Bullying: Stop the complaining.

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

You know what i don't get with bullying and suicides resulting from it: if you've stopped fearing death and started pondering suicide why not use that lack of fear of death to stand up for yourself?

Suicide as a consequence of bullying is the most silly and illogical concept ever.

*FACEPALM*

You clearly don't get it.

When people decide to commit suicide as a result of bullying, they don't "stop fearing death".

They either:
a) Feel so worthless that they think they deserve to die because they think the world will be better if they die since they're so worthless.

b) Feel so worthless and in pain that they feel that death is better than living in that torment all the time, and think of death as an escape route.

Typically, when you feel that emotionally and psychologically crushed, choosing to stand up for yourself even if it hurts you is the LAST thing on your mind. Typically, the ONLY thing on your mind is "OH GOD IM SUCK A FREAK AND LOSER AND FAG AND I WANT THE PAIN TO JUST STOP AND THEY ARE TELLING ME THAT ITS BETTER IF IM DEAD OH GOD MAYBE THEYRE RIGHT I SHOULD JUST DIE IM WORTHLESS etc" every waking second of every day.

Also...Umm.....Those that DO decide to make that desperate last stand against their bullies once they "no longer fear death"?

They tend to re-enact fucking columbine. Because, Hey, what do they have to lose? They were gonna commit suicide anyway! Might as well take a few of those fuckers with you, right?

 

[xDarc]

Could it be that we are hearing more about bullying because youth of today are getting too soft and can't take it? And if they are getting too soft, why is that? More tweets and less social skills perhaps? More touch screens and less dumbbells maybe?

I know the demographics here, so I'm sure the answer will be a resounding no, but I just call em' as I see em'.

I grew up in the Detroit burbs and as soon as I got into Jr. High in 1994, every kid thought he was Tupac or Dr Dre or some other sort of ganster... oh it was bad. Wish you young ones could have seen it.

 

[Kaptin Krunch]

Not reading the entire thread but I think you can always 'deal with' bullies. Don't let idiots get to you, as simple as that. If someone is fucking with you to the point that you even consider taking your own life, walk up to them and punch them in the throat. Don't be afraid of conflict, I've yet to read a story in which somebody commited suicide that couldn't have been avoided had the victim fought back.

 

[mattttherman3]

Well, my bully got stopped after I stood up to him. got him suspended for shitting in a garbage can. Also screwed him over in our final project for class, no one wanted to be our partner, but I got him to do the hard calculations part and told the teacher I was going it alone, he went for it too, it was great. Ah grade 9.

 

[Matthewmagic]

Not reading the entire thread but I think you can always 'deal with' bullies. Don't let idiots get to you, as simple as that. If someone is fucking with you to the point that you even consider taking your own life, walk up to them and punch them in the throat. Don't be afraid of conflict, I've yet to read a story in which somebody commited suicide that couldn't have been avoided had the victim fought back.

Depending on the level of bullying you are experiencing. It becomes easy to feel like the whole world is against you. It isn't that easy for them.

 

[Sight Unseen]

Bullying is a really serious issue and it can fuck kids up for a long time... When I was in 8th grade I got bullied and then all of my friends and almost my whole class started joining up with that bully. My friends all left me and literally told me (over MSN no less) that they didn't want me to hang around with them. My whole little world just collapsed around me. And this was only a relatively minor bullying comparatively, amounting to a kid in class just picking on me and calling me names repeatedly, followed by my class mates all joining in. They even managed to get my teacher to put one of the names they were calling me in the school yearbook as my "nickname" when I was absent one day.

Anyway, after all of that, it changed me. For years I became very shy and had a very hard time making friends. I was always self-conscious about who I was and I felt myself sometimes giving in to what they had called me, years earlier. It's a psycholigically brutal experience, and I'm not a person who is easily depressed by any means.

So no, bullying is NOT okay, and people need to know how to handle bullies and they shouldn't be left to fend for themselves because that never helps anything.

I like to post this song when discussing bullying because I feel like it sums up my feelings very well, and it's made me and several other people cry from seeing it.

 

[Kaptin Krunch]

That's the thing man, dont lose. Dont give them a chance to fight back if the problem is really that bad, walk up to them, hit them in the throat, then elbow them in the nose acouple of times. Doesn't matter how big somebody is, a broken nose is going to fucking hurt.

