heart - I relate to what you say. The solutions they tell you about such as ignoring them - doesn't work; standing up for yourself - they laugh at you or you get beaten to a pulp because they outnumber you; telling the teacher - they hit you all the harder when the teacher's gone... none of these things work. You're right that it's a witch burning mentality... it seems the only person who can turn things around is the victim themselves but it's incredibly unlikely that most people will have either the intelligence, articulateness or social smarts to be able to realize what they have to do and then have the courage to do it.
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Originally Posted by Lateralus
I was usually one of the smallest kids in my classes, growing up. It wasn't just genetic, I was also a year younger than most of the other kids. I'm sure I was a potential bully target, but I never really faced much bullying in school (nor was I a bully). I'm not really sure why. Maybe because I usually appeared confident?
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You remind me of a kid I knew in school whose name was Reuben, had red hair, glasses, freckles - everything said he was a textbook case of a victim waiting to be bullied. And yet he was one of the most popular kids in school. Because yes, he was confident and just didn't let the bastards grind him down.
If I may ask, how was your home life then, at that time? I knew that Reuben had a very supportive and loving family, they were all very outgoing and socialized a lot, visiting friends, having barbecues, they were just, well I don't know, there was something about his family that made me not surprised that he could face bullying attempts with a cheerful laugh and somehow diffuse it.
In my case I had criminally negligent parents so I was already more than half way to believing I was worthless before the bullies even got to me.
I sometimes blame myself sorta, for my daughter being bullied... well, not blame as much as just figure it's possibly largely because she's not had a mother to teach her the female social smarts, she's lived mainly in a male dominated environment where challenging is done face to face and settled that way too, after which y'know, there are periods of peace before the next challenge. The nasty sorta social manipulation that girls do in schools is something she's just not been equipped by her home life to handle....