Bystanders Can Stop Bullying
One day my daughter came home from school with a story about a kid who had been bullied. She was in middle school and she had witnessed a bully making fun of another child. I asked her how she responded. She said she watched and listened but didn’t do anything because she didn’t know what to do. As she told me, I saw the beginning of tears in her eyes.
I learned a couple of things about bullying that day. One is that, in the heat of the moment, kids don’t automatically know what to do if they witness bullying. We need to teach them; we need to talk it out with them and explore…even role model…different choices they could make. Ask the bully to stop. Pull the victim away. Tell someone. Hit the kid. And then talk about the likely consequences of each.
But I learned something else that day. Bullying hurts the witnesses, too. It hurts to watch someone get hurt. And not knowing what to do, feeling guilty about doing nothing, that hurts too.
That’s why I included hitting the bully. Not a good choice, I know, and not one that I said out loud to my daughter, but I won’t say I didn’t think of it. But then I stopped and said to myself, there is another hurt kid in this story. The bully. Somewhere along the line, she got hurt as well.
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July 2nd, 2009 at 4:11 pm
My sophomore year in high school one of my best friends had her first run-in with internet bullying. It all started with of course, Facebook. My friend had an application on her Facebook page called an honesty box where people could leave comments in the box anonymously. The only thing you would find out about the person who wrote a comment was whether they were a boy or a girl. The catch was that in order to write in someone’s honesty box you had to have one of your own.
Well one day my friend received a nasty comment in her honesty box from another girl telling her how horrible of a friend she was and that no one truly liked her. My friend was crushed. She came to school the next day in tears. She knew another girl had sent the message but she had no idea who it was. Upset, she decided to do a little digging on Facebook and narrowed down who had their own honesty box that would allow them to comment in hers. All signs pointed to one girl, another of our friends. My friend quickly confronted her and of course the girl denied everything. The two girls began verbally fighting and ignoring each other for a good solid week.
The final confrontation took place at our weekly Friday night football game. Anyone could tell you that this was not the place to discuss an argument. It was loud, obvious, and completely public. All of our friends waited and watched this spectacle occur during halftime. My friend was getting chewed out by this other girl, and all my friends and I did was watch. We let her get verbally abused for a good ten minutes. We did nothing while our friend was shaking with tears. At the end of the fight we all comforted her and took her side, but all I can think of now is how would I like it if all of my friends just sat and watched me get attacked. I would hate it. Why didn’t I do something? Being a silent bystander was worse than actually bullying my friend.
July 2nd, 2009 at 4:12 pm
In the 8th grade, I played on a club volleyball team made up of girls from many different schools. It was hard and a bit awkward at the beginning of the season with one team of 12 girls who didn’t know each other and only had one thing in common, volleyball. But, it didn’t take long for all of us to make inside jokes, become friends, and even hang out outside of practice. That was, all of us but one. While most of us took to each other very quickly, there was only one girl on the team that never fit in with the rest of us. Somehow, her personality and sense of humor never matched the rest of ours and she was left out and never really included. While I never had a personal grudge or dislike against her, I never stood up for her or attempted to include her more. I just stood by and watched as the other girls purposefully left her out of things and even sometimes, made fun of her to her face.
I never realized how much this girl was affected by this bullying until one night when she broke down and cried. We were at a tournament and when someone made fun of her for a bad play, she broke down. She started telling us how unhappy she was on our team and how much our bullying had affected her. Right away I felt terrible. Even though I was not one of the girls to outright bully her, I never attempted to stop it, which was just as worse. I was a silent bystander who let this girl get hurt just because I wanted to fit in. While I could have easily stepped up and included her, I didn’t. I became a bully myself as I stood by and let her get hurt.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
Bullying has always been a part of society, but it seems, in recent times, people have taken a greater notice of it…or maybe that’s just me. I know that if I were to walk down the religion hall at school, I could not walk into a classroom or counseling office without walking by a poster promoting awareness about bullying. It seems to be the new “it” pandemic, if you could call it that, although I’ve never consciously witnessed a major bullying incident.
In fact, the sad truth is, most of my friends used to make fun of it. I remember sitting at lunch one day and one of my friends came in saying, “Look what I got!” I looked and noticed that it was a bullying report from the counseling office. She sat down with a serious look and started drawing pictures about fake bullying incidents that she thought were “funny.” We all laughed, but some of the stuff she drew wasn’t funny at all…It was awful…That’s about as close as I’ve ever been to bullying.