 

[Kaptin Krunch]

Its not hard to suckerpunch somebody, hit them where it hurts and they're going to go down. Im a skinny dude, and ive layed people the fuck out for talking shit. It takes alot to get me mad but if you get me to that point im going to mess your face up a bit. Maybe i've just been raised different than most people on this forum, im from a pretty redneck family and was raised to not take shit. Seriously, its reallllly easy to break somebodies nose >.>

@CriticKitten
Im a senior in high school, i haven't seen one case of severe bullying, acouple fights now and then but nothing serious.

 

[Vault101]

Here's the thing, I don't really believe bullying exists. Ask someone if they're a bully and they'll say no, sometimes even if you call them out on their bullyish behavior. Why? Because in everybodies own mind they're the hero of their own story.

which proves...absolutly fuck all, thats a given fact. Hitler didn't see himself as a monster, you want to tell me he wasn;t a monster?

[quote/]Furthermore, what exactly equates bullying anyway? If someone doesn't want to be my friend because they find me annoying, am I being bullied than? When the higher ups at my job conspire against me- professionally- to keep me from being promoted, is that bullying?[/quote]
oh for-
there is a sliding scale, certain group behaviours..such as leaving the weird kid out or "joining in" on the general consensus of "omg that kids such a loser!" or whatever is passive bullying at worst...and I admit we are all guilty of it in some form or another, theres always that one annoying kid whom you only hang out with out of obligation, from my expereince it comes from insecurity and wanting to "fit in"

bullying is generally ATTACKING another person consistantly and unfairly, bullys (the worst kind) arent normal happy well-adjusted kids, they are assholes, also the group mentality thing when taken to a ore extreme level (like lets beat up this kid because of his pokemon backpack)
[/quote]

 

[Ryotknife]

jimmity cripes, looks like I got out of the school system just in time (2002). Never heard anything remotely like some of these stories in these threads when I was in school. Being picked on by the opposite gender? bullied so much that people commit suicide? Even the degree to which people are bullied is obscene compared to my days. I guess bullies in my generation had "class"

That said, dont expect the teachers or administration to do jack. Thanks to helicopter parents and just parents that find any excuse to sue, teachers in many districts have zero power and the newer administrators no longer have a backbone to do what is neccessary (at least in the US). The Education system is FUBAR'ed.

Oh, the schools will put on a good show and cover their butts, but they wont actually do anything. Schools are turning into a cesspool both for students and for everyone working there.

 

[WolfThomas]

Obviously everyone has different experiences but telling a teacher only ever resulted in good things for me. A lot of the students who bullied were on very shaky ground with the coordinators for other things like attendance and behaviour in class. Few complaints handled anonymously on top of that (and they always had multiple victims) and they were threatened with outright expulsion, the ones who didn't give a damn got expelled, the ones who needed highschool stopped very quickly.

 

[drummond13]

To address one particular part of your OP, how is ignoring bullying not dealing with your own problems? Ignoring can be a surprisingly effective counter-bullying tactic, for example before I was a teenager I was relatively immature for my age and used to react strongly to bullies, often trying to fight them.

Once I hit puberty however I matured a good deal in a short time and calmed down, so when bullies tried to goad me into a fight or insult me I'd refuse to fight but crucially I'd also refuse to back down, or show emotion. Within a year the bullying almost dropped off entirely and for the rest of my secondary school years there was only a couple of minor incidents, never with the same person either. This was entirely by my own actions.

Ignoring is effective because when you get down to it, bullies bully to either amuse themselves or make themselves feel tough or better than the victim. Bullying someone who shows no reaction to you is not fun, nor does it makes you look like the bigger man if the victim refuses to budge. So perhaps OP you wouldn't have experienced such a "fair share" of bullying if your youth if you'd dealt with it responsibly rather than settling it over fists in the park?

You answered your own question. You DIDN'T ignore bullying.

"Once I hit puberty however I matured a good deal in a short time and calmed down........or insult me I'd refuse to fight but crucially I'd also refuse to back down, or show emotion."

You stood up for yourself.

The common idea of ignoring means it doesn't exist. For my personal experience, treating bullying as not existing meant that said bully would push even harder. Furthermore, I always noticed that the kids who pretended it never happened where also the ones who didn't stick up for others, they simply allowed it to happen.

As for the fist fight comment, as I said, I'm simple-minded (not meaning I'm dumb). I never was drawn in to name-calling and chest puffing. If you wanted to say something to be rude or to demean myself or others, that's fine. Just understand that I'm ready and willing to defend myself if it comes to that.

