Roaming around the internets recently, I came across this article on bullying by Alan E. Kazdin and Carlo Rotella.
In one large-scale national study of elementary and middle school students, 17 percent reported having been bullied, 19 percent said they bullied others, and 6 percent reported bullying and being bullied.
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Because a bully’s success depends heavily on context, attempts to prevent bullying should concentrate primarily on changing the context rather than directly addressing the victim’s or the bully’s behavior. — from “Bullies can be stopped, but it takes a village” by Kazdin and Rotella
I wasn’t very popular in grade school, and I came in for my share of mean teasing and playground bullshit, but I was only ever bullied by a teacher. In high school, the mean people were more articulate and inventive, but I wasn’t a particular target.
But a lot of kids were, and are. I am so glad I’m not growing up now: at least in my day we didn’t have email and Facebook and cell phone cameras, we didn’t start expecting sex from each other at age 12… we didn’t have instant access to each other and the wider world. We were (mostly) still kids and that was okay.
I think it’s harder now, and I think bullying is more of a social sport than it used to be, and I worry about that. Kid bullies grow up to be adult bullies. People who have been allowed to intimidate others at age 17 often become 18-year-olds who feel entitled to take up as much of other people’s space, resources, and energy as they please, and who think that getting what they want when they want it is the Meaning of Life. Apart from the damage it does to bullied kids physically, psychically, and emotionally, bullying separates us from one another. It hurts community.
And that’s why I like the emphasis in this article on both individual responsibility (problem-solving for ourselves, and helping others to solve their own problems) and community solutions. I think perhaps the days when we can simply be our own best lone gunslinger are passing away: we are now making trouble for each other on such a broad school/city/national/global level that we can’t just fix each other anymore. We can find solutions, but more and more it seems that those answers involve and depend upon other people.
I believe in individual choices, individual courage. Individual responsibility. I’ve been a gunslinger all my life. But I’m also very glad that I’m learning to be a part of the posse.
Enjoy your day.