However, I do have friends who have been affected by bullying. One friend, in particular, has had a really rough time… and it is here that I should note that bullying doesn’t just affect those who are “different.” It can also affect those who are very similar to us. I have a friend who is really more of a little brother to me. I’ve known him ever since he came to my school, which was four or five years ago. He’s a really sweet kid, who hasn’t always had the easiest time making friends…though I’m not really sure why …. For as long as I’ve known him, he has had trust issues, paranoia, and countless other insecurities and issues, but it was recently that I found out why. It turns out, when he was in sixth grade, he had a really hard time. He had a few good friends, but many of the kids in his grade chose him as a target for their bullying. His few friends found that when they were around him, they too were susceptible to it; instead of sticking up for him, they joined in the bullying, so they were no longer the targets….No one knew what a sweet guy he was. No one stopped to listen to his problems. No one cared about his family issues, like the fact that his dad and mom constantly tell him he was a mistake…No… all the aggressors and bystanders cared about was that it wasn’t them getting picked on….He still has his issues, but the good news is that he sees a counselor once a week and he blogs, something he finds very cathartic. He was lucky in the fact that he did not come to physical harm…We hear of many cases in which kids can’t handle bullying. I remember hearing about one boy who was called a “homosexual” by his peers. He couldn’t take the constant attacks, so he hung himself…My friend was lucky in the fact that he never took it that far, although he does have psychological ramifications,…but I guess I would too if I were placed in his situation. His friends abandoned him to save themselves…They didn’t see any other choice…However, it is possible for bystanders to stop bullying…it just takes a lot of courage and will power, something many kids who are affected by bullying lack. Though I didn’t know my friend when he was in sixth grade, I can see the affects that those experiences had on his life, and I wish I could’ve had the opportunity to stand up for him; I know he would do the same for me.
August 1st, 2009 at 11:14 am
Bullying starts with the parents I am convinced. Last night my daughter went to a birthday party from 5 to 8 pm. When I picked her up at 8 pm I found out from her that 3 of the girls invited (9-10 year olds) had received a different invitation. They were invited to a “secret sleepover”. They arrived at the party at 5 pm like all the other guests with their sleepover gear. End of secret. At 8pm the “uninvited” got handed goodie bags and were picked up by their parents one by one. How incredibly hurtful to the rest of the girls! How thoughtless and just plain tackless. Amazingly the birthday girl is nice per my daughter, but I would guess for not much longer. How could she be with parents like these? They could have had a sleepover another night if they didn’t want a large group. But to hold both the same night just shows how little they understand that children are people with feelings. I can’t imagine an adult party being handled in this manner. I hope you can put this in one of your future books. i would be happy to send a copy to these parents anonymously.
September 4th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
I’ve been dealing with bus bullies for almost 2 years now. The most recent time was last Monday. He was talking to a parent when another child slapped him. Oddly, none of the parents reported this or made any effort to stop the bully.
So far this year the two boys who bother him have shined a laser pointer in his face, threatened to steal his backpack, threatened to tell lies about him, and, now, have hit him.
Sadly, the bus driver views my son as the problem because he tries to tell on the boys who are picking on him. I’ve repeatedly asked the bus driver to move my son’s assigned seat, and he keeps moving my son back next to these boys. When my son tries to tell the bus driver sighs and harumphs at him.
It’s to the point that, although it is a major inconvenience, I drive my child one way each day. Sadly, I know of other parents whose children have had these same sort of problems. Two have chosen to withdraw their sons from this school district.
When the adults’ response to bullying is ignoring it there isn’t a lot of hope for the kids who are being bullied.
October 9th, 2009 at 8:43 am
I’m looking for some advice about a different type of bullying. My son which is going to be 18 yrs. old this month argues with his girlfriend,which is 15 yrs. old. They both are very immature and controlling. They talk to each other with utter disrespect, calling each other out of their names. They have been together for almost two years. Their fighting has got so bad that both sides of the families do not want them together. They only talk on the phone which still just ends up in verbal assassination. It has also spilled into their school. They both have been suspended from school for 3 days for arguing. Just this week they where told by the Assistant Principal that they are no longer to be near each other or they will be suspended or expelled from school.