Which is why I always called out bullies with the simple line "Look, I'm not going to argue with you, you want to keep calling me that/treating me that way/ doing that to me, then lets meet at the park."

More often then not, the bully would back away from a comment like that.

Then you didn't have very effective bullies, did you?

Most bullying I received in school came in the form of name calling and taunts, but it was constant and from a large group of people. Not having more than a couple of friends, there wasn't much defense against it. Sure, I could brush it off some days, but over time it really hurt. I don't consider myself a weak person because of this; it's just hard to hear demeaning things about you every single day relentlessly from a large group of people.

Once or twice I snapped and made it physical. I would get in trouble for these times, since I was the one who started the fight. Other times they would be the ones who made it physical. I'm glad you had the luck to have bullies who backed off at a challenge or who chose to take you one one on one, because I sure as @#$% didn't. They got in trouble, occasionally, but this didn't even slow them down. They just didn't get physical again for a while.

It's very easy to say "stand up for yourself", but when you're outnumbered and have been marked as a target by a large group, "standing up for yourself" doesn't always work. And when it doesn't, what then?

Look, I'm not saying the social reaction to bullying is perfect, but you seem to believe it's an easy thing to deal with simply because you clearly had it easier than many.

 

[AlbertoDeSanta]

snip.

Just out of interest, how did you deal with your bullying if you state that violence NEVER fixes anything? Not trying to be snide, but the general sentiment is that telling a teacher is pretty much useless. Speaking from experience, teachers did (or wern't allowed to do)fuck all, brick to the head, worked quite well.

Obviously if you're being set on by 3 or more guys, you can't feasibly fight back unless you're bruce lee or armed with a gun, but if it's one on one (two at a stretch if I've got a weapon of some description), I'll personally take my chances. (I've already discusssed that this can't or isn't the case for everyone to have that "fight" in them in my post above so I won't repeat myself)

I ignored it, sometimes I told the teacher. As said before, it really depends on the situation. The reason why I said that Violence was never acceptable in retaliation is because it can cause the cycle to repeat. If they begin being violent to you, that's where I'll put my hands up and say "Go for it", because Self-Defence is fine. If you begin the fight, with no prior knowledge to their inclination to fight you, then you are just as bad. With multiple guys... That's a toughie. I've never been in that situation, mostly because I just don't let it get to the stage where a Fight will occur (Two occasions). But I'd say that it'd be luck that you'd get out with no major injury.

Overall, it really comes down to circumstance and the situation at hand, but I believe that violence is never an acceptable first answer; a last resort for sure. But never the first choice.

 

[OmniscientOstrich]

snip

Wow, seems we have a lot more Internet Tough Guy's on this forum than I thought. I think it's also worth noting that this is Kaptin Krunch's first post:

Do you think it's bad?

I realized something recently, I lie. A lot. I lie about anything and everything if it will result in something good happening to me. From tiny inconsequential lies to huge over arcing lies that would blow up in my face if the person found out.

I'll lie without even planning too, I can be having a conversation and if I see an opening to bullshit someone and have something good come my way the lies just kinda flow out of me. Now I know lying is supposed to be bad and you're 'supposed' to feel bad for it. I used to think that, or at least I think I did. Maybe i'm just a self serving asshole but if that's what I am it's all good because you gotta look out for number one!

So what are your thoughts when it comes to lying? To be honest sometimes I impress myself with the stuff I come up with when i'm on a roll and the bullshit is flowing.

In fairness, he actually left it a good 10 days before posting in another thread, so it's almost a half-decent troll attempt, certainly a lot more subtle than that guy who made 10 threads in the space of as many minutes. Kudos to you sir, you gave me a decent chuckle in this otherwise face-palm inducing slog.

 

[Leonardo Huizar]

Bullied as a kid: I was always a big kid but that never stopped pieces of shit to try to instigate with me, i even stood up to some wannabe gangster who clocked me in the middle of class and split my lip open. But i didnt reel in pain or give him the satisfaction of crying from the pain.

One Halloween me and my younger brother were taking pumpkins that we bought locally, then some other wannabe gang member [teenager versus a kid, so fair fight for him and all] decided to try and steal them from us just for the sake of because. I told my brother to run home as i got in front of him and took a beating and several kicks to face... then the neighbor lady caught his ass and stopped the beating... then the cops showed and dealt with him.

