Bullying?

[widgeon13]

Why is bullying so much of a problem today vs 30 to 40 years ago. I remember bullying and being bullied but don't remember any kids taking their lives as a result of bullying. Today it seems to be a major problem and getting a lot of TV time. It happens in all economic strata and from my perspective doesn't seem to have any specific target audience. Yes, fat kids and kids that are considered to have homosexual tendencies are a clear target but some kids seem to do it just for fun.

Any of your kids or individuals here experienced this problem? When kids are taking their own lives as a result of this, it is no doubt a major social problem. Does it relate to the uncivil manner in which our political environment functions, does it relate to the decline of the traditional family structure or just a dysfunctional family environment.

I just can't understand how kids can be so mean and why they choose to be this way. What do they gain, is it peer pressure?

[Oh Haha]

My kids are just starting school so they haven't experienced any of this.

I was picked on during my school years. Admittedly, I was not one of the "cool" kids.

[billybek]

Just a WAG on my part.
Because kids lives are so structured around school/sports/hobbies there is little time to find a group of buddies just to hang out with.
In the past, it really never mattered too much if you were bullied as you always had friends that couldn't be influenced by the put downs and isolation that bullies can cause in a school environment.
You wouldn't want to be targeted by a bully if your world revolves around the social structure that exists there. If you have no buddies, the isolation must be painful for some kids.
Like I said, a WAG.

[widgeon13]

I grew up in the 60's and moved many times during grade school and HS because my father was in the military. I didn't really have problems getting to know other kids and make friends. I did take some ribbing because I was skinny but it always seemed to come from my friends and so seemed all in fun. Got my azz kicked a few times and kicked azz a few time but never wanted to do myself in over anything.

The bullying problem today is terrible and would seem to define the way these kids will function as they get older and become productive?? adults. That concerns me.

[Oh Haha]

Oops. posted too soon.

In my experiences, the "bullies" were kids that had troubled home lives. They weren't necessarily the hoodlums. I went to school with upper middle class kids(we were not) and some of them were the worst for picking on others.


My thoughts on why it has become so relevant lately is the growth of the social media. You can say anything you want to pretty much anyone and don't have to do it face to face.

Part of the problem is that some people, for whatever reason, believe that if it's on the computer it's true.

Calling a girl a slut back in my high school days would cause her some bad feelings(maybe, depending on the girl I suppose) but now you could easily have several others continue those words and pretty soon it's spread all over the internet. You can't erase what's been typed.

[ZOO]

There's been a mindset shift, too. We used to say "suck it up, it will make you tougher", but I think we've recognized that such advice isn't universal. Bullying (repeated, ongoing harassment, to clarify) can cause significant emotional and psychological damage. No one should have to "suck it up".

But, the only way to stop it is to address it. Immediately. And to support both the victim, and the harrasser -- it's as much a teaching opportunity as anything else. Simply "punishing" the bully won't resolve it.

[peppy]

In the small community where we have a restaurant, there have been 2 suicides of young guys. The first was in August and he was about 22 and the second was in January and he was 15. The second one was bullied, I don't know about the first.

I don't really understand what all the details are, but it is of concern with the number of teenagers I work with. Other than me stressing that there are other and better options and offering an ear to listen I really wouldn't know what to d0.

I do know that growing up we picked on each other a lot, but it was not on Facebook.

[legion]

I was bullied pretty consistently from grade school to high school.

I think there are two kinds of bullying, and not everyone who does it is a bully.

First, I was an odd kid, so I was picked on by other kids for my strangeness. This is a mechanism that is normal and is designed to reinforce social norms. Many kids today have never been picked on, have been told their whole life that they are special, have always had a hovering parent there to protect them, and they get out into the workforce as adults and they expect to land a six figure job as a director in their field. But their expectations don't match reality, and they don't really know how to behave around other people. Further, they are used to putting in minimal effort and being praised immensely for it. Without ever facing ANY adversity, they don't know how to deal with it.

Given the above, when a kid really does get bullied, it can cause them extreme cognitive dissonance. I don't think the Internet makes it that much worse, I just think kids today have no skills for dealing with adversity. I remember feeling like the bullying was coming at me from all sides at certain points in my life, and I did fantasize about "getting back" at those who were picking on me, but I never thought about going Terminator on the school to do it.

I remember getting picked on pretty much since I started school. I remember a bully picking on me in 3rd and 4th grade (same kid). Sometime around the end of 4th grade another bully started picking on me too. Then a strange thing happened: the first bully got jealous and beat up the other bully. Then he and I became friends and he was sort of my protector. (And the fact that he had been held back twice in grade school made him a big protector.)

I got picked on by pretty much everyone in middle school, once again, mostly because of my own, odd behavior.

I've never been one to back down, and when things got bad freshmen year of high school and I couldn't take it anymore, I challenged each and every person that was picking on me to a fight. (I later learned that one supposed friend was egging these guys on telling them I was bad-mouthing them, but that's another story.) Most backed off, but about 10 of them did show up at my house one day. I called the cops, they backed off after that as well.

By the time I hit junior year in high school, I'd stopped most of my odd behavior in an attempt to fit in. I started making a lot of friends. I pretty much stopped getting picked on, and when someone did say something, it just rolled off my back. By senior year, I was at the center of a large group of friends. I wasn't in with the self-proclaimed popular group, but I was one of two people that pretty much decided what 20-50 people were doing every weekend.

You know what all being bullied taught me? It taught me how to behave normally around other people. It taught me that I could make my own friends and the more friends I had, the less attractive target I was to bullies. Most of all, it taught me how to solve my own problems and that it was my responsibility to solve them.