My husband and I don’t know what to do. We are in our 50’s and have two adult children. We thought we could handle just about anything but we have never faced this type of problem.
When we caught him on the phone arguing we made him get off the phone. If the arguing continued we took the phone away for weeks even months. But he would find some way to get on the phone. It became futile. We feel that our only recourse is to ask him to leave if this continues. We really don’t want to do this but we can not handle all the drama.
We really have not had a problem with him until, he got a girlfriend. Which made us see another side of him. I believe he is controlling and has an anger problem, which I have talked to him about. I also suggested counseling which he refused and responeded that I would just be wasting my money.
Please if anyone has any suggestions please send me an e-mail :
garrydebbie@bellsouth.net
Thank you-
January 12th, 2010 at 10:23 pm
As long as the schools themselves leave bullying to be settled amongst the kids and as long a parents continue to think, let alone say “not my kid” there will never be a change in this atrocious behavior. There was an eleven year old at my daughters school that killed herself due to bullying. If you think that the school stepped in to talk to the students about bullying think again. The next week my daughter (11) was verbally assulted (the bully didnt know I was in my car waiting to pick up my daughter), I marched right up to her and told her that if she ever spoke to my daughter like that again she would greatly regret it. Now, her parents were pissed, as I would be too if some strange lady talked to my daughter like that. I understand and respect that and I am willing to take the responsibility. The next day I received a phone call from the asst. principal. He told me that he cannot stop me from addressing these kids but suggested that I let him handle it from now on. Heres how he handled it…..He pulled my daughter in with the bully ask for eash side of the story. The bully said “It wasnt me it was another student” She walked out without consequense and my daughter was right back at the beginning. The way I see it, this particular bully will think twice before messing with my daughter again because her mother is a total winch. I would rather have this scenerio than the asst. principals.
Note to parents – if your child is yelled at by a parent, ask why first, there probably is a reason. your child is no better than anyone elses, you cannot be with them 24/7. stand up for your child no one else will. teach them to stand up for themselves as well.
and yes…I am just as hard on my children as I am protective. I just happen to have a 17 year old that did the bullying. She did not last long on top before I gave her a taste of her own medicine. We as parents need to lead so that our children can follow. The schools aren’t going to do it on their own and lets be honest, they cant.
March 12th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
Hate motivated behavior continues to be a real problem on middle and highschool campuses who claim they are “zero tolerance”. The truth is, however, they tolerate it daily and kids have to watch and listen as their “friends” bash others with some of the most hateful names ever. Schools are useless at stopping this – they have a “don’t do this or else” curriculum that goes nowhere. They have rules assemblies where kids don’t listen and policy handbooks that kids don’t read. Parents do nothing because, after all, bullying is “part of growing up”. Until kids become part of the dialogue and start talking to each other about how this hurts, and start standing up for each other, nothing will change. We must make it “cooler” to stand up against hate than to spout hate. I started a club to do just that. Voices Against Cruelty, Hatred and Intolerance (VACHI) – http://www.vachi.net is dedicated to teaching kids, parents and teachers about hate with the hope that with interactive discussion, we can reduce and eventually eliminate it. But, parents must tell their kids what is right and wrong. When you hear your teen say “That’s so gay” or “That’s retarded”, you need to stop them and let them understand that such words are offensive to some people and so they need to eliminate them from their vocabulary. Teachers need to include these types of topics for class discussion as part of their other curriculum. Do you think Piggy from The Lord of the Flies actually liked being called Piggy? Why not take a few minutes from the “good vs. evil” lesson in that classic novel and have a lesson in perspective taking using the assigned literature as a guide. Incorporating tolerance lessons into the curriculum and getting kids to talk about these things in a more constructive and instructive way may go a lot farther than the once a year assembly. And, schools must make examples of what is right and wrong. My brother’s teacher called some of Romeo’s actions “retarded”. What is that teaching? And, if a teacher does hear another student calling a fellow student gay or retarded, he needs to be called out on it immediately and referred for discipline in front of the class. Kids hear this crap all day long and think it is okay. We must start teaching them that this is hurtful and it simply escalates from the “that’s so gay” to “you’re so gay” attack out in the lunchyard. Join the movement. Become a fan of VACHI on facebook and start a club to promote tolerance at your highschool. The time is now that we take a stand for living in a hate-free environment.