can develop empathy with the Other. Many are quite empathic by the time they enter grade school, but it takes longer for others. That's all part of normal development, to a point. Early adolescence sees a great blossoming of empathy.

But some never develop empathy at all. That is the basic definition of a sociopath, and they are surprisingly common. I've seen estimates of 4% - 5% of the general population are non-empathic. It's very easy for them to engage in criminal behavior because they feel no sense of guilt for causing pain or harm to others. But not all sociopaths are raging criminals, not by a long shot. Most of them learn to avoid criminal or anti-social behavior because it will get them in trouble. They may still be petty con-men, abuse their families, and be generally nasty people, but they stay out of jail. Some become quite effective businessmen or salesmen, ruthless with the opposition and not really caring if their customers are satisfied, just as long as they make money.

I would agree that the worst bullies are those who have not developed empathy; the worst of the worst are those who have not only not developed empathy, but have also not been exposed to negative consequences for their behavior. Both approaches are necessary when dealing with child bullies. You can model empathy and speed up the developmental process a little. A loving, empathic, responsive mother/main-caretaker has been shown to be important in children's development of empathy. Teachers can supplement this.

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(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-14 04:52 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]beckyzoole, 2008-05-14 08:10 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]leora, 2008-05-15 11:35 am UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]beckyzoole, 2008-05-15 01:09 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]leora, 2008-05-15 01:13 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]beckyzoole, 2008-05-15 06:03 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]raging_tiggy
2008-05-15 02:10 am UTC (link)
I don't believe counter attack to be about "retribution" Instead, I see it as a rather effective form of operant conditioning.

Bullies, in my experience, don't operate on a very high cognitive level. They seem to float around in a sea of "I want!" and "That would be fun." Understanding their victims beyond basic analysis of perceived weakness doesn't seem to enter into it. Empathy seems non-existent. What they DO seem to understand, is the "Burned finger" lesson. When you were first learning your way around the kitchen, I would bet that at some point you burned a finger or two by incautious behavior around hot objects. I would also hazard a guess that this VERY quickly taught you a valuable lesson in safety. To a bully, a target that shows a willingness to fight back aggressively (Not necessarily physically), can provide that "Burned Finger" that teaches them at very least, to stay clear of that particular target.

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(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-15 03:22 am UTC (Expand)

[info]perlandria
2008-05-14 03:42 pm UTC (link)
That person does exist. I have no idea what allows you to be fortunate enough that they do not act that way towards you.

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Thoughts
[info]ysabetwordsmith
2008-05-14 04:38 pm UTC (link)
Perception, probably. Some bullies are dumb and will attack targets more or less indiscriminately. Most, however, go looking for people who can't fight back, verbally or physically. If you carry yourself with confidence, you're much less likely to be victimized. And there is an aura about a hardcore pacifist that makes most violent people avoid them. An effective predator does not select inappropriate prey; an alert bully will neither pick on someone who can fight back nor torment a victim in front of someone who can intervene effectively. Most bullies learn those skills within a few months or years of bullying.

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Re: Thoughts - [info]perlandria, 2008-05-14 04:47 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]ataniell93
2008-05-14 06:45 pm UTC (link)
A person of [info]ozarque's verbal skill is going to be not worth the trouble to deal with that way when there's always someone less skilled to bully. Bullies always take the path of least resistance.

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[info]catsittingstill
2008-05-14 03:51 pm UTC (link)
We need children who are skilled at conflict resolution and have been trained in peer mediation.

For that to be helpful, the skilled children would also have to care enough to use their skills.

I was bullied a great deal in grade school, and I never saw any indication that any other kid cared at all.

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[info]dawnd
2008-05-14 04:56 pm UTC (link)
We need a culture that supports it. As I mentioned above, my daughter's school has a very prominent anti-bullying campaign, complete with child Conflict Managers and protocols for dealing with this. There is *prestige* associated with being a Conflict Manager, and the Conflict Managers are in fact trained (to try to keep down the instances where they just use their status to do a different sort of bullying). It seems to be very effective.

