Just stumbled upon this "reflective response" Fiona wrote for her online course:
Bullying: beyond victim-blaming
Posted on April 26, 2016
It is clear that although as a society we are talking about bullying more than we ever have and lots of people are working very hard to address it with teaching and resources, but surprisingly the problem shows no sign of going away.
Obviously we don't want to blame the victim for the bullying he or she is receiving. As a result, it is understandable that schools have put the focus on the wrongness of the bully's actions. They have brought in zero-tolerance policies and harsh consequences for bullying.
We shouldn't tell victims that they are at fault. We shouldn't tell them to just stick up for themselves, develop thicker skins and try to fit in and make more friends. But some experts are suggesting a new approach that aims to empower victims and build their emotional resilience, therefore minimizing the harm that bullying and abuse causes.
I believe that one of the main reasons I have never been bullied, or more specifically never felt the effects of emotional abuse or social rejection is that once I was at the point where I entered in to the social dynamic of public school, I already felt quite comfortable in my own skin, and felt accepted at home and by my close friends.
Insecurity is an open wound that is easily spotted and easily used to inflict pain and discomfort to a person. But it can also be potentially prevented from a young age by showing affection, love, and acceptance to a child. Some studies state that very simple methods can be shown to increase resilience in a person. These include teaching mindfulness, encouraging them to find interests, inspiring positive emotions, and promoting problem solving skills for when they might find themselves in a socially aggressive or uncomfortable situation.
In my opinion, most of it comes down to the level of comfort that a person feels about their self, or their relationships with the people around them. This creates a context for potential social experiences, and could reduce the chance of bullying, coercing or peer pressure, and other negative results of the people and groups in their social world.
I had prompted her with a couple of ideas: she might talk about why she thinks she and her siblings have been relatively free of bullying, and also if she wanted she could look up some ideas about emotional resilience and bully-proofing. Then she was off and running.
That's what she came up with. I'm kind of proud. But I also wonder whether what she's describing is representative of the experience of other unschoolers.
Have your kids been bullied? Do you think they have a secure self-concept that will weather social stresses encountered in group settings? How much of this do you think comes down to temperament?
I think my girls have some innate resilience that will make it harder to be be bullied. They can speak up for themselves. They tend to take on very active roles in their groups, rather than sitting back, which I think might make someone prone to bullying.
But I've also understood that my oldest was made to feel bad *by a counselor* for choosing to sit out of swimming. That year she couldn't quite step up and make friends because as girls get older, they do things like day camp in pairs. They aren't as open to making new friends as younger girls are. She shrunk that week, and it was strange.
So my oldest had a negative experience, she hasn't returned to camp, and I question whether she is the forthright kid I see so much of the time. She's usually quite comfortable seeing adults as her equals, yet this young adult managed to shut her down with one comment.
What would an interaction with a child be like? Ongoing, overt bullying I would think they could manage. But what if it started more subtly? Caught them offguard? I don't know. I'm not so confident.
Good point. And yes, if it comes from a group leader ... that's a whole other ballgame, isn't it.
I guess my experience (or lack of it) with my kids and bullying is skewed by the fact that being sensitive introverts they were not really all that interested in putting themselves in unstructured unsupervised situations with other kids until they were on the far side of 11 or 12. They had sensitive radar when it came to impulsivity, aggressiveness or hurtfulness. They simply didn't want to be in environments where those possibilities were lurking.
My kids were pretty much teenagers before they put themselves in situations where bullying was even theoretically possible. Well except for roaming with friends at our summer Suzuki camp, but that's different ... our Suzuki friends are the world's loveliest kids
My kids have been bullied. They dealt with it very well. One time a little boy was hitting N. He just told the boy to stop and walked away.
The sad thing is the bullies are everywhere. We will have to deal with them at some point or other. In the work place or just walking down the street. :gloomy I was bullied to the point of misery in High School. I don't need therapy to know that is part of the reason that I homeschool. (saved $$ right there..LOL)
Anyway, people hurt others. Sometimes they don't even know that they are doing it. :irked
I think bullying is an inherent part of the hierarchical and age peer structure of school. Here's a link to the results of some research I came across a few years ago; the authors have done work more recently that extends this:
I came across a number of "profiles" of the bullied on the internet, and as a formerly bullied child myself, it appears that victim blaming is still pretty much the norm: for example, the recent work of the authors above suggests that intervening with the aggressive students isn't fruitful; it's the passive ones that are "allowing" the bullying to happen. As for me, I was very small for my age, and very quiet, but I had no objectionable physical or psychological characteristics,wasn't suicidal, didn't have low self esteem, wasn't bad at gym, wasn't friendless...I just looked like I maybe belonged three or four grades back. So yeah, I didn't ASK for bullying in any way, and aside from a time in the summer after 7th grade when a classmate would have killed me if she could have (my husband was held at knifepoint by a classmate who tried to molest him), I was never in physical or psychological danger from it. I didn't need resiliance training; I was "resilient" ,but no one told the bullies; our experience was one of reasons we decided to give our kids options. So maybe a silver lining? >
So... my solution to school bullying is to limit the age segregation and compulsory socialization that causes some of it, to explore multi-age classrooms, to give children more agency in when they want to attend and what they want to learn. As we unschoolers do.