[DanielDudley]

Two ways to respond. Deer in the headlights or cornered bear.

I think there is much greater pressure on kids today, but suicides happened when I was a kid. In the seventies, if a kid offed himself, it was local news. Now it seems like it is much more likely to be on the networks. It is like there is one more option, a well publicized option.

It wasn't an option when I grew up. Kids need hope for the future. I don't see a lot being offered today.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

The core problem is that we as a society reward it. The bully kids of today end up becoming enabled and turning into the brash, loudmouth, aggressive "macho" type adults of tomorrow who simply deal with situations and people by intimidation, shouting, confrontational behavior, etc. Nobody deters it in the adult world (in fact it's often rewarded) and I'm guessing a lot of kids see it and simply learn from it/emulate behavior, quickly figuring out it's better to be "on top" than "on the bottom" since nobody else is going to intervene on their behalf.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by widgeon13

Why is bullying so much of a problem today vs 30 to 40 years ago. I remember bullying and being bullied but don't remember any kids taking their lives as a result of bullying. Today it seems to be a major problem and getting a lot of TV time.

My guess is that the problem is approximately the same as it always was. The difference is the media. We used to get one newspaper and 3 TV stations with local and network news programs. Now there are the same 3 local and network news programs plus CNN, HLN, and Fox plus MSNBC and other stations that do news when it is sensational enough. All those news outlets need content, so they dig up anything that will get attention. That's why we get hourly reports on Charlie Sheen. Nobody give a crap about him, but his story is cheap content so we hear about him all the time.

[s_morrison57]

I was never bullied but I was a cops kid and we moved every 3 years or so and I was challenged to a fight most new places I moved to and always won so I was left alone.
One kid was picking on my 11 year old son and it was bothering him why this kid was bugging him. The wife said that he may have to lay him out, they play in the same hockey league and the other kid is maybe 4' 3" and 75 pounds, my son is 4' 11" and 135 pounds and he just flattened this kid into the boards behind the net, layed him out. The kids dad approached me after the game and had some comments and I told him it was probably cause his kid was bullying my son at school, the bullying stopped, don't know if it was the hit or the talking to that his dad gave him.
I think kids that bully are are product of poor parenting, and before anybody complains that my wife would encourage our son to lay a kid out then you just have to remember, " keep your head up in the corners and your stick on the ice". BTW it was a clean hit.

[GH85Carrera]

I had one year of intense bullying. My dad was in the Air Force so we moved a lot. I was in a different school every singe year for 1st to 11th. I got to go to the same school for 11th & 12 grade. I learned to make friends very fast. Every year I had to do it again.

The bad year was 9th grade. It was in Hawaii and I was 50% of the white enrollment. There was just one other Haole in the entire school. I had a team of 4 boys that designated themselves as my tormentors. Two boys in particular were the worst. There was only one teacher on campus that was any sort of protection for me. The other teachers just ignored it. Every Friday in Hawaii is "kill haole day" so Friday was the worst. The last Friday of the school year was THE "kill haole day" so I just skipped that day. Even Chuck Norris could not whip every other kid in the school.

I never even thought about killing myself, or anyone else. If the fairy godmother came along and asked it I could snap my fingers and have those two boys die a slow horrible death I would have said yes. But that was as unlikely as them becoming my friends.

I was thrilled when we moved to Hickam AFB. That meant a school that was 60% white, so the threat was over for me.

I made a consious effort to forget those two ashat boys. Over 20 years ago I realised I can't remember their names or faces. When I think of that year and those boys I see a large brown puckered ring. They are just two asholes from my past.

[onlycafe]

kid in the fifties and my last name is furer.
you do the math.
i've heard all the hitler jokes.

[wdfifteen]

Originally Posted by onlycafe

kid in the fifties and my last name is furer.
you do the math.
i've heard all the hitler jokes.

Ouch! My stepson's best friends were Ewin and Jeremy - Urine and Germy.

[Evans, Marv]

Having taught in a rough area, I saw a lot of attempts at bullying. The other teachers (except for maybe one) just let it pass and ignored it. I always intervened. One time there was a mexican kid bullying a philippino kid in class, and I put a stop to it. A few minutes later the philippino kid left class and about ten minutes after that 5 philippino kids walked into class & headed for the mexican kid. I was team teaching and got up immediately and grabbed two by the collar and told my team teacher to do the same while I was headed for the Principal's office (a woman). The 3 other kids chased the mexican kid around in the classroom for a while and my team teacher just stood there and told them to stop it. In the Principal's office, she just informed the two I brought in they couldn't go to school there if they acted that way. I told her she they weren't students and she had to get the police involved or there would be a bunch of gang action the next day or later that afternoon. She continued on with her line of talking & I left. The next morning there was a big gang fight on the street beside the school. Basically what it boils down to is most people don't want the problem and don't have the guts to face it. Administrators at a school don't want to draw attention to it because it might look to those higher up they don't have control of things. At least, as a result of that, we all got phones installed in the classrooms.

[jyl]

People behave 10x worse online - look at PARF.

Today's kids are growing up in the Internet, online is a huge part of their reality (not all kids, not my kids, but some kids).

Parents are unaware of the behavior online, or unable to control it (I have some friends who, for various reasons, had to monitor and restrict one kid's online activity, it involved all kinds of security software, keystroke loggers, etc - total PITA - can't just say "no computer" because high-achieving kids above a certain age need the computer for school).

Schools don't have the power to punish kids for behavior on their home computers, or it is a gray area that they have not figured out, legally or practically (can the principal of your kid's school confiscate the computer in your house? Didn't think so.)

So, it is a problem right now. Until society figures out how to deal with it.