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(no subject) - [info]catsittingstill, 2008-05-14 05:58 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-14 06:09 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - (Anonymous), 2008-05-15 08:29 pm UTC (Expand)
Response to dawnd... - [info]ozarque, 2008-05-14 05:59 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Response to dawnd... - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-14 07:35 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]kelsied, 2008-05-15 12:41 am UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-15 03:36 am UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]kelsied, 2008-05-15 12:53 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]leora
2008-05-15 11:57 am UTC (link)
I did once. I had someone who wasn't my friend defend me against her friend, it was so amazingly bizarre that I still remember it. I'm not sure how old I was, probably 7 or 8. They were at least two years older than I wass, but no more than 10, because that's the age range for the school. They were probably fifth graders, oldest in the school. It was on the school bus ride home. I wasn't feeling well, which is why I was coping particularly poorly with something that normally wouldn't even have been enough for me to notice or think about. But I was really tired. A girl sitting behind me kept poking me. I'd get annoyed and try to brush her away, then she'd do it again. I just wanted to rest. Her friend told her to stop. Then she told her to leave me be and make sure that I got off at my stop (I must have looked tired) because she had an earlier stop and the friend had a later one. Her friend stopped pestering me. When I got home, it turned out I had a fever, which explained why I was so exhausted and not feeling up to deal with simply being repeatedly poked.

It's rare, but hey, every now and then a kid does spontaneously stand up to their friends to defend some other kid they aren't even friends with.

(Reply to this)(Parent)
Thoughts
[info]ysabetwordsmith
2008-05-14 04:19 pm UTC (link)
I had many opportunities to practice verbal and physical self-defense while growing up. I found that some bullies could be dissuaded by ignoring them, and since I'm social teflon that was fine.

But many bullies seem to enjoy, not the reaction, but the delivery of abuse. They aren't dissuaded by anything that doesn't have a firm negative impact on them personally. Most adults were unwilling or unable to intervene. So I dealt with those situations myself -- by targeting the bully's weakness with ruthless precision. Everyone has things they don't want other people to know. If you can identify and belt out one of those, the bully will avoid you like the plague for fear of it happening again. That was the technique I found most reliable. People learned not to pick on me beyond a causual level because I simply wasn't a safe target.

However, the environment is changing now that some youths have forced adults to care about bullying. Almost every incident of school shootings has had a background of bullying, so schools are being more careful to prevent it now that it has consequences they don't like. That's some good progress. Whether it will outweigh the concurrent trend of making schools even more like prisons, complete with guards and body-searches, remains to be seen.

Peer mediation is a great idea, one of the most effective I've seen. Too bad it's not used in every school. We have student leaders at the Grey School, and part of their job is to maintain a congenial atmosphere (backed up by faculty if necessary). We also have a policy of polite interaction; bullying and trolling are strictly forbidden. So we very rarely have problems with verbal abuse.

It's entirely possible to create a healthy environment, but that requires time and attention. People often don't bother, and sometimes simply do not have the resources.

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Re: Thoughts - [info]elfwreck, 2008-05-14 11:25 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Thoughts - [info]ysabetwordsmith, 2008-05-15 12:42 am UTC (Expand)

[info]naohai
2008-05-14 07:06 pm UTC (link)
This may sound a little odd, but-- I am really happy to see so many adults thinking seriously about this problem and how to approach it. I was bullied quite a bit as a kid, and one of the things that made it worse was feeling that adults (who I thought were supposed to be looking out for me) wouldn't provide me with any useful advice on how to cope, nor really intervene at all on my behalf. It was "just part of being a kid", no big deal to them, and somehow accusing someone of being a bully was made to seem more a violation of the social contract than actually being a bully.

So thank you, parents and teachers especially, for trying to break these patterns of bullying and bad treatment.

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(no subject) - [info]lilairen, 2008-05-14 07:22 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]dawnd, 2008-05-14 07:40 pm UTC (Expand)
(no subject) - [info]kelsied, 2008-05-15 12:43 am UTC (Expand)

[info]nolly
2008-05-14 07:34 pm UTC (link)
Adult intervention can help, or at least, it did in my childhood, though as we all know, the plural of anecdote is not data. We moved to another state the summer I was between third and fourth grades. At my previous school I had had many friends, both from my neighborhood and elsewhere. I wasn't Little Miss Popular, but I was OK, socially. My new school was very, very different from my old school, and certain patterns and behaviors typical at the old school rapidly got me branded "the weird new kid" at the new school. Also, there really were no neighborhood kids where we were, and I didn't see much of my classmates outside of school -- the girls in my Scout troop were mostly at other schools, or at least in other classes, for instance.