Bullied as a teen: Some pothead cholo used to treat me like shit on the bus to school everyday for 3 years of high school unitl he dropped out

Two arse holes tried to harass my cousin who is a girl about a year older than me, i confronted both of them at school, both big dudes and i was willing to throw down because she always looked out for me and i was not going to let this sh*t fly with me

Went to a different high school my senior year and was actually more athletically inclined as well as training to enter the US Army so no bullies my senior year

Bullied as an adult: While in the Army some douchebag from texas who i shrugged off because he was a loser who tried to get under my skin. When i was stationed in S. Korea some clique of "guys" would just disrespect me at their leisure but at the time i was taking Tae Kwon Do and have proven my prowess by dropping a infantry soldier who tried to bully me. Still didnt stop them from trying to dis me.

At work afew years ago some douchebag, who daily would just try to goad me everyday he worked. Every f*cking day. Until finally one day he was trying to piss me off right after work inside the building i work. I had enough and dropped my personal books and said really loud at him: "YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH ME!?" Then he backed off and walked away. Id didnt threaten him with violence, but my body language said otherwise.

Also this one new guy at work i was training tried repeatedly to get under my skin... this was harder on me because i at that point in my life had a very traumatic event regarding sexual abuse. So while i was trying to function with that garbage on my mind nonstop at work, this dude would just push my buttons every chance he got. He eventually got fired, thankfully along with douchebag for unrelated karmic reasons



So bullying doesnt stop in life for some of us.

My only advice to the young-lings being bullied is: See a weight, pick it up a hundred times, then the same on the other arm, take a karate or boxing class, dont take sh*t from bullies. Bullies are cowards and if they fight in groups expect to fight really dirty [dirt in the eyes, jabs to the neck, biting, twisting arms so ligaments tear apart] and make your own group friends just in case cause bullies wont mess with superior numbers.

Violence isnt the answer, but the simple mind of a bully will get the message crystal clear

 

[Loonyyy]

Bullying is a really serious issue and it can fuck kids up for a long time... When I was in 8th grade I got bullied and then all of my friends and almost my whole class started joining up with that bully. My friends all left me and literally told me (over MSN no less) that they didn't want me to hang around with them. My whole little world just collapsed around me. And this was only a relatively minor bullying comparatively, amounting to a kid in class just picking on me and calling me names repeatedly, followed by my class mates all joining in. They even managed to get my teacher to put one of the names they were calling me in the school yearbook as my "nickname" when I was absent one day.

Anyway, after all of that, it changed me. For years I became very shy and had a very hard time making friends. I was always self-conscious about who I was and I felt myself sometimes giving in to what they had called me, years earlier. It's a psycholigically brutal experience, and I'm not a person who is easily depressed by any means.

So no, bullying is NOT okay, and people need to know how to handle bullies and they shouldn't be left to fend for themselves because that never helps anything.

I like to post this song when discussing bullying because I feel like it sums up my feelings very well, and it's made me and several other people cry from seeing it.

Rise Against for the win. I think they perfectly outline the problem: The people getting hurt aren't to blame. What sort of a monster lets that happen?

I feel bad for your story, I had a similar sort of situation when I moved schools, and didn't fit in.

The ideal solution would be for people to simply not put up with it, for the kids to reject those who would bully outright. But, people are dicks, so you need to have a system in place for when that doesn't work, and that's what the administration is for.

Is your name by any chance a reference to this song? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXZpqORcuFM

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

I'm...not sure you get it.

Telling a teacher does nothing. Sure, they may get a detention. Very rarely do schools have effective ways of dealing with systematic victimisation.

Ignoring it doesn't work, as anyone who has actually been in a situation where they are being victimised knows. What are you going to do? Start walking away? Most naive advice I've ever heard.

Standing up for yourself is all well and good for lads of integrity like myself and (I'm assuming) the OP, because we CAN. Some people can't. Or just don't, because they know if a teacher sees that they'll just dismiss it offhand and go "Well I don't care who started it both of you pick up rubbish" or some inane crap. Once you respond, if you can't finish it yourself, or worse, if you end up not looking like a victim, no-one's going to care enough to get to the bottom of it.

Not to mention, there's not just one kind. Sticks and stones may break your bones but words will etc. is absolute and utter bullshit and I can't believe that is seen as an actual solution. Most severe abuse has at least a component of this, and can spread into other areas of the victim's life. Crucially, it is also the form that people give least of a fuck about and which does the least demonstrable harm (demonstrable to an idiot, that is).