I think bullying is an inherent part of the hierarchical and age peer structure of school. Here's a link to the results of some research I came across a few years ago; the authors have done work more recently that extends this:
I agree. Bullying in different forms is everywhere, and in all age groups. But school kids have to keep going back, day after day after day. If you come across a bully in the subway, or at the supermarket as I have from time to time, its not a big deal. Its a one off experience. If you encounter a bully once a week for 3 months because you are doing some class as a homeschooler, then you get to choose to leave the class, or put up with bully until the end of 3 months. Its only once a week after all.
But bullies in schools are an all day every day , possibly decade long phenomenon. Long term abuse changes the dynamics of bulling.
Reading about bullying strikes a bit of fear in me, mostly because I've never felt bullied when I was back in school, and am worried that my kid could actually face such issues in school in the future. It's just so far removed that I can't fathom how it's like to face that, and on a regular basis.
It seems to me that bullying occurs when the participants percieve that they are in a closed social system (such as a school or an office) where choice is missing, and a mechanism for justice is not available, or ineffective.
I unschooled both my girls (including a year at Sudbury Valley School) and the fact that they are so practised in finding choices and making choices has become a kind of armour plating.
When people are free to move away from crappy behaviour, they tend to move towards nice people.
It seems to me that bullying occurs when the participants percieve that they are in a closed social system (such as a school or an office) where choice is missing, and a mechanism for justice is not available, or ineffective.
You are absolutely right. Being a bully is a reaction to feelings of powerlessness. Being bullied is largely the result of lack of choice. Closed, hierarchical social systems favour both these things.
ah...adult bullies. (Unfortunately) it seems that they are often more "successful" than non-bullies. Look at the president-elect, behaves just like a schoolyard bully, unbelievable. My husband's workplace has apparently had a series of bullies, often parachuted in from elsewhere, with no knowledge of the workplace culture, always assume that we are a bunch of dolts just crying out for "leadership" and "vision" in a facility with very few hierarchical layers...what WE want is a collaborative atmosphere. And HIS boss is cut out of the same cloth. And we ask HOW these people could EVER have been considered for positions of such responsibility. We don't NEED people who make the workplace so toxic that major break topics are retirement and the possibility of working elsewhere, but those not in this situation seem blissfully unaware what is going on. Even though dozens of complaints have been made, the issues are assumed to be with lower level workers rather than the toxic managers. So...it looks like, if the same sorta thing plays out on a national scale, we're gonna be in for a rough (hopefullly only 4) years, at which time climate change, living wages, environmental issues, social safety nets, access to medicine...will have to be addressed from square one. Unbelievable.
bullying is just our culture (here at least). So many people get rewarded for bullying in our society. I got bullied for so many things, for not being sporty, for being too smart, for having glasses, for having the wrong clothes, for having an eccentric family, for choosing to be gentle not aggressive.... Our society rewards aggressive, confident, normative, sporty people who aren't too intimidating or challenging even while we loudly and publicly proclaim "Bullying is bad!" I think we'd have to change our whole societal outlook and that's not happening tomorrow, as someone said look who the US just elected, and we've had our stupid people in power up here like Ford. Every job I've ever had, there have been bullies of one kind or another. I'd guess the only way to avoid this is to be at the top or be a bully yourself, I'm currently avoiding this by working by myself. I'm not sure if homeschoolers would be exempt as an entire group, just because they are homeschoolers, my experience has been aggressive/conformative/non-noticing/oblivious/self involved parents of any stripe can have bully kids, even ones who outwardly appear like earth mothers/pacifists/remnant hippies.
I'm curious about the definition of bullying, especially as it is being portrayed as being pervasive amongst adults. That's not my experience, at all. I don't doubt that it happens (thinking of Deborah's descriptions of the toxic environment her dh works in) but I cannot think of a time I have ever been bullied as an adult. Maybe I'm exceptionally fortunate.
But it may that my definition of bullying is different from what others use. I think of it as recurrent use of strength/power/influence to coerce the victim. So I would put rudeness, hurtful language, judgmentalism, exclusion, self-promotion, teasing, condescension and so on in different categories. Not that they're acceptable. But I feel there's a danger in watering the term bullying down and applying it too widely, because it loses its power to condemn.
I've heard parents complain that a neighbour six-year-old telling their child "I don't want to play with you" is bullying him. If thoughtless self-centeredness is bullying, then it's something that happens everywhere to everyone and it gets harder and harder to react to bullying with urgent indignant intervention, to recognize the situations where personal welfare and safety are at imminent risk.
I just re-read what I wrote (last spring) above:
My kids were pretty much teenagers before they put themselves in situations where bullying was even theoretically possible. Well except for roaming with friends at our summer Suzuki camp, but that's different ... our Suzuki friends are the world's loveliest kids
and should report that we did have some pretty major social misbehaviour issues at this summer's camp. There was some near-predatory sexual behaviour, extremely hurtful judgmentalism and objectification, exclusion and inappropriate sharing. I revise my assessment: there are at least two exceptions to my pronouncement that they are the world's loveliest kids.
Miranda
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