By 5th grade, it had reached the point that when I sat down at a lunch table, everyone got up and moved. Our teacher forbad this behavior -- she didn't try to make anyone be actively friendly or anything, she just made them let me sit with them. And lo and behold, once they got to know me a bit, everything got much better -- I had a few pretty good friends, good enough that we would get together at each others' houses outside of school. There were still other kids who picked on me, but it was better.

And then came junior high; most of my elementary classmates went to the other junior high, and I had to start over. By 9th or 10th grade, I'd mostly hit the "weird, but our weirdo" status, in which some people would pick on me, but others would step up in my defense, sometimes in ways I didn't recognize til years later. I didn't have a lot of actual friends in 7th-9th grade, though; 10th was a little better.

Then I went to geek school and all was well. :)

Edited at 2008-05-14 07:37 pm UTC

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(no subject) - [info]ysabetwordsmith, 2008-05-15 12:44 am UTC (Expand)

[info]kalima62
2008-05-14 08:26 pm UTC (link)
My children's elementary school had a conflict management team of kids who voluntarily gave up their recesses to participate. If there was an issue they would mediate right there on the playground. One of my sons did this for a year and liked it. It worked very well to cut down on the bullying at the school.

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Response to kalima62... - [info]ozarque, 2008-05-14 08:32 pm UTC (Expand)
Re: Response to kalima62... - [info]kalima62, 2008-05-14 08:37 pm UTC (Expand)

[info]raging_tiggy
2008-05-15 01:49 am UTC (link)

"I can say only that I've worked in conflict resolution for more than thirty years, and have had the good fortune never to encounter an individual of that kind. If I did encounter one, my judgment would be that the situation represents illness -- pathology -- and that what's needed in such a case is the attention of a skilled therapist. It would be a situation that I consider to be far beyond the boundaries of my expertise."

I would guess, by your references to advanced age in other areas, that you didn't begin your work in conflict resolution, (Working back from present day), until you were already a mature adult and have by and large, worked primarily with adult clients who were actively seeking ways to minimize or avoid conflict.
This would seem to me, to tend to insulate you from this sort of predator, who actually tend to ENJOY, conflict, and see no reason to change, unless forced by circumstance.

I also would agree that such a mindset in an adult is indeed likely an indicator of some serious pathology needing professional therapy. (Alas, they are also unlikely to seek it unless it is mandated by some outside authority).

On the other hand, this predatory, almost sociopathic mindset IS fairly common in children...until they grow out of it, or are taught firmly that such behavior is unacceptable.

All of the suggestions I have seen that reference success have one common factor. An "Appeal to authority"...either a teacher, a principle, a parent-advocate, or even peer mediators. No matter the specific authority, it is a force that has some means of enforcing its will, or imposing sanctions. (Yes, peer ostracism and/or disapproval DO count as sanctions.) This is all well and good, IF the authority available is willing and able to step in AND trusted by the child being bullied AND has the capability to levy and enforce sanctions of some sort. Otherwise it is worse than useless. An impotent protective authority only provides a veneer of protection, presenting an image of safety, without providing the reality of safety.

That being the case, I stand on my contention that for SOME bullies, the only effective defense involves sanctions and/or some other method to make the bullying so counter-productive or costly, that the bully either gives it up as not worth it, or finds other targets. I agree, that Ideally, there would be programs and/or groups in place to teach conflict resolution and reasonable interaction behaviors to children. But there are not...In many cases, even the supposed "Adults" modeling behavior for the children are in great need of such classes. Until this changes, My contention stands.

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(no subject) - [info]raging_tiggy, 2008-05-15 01:58 am UTC (Expand)

[info]desert_born
2008-05-15 02:20 am UTC (link)
unfortunately, what's required to control bullying in children is for them to have a home environment that doesn't encourage verbal and physical intimidation as coping mechanisms.

by the time they're bullying their peers it's way too late. and the lackadaisical attitude of many teachers and school administrators and parents of "oh kids will be kids" is a) wrong and b) intensely damaging to the many victims of bullying. this is kinda personal by me because my extremely non-violent husband was bullied quite badly all through school and as far as i can find out NO ADULT ever thought of trying to stop it. :(

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