I don't care what the media says. There is abuse that occurs that is systematic and that leads to suicide. And while I will agree that sometimes victims don't take the necessary steps to report it, the biggest problem is the complete inability of schools or other intstitutions to recognise and deal with these problems. It's just a one-off dispute or "kids will be kids". And Jesus Christ, the amount of "just ignore it" is fucking stupid.

The only thing I can say in regards to the OP's experience is, and I'm not trying to belittle you, if you stood up for yourself and it STOPPED, you did not have that bad a time of it.

 

[Remus]

Strongly disagree. Way to put the onus on the victims.

Bullying is innacceptable. End of story.

Try being victimized daily by anywhere from 5 to 30 people. < YES
Ever get punched repeatedly with small wooden objects cause it hurts more? < YES
Ever get mobbed by 20 guys with the sole intent of kicking the crap out of you? < YES
Ever have teachers not believe you, or just do nothing at all cause they share the OP's view? < YES
Ever spend lunch hours hidden as much as possible in order to avoid being harrassed? < YES. Specifically the table kids in detention or ISS sat because they weren't allowed to speak.
Ever think that one day you just might snap and kill every ************ in the school then yourself? < ABSOLUTELY
And all this because you aren't very athletic, are good at art and live in a small town that you moved to in middle school. < Dealt with the same kids at the same school for 7 years.

I say 7 years because near the end of 6th grade I snapped and assaulted my principal, or more accurately punched him in the nuts. I was expelled for the rest of that year but allowed to move on to the next grade with my class. From that point on I was either respected or feared. Nobody even attempted to bully me and I made a point that I didn't accept seeing others bullied around me. This and learning the fine art of leverage/mass displacement - the ability to throw a person twice your size across the room, kept my classmen well in line.

Now I was never the athletic type but I was a brick regardless. I always stood up for people weaker than myself and had no qualms about missing school days for doing so. Bullying is unacceptable and a zero tolerance policy should reflect this, punishing the offender either before it escalates to violence or far worse than the victim if/when the victim finally tries to make a stand. School should not be about forced darwinism. The only time Darwin should ever come up is in a science or history book.

 

[Loonyyy]

Yes because "standing up for yourself" always works and the victim standing up for himself always wins.

We shouldn't make teachers get involved in bullying or try to resolve the issue, we should just tell the kids "tough luck" and let them sort it out on their own. What could POSSIBLY go wrong?

Spoiler

Let me give you some advice, standing up for yourself doesn't always work like people think. This isn't some school show where the kid stands up to a bully, beats the crap out of him, then the bully being the coward he is goes away forever. Most bullies come from violent homes as it is, they probably are beaten enough by their parents that one extra beating at worst just gets them pissed. They thrive off of power and domination. Take that power away from them and they're more determined then ever to get it back... Which means that when you aren't looking, your next beating will be even MORE painful.

Bullies don't give a crap if you "stand up to them", they'll keep bullying regardless of what you do. The best thing to do is get a teacher and let that asshole know that if he tries it again, he'll just end up with a detention.

It's a good point that one. I'd think Americans(Who tend to be the ones who talk about "Dealing with it") should especially be able to take note of that. Their culture and martial philosophy is based on the idea of the citizenry being able to take up arms. They defend the right to own personal firearms. So the idea that one should fight back, can easily be tied to it: If you can't fight back, you need a weapon, becase "Standing up for yourself" is the only option.

I know that sort of thing was my plan for a long while. General misanthropic fantasies about the systematic butchering of the stupid and the bogans, and the like. It's not a healthy thing.

I was actually thinking of writing a novel about it, an anti-hero story about a kid who, through persecution, turns to violence. It'd at least be thought provoking.

 

[WolfThomas]

At one of the schools I went to, they actually changed the rules, because of the excessive amount of bullying I received.
They didn't change the rules in my favor though.

I reported to a teacher, every instance of bullying.
There was so much of it though, the teachers started to not believe me. They thought I was making it all up.

So they changed the rules so that a teacher could only take action if they personally witness the bullying themselves.
The bullies were clever though, and waited until the teacher wasn't looking or went out of the room.

Also, I had one instance where a teacher was a massive bully himself.

To be fair that just sounds like a shitty school.