It’s time we learned the lessons from school bullying. Now. Today, not tomorrow. No more children and young people should be bullied to death. No more people should be bullied into suicidal depression. No one should be bullied.
It’s terrible that Phoebe Prince was bullied to death. It’s tragic that she wasn’t the first person to suffer that fate. It’s time that stopped.
The first lesson to be learned is how to recognize bullying. What is bullying? And what isn’t bullying?
Bullying is about behaviour, not whose behaviour it is. We don’t need to look for bullies; we need to recognize that what people are doing is bullying.
Bullying is goal-directed, intentionally aggressive behaviour which is either excessive or unnecessary, directed by one person (the bully) towards another person (the target), with one of the goals being to harm the target.
The first thing to notice is that bullying is goal-directed, that is, it’s serving a purpose. One of the bully’s goals is to harm the target, but that’s not their only goal. Bullying is used to reinforce the bully’s position as a strong leader or to establish the bully as a strong leader. In our society, the image of a strong leader carries within it features of verbal and physical aggression. By verbally attacking their target, the bully shows their ability to be the strong leader and to put the target “in their place.”
Bullying is intentionally aggressive behaviour. Bullying is not accidental. The words and actions are deliberately chosen because of the damage they will cause.
What sets bullying apart from other forms of aggression is that it is either excessive or unnecessary. The verbal abuse isn’t called for. It’s not necessary. There is no reason to call the target names, to taunt them or to make cruel jokes about them.
The verbal attacks increase from verbal abuse into verbal violence — gossiping, demonizing, threats to destroy their reputation, threats to physically hurt them. The verbal attacks become physical attacks — bumping, hitting, and worse.
Why haven’t the schools recognized what was going on? Because we have some misconceptions, some misleading ideas about bullying.
First, we think of bullying as being done by children in the playground, that bullying is childish. This hinders our ability to see the dangers in bullying. ”Oh, it’s just name-calling. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.” ”It’s just a childish game; it’s not serious.” It’s not a game, and it is serious.
Next, we don’t think it’s bullying until someone gets hit. We ignore the devastating and damaging effects that verbal abuse and verbal violence have.
We think of bullies as thugs, big ugly brutes that beat people up. In an April 4, 2010 online article in USA Today, Rich Hampson writes, “Educational psychologists describe a new kind of bullying. The perpetrators are attractive, athletic and academically accomplished ….” In other words, if the bully isn’t ugly, unathletic, getting poor grades and has few friends, what they say and do won’t be recognized as bullying, as excessive or unnecessary intentionally aggressive behaviour.
Bullying is about behaviour, not whose behaviour it is. We don’t need to look for bullies; we need to recognize that what people are doing is bullying. Again, my definition:
Bullying is goal-directed, intentionally aggressive behaviour which is either excessive or unnecessary, directed by one person (the bully) towards another person (the target), with one of the goals being to harm the target.
