School bully gets what he deserves

[The Brain]

Who asked for the seduction community's view?

Din mor. She just asked me. *puffs from his pipe*

[Drakken]

Thought the Brain took all jokes, even the worst ones.  My disappointment is immense.

In any case, bullying is much more than just being an ass, it's being an ass with the deliberate objective to hurt.

[grumbler]

It's a different thing than cliques, I think, at least as I understand them. It's about picking on one person very intently, not about different social groups disliking each other.

Again, this is a language difference.  Everywhere I have been in the US, cliquishness exists when a group of people think they are superior to others because they are members of that group.  You don't need two groups to have a clique, unlike what you describe.

So, some of what you would call bullying I would call cliquishness.

[Jacob]

Fair enough.

Here's a scenario:

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch, spread rumours about her being a slut; send her text messages calling her worthless; troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence; occasionally steal her homework and personal effects; react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter; and compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl.

You'd consider that cliqueishness rather than bullying? I mean, not that it matters what label we put on the behavior other than for clarity of communication.

In Scandinavia, the above scenario would be considered bullying. If actual violence was used by the girls against their victim, it'd still be considered bullying. The violence would of course be a very bad thing, but it would simply be considered one of many behaviours used to bully the victims (and one of the easier ones to deal with) rather than the line that divided bullying from a different sort of behaviour.

So when you hear people in Scandinavia speaking about work-place bullying (and no, I've never worked in a place where that happened either) that's what they mean, not someone punching someone or other physical stuff.

In short: yeah, language difference.

[Razgovory]

Nobody attacked me on facebook when I was in High school 

[grumbler]

Fair enough.

Here's a scenario:

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch, spread rumours about her being a slut; send her text messages calling her worthless; troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence; occasionally steal her homework and personal effects; react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter; and compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl.

You'd consider that cliqueishness rather than bullying? I mean, not that it matters what label we put on the behavior other than for clarity of communication.

No, I wouldn't.  That's is bullying, which is my point.  Even if the girl was part of another group, this would be bullying.

In your first scenario, where the interaction is "more about being excluded from the social group," is what i would call "cliquishness."  Your second scenario, where the interaction is more about harming the other person than about making sure they know they aren't in your group, is bullying.

In short: yeah, language difference.

  I think English-speakers are used to having a bigger vocabulary with more precise distinctions.

[Jacob]

Ah... that was just me expressing myself poorly, then. When I said "being excluded from the social group" I was thinking of that active and malicious exclusion that we both agree is bullying, not just the garden variety "you don't get invited to our activity/ party because we're not really friends."

[Slargos]

Fair enough.

Here's a scenario:

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch, spread rumours about her being a slut; send her text messages calling her worthless; troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence; occasionally steal her homework and personal effects; react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter; and compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl.

You'd consider that cliqueishness rather than bullying? I mean, not that it matters what label we put on the behavior other than for clarity of communication.

No, I wouldn't.  That's is bullying, which is my point.  Even if the girl was part of another group, this would be bullying.

In your first scenario, where the interaction is "more about being excluded from the social group," is what i would call "cliquishness."  Your second scenario, where the interaction is more about harming the other person than about making sure they know they aren't in your group, is bullying.

In short: yeah, language difference.

  I think English-speakers are used to having a bigger vocabulary with more precise distinctions.

So you just used the term "bullying" for both physical and verbal harassment out of sloth?

[Martinus]

It's a different thing than cliques, I think, at least as I understand them. It's about picking on one person very intently, not about different social groups disliking each other.

It's all about dominance and submission play, but here totally non-consensual. The bully picks on the target because it cannot or is unwilling to stand his ground and retaliate, or lacks the social savyyness to make a network to support him. He is weak, the bully feels the fear, and with each picking on it confirms more and and more his dominance not only in the bullied's eyes, but also the peers.

The problem is, most times the target is encouraged not to defend himself or to find support in numbers through friends. Rather he is taught to be self-conscious about the others' - even the bully's - feelings. Alas, both family and school structures are badly, badly, badly equiped to deal with bullying.

To be honest, the kind of consensual "bully" set-up is pretty hot. 

Wonder if I like it because I was never really bullied and was always a bit of a "golden boy".

[Martinus]

Fair enough.

Here's a scenario:

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch, spread rumours about her being a slut; send her text messages calling her worthless; troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence; occasionally steal her homework and personal effects; react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter; and compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl.

You'd consider that cliqueishness rather than bullying? I mean, not that it matters what label we put on the behavior other than for clarity of communication.

In Scandinavia, the above scenario would be considered bullying. If actual violence was used by the girls against their victim, it'd still be considered bullying. The violence would of course be a very bad thing, but it would simply be considered one of many behaviours used to bully the victims (and one of the easier ones to deal with) rather than the line that divided bullying from a different sort of behaviour.

So when you hear people in Scandinavia speaking about work-place bullying (and no, I've never worked in a place where that happened either) that's what they mean, not someone punching someone or other physical stuff.

In short: yeah, language difference.

The thing is, the behaviors you describe range from quite reprehensible to something that it would be totally ridiculous to ban/prevent. E.g.

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch - would that be punishable in Scandinavia schools? 

spread rumours about her being a slut - probably bad but hardly actionable

send her text messages calling her worthless - a bit more actionable

troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence - so?

occasionally steal her homework and personal effects - actionable/bannable

react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter - depends on the type of insults, but barring big ones, hardly actionable

compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl - depends on the extent.

The problem is, with bullying defined as such as you get into the ridiculous area we got over the years with "fascism" and "genocide" - people stop taking these terms seriously anymore, because everything is dubbed thus.

[stjaba]

The Street Fighter version of the video:
http://kotaku.com/#!5782603/casey-the-bully+breaking-zangief-kid-gets-the-street-fighter-remix-he-deserves

[katmai]

Even though like Berk i moved around  a lot , only really had one kid try to bully me in 7th grade, he stopped when i knocked him on his ass.

[Slargos]

The problem is, with bullying defined as such as you get into the ridiculous area we got over the years with "fascism" and "genocide" - people stop taking these terms seriously anymore, because everything is dubbed thus.

Sometimes it's hard to say where your schtick ends and your stupid begins.

When a fag is beaten to death by a mob of skinheads, should we perhaps treat every blow individually and determine that they really aren't that serious and that the death was an accident given that the fag was already in a weakened state when the last blow landed?

I mean, painting the individual blows like they were part of a determined beating is really going to weaken the definition of a determined beating since people just won't take it seriously any more.

[jimmy olsen]

Mother of the bully demands an apology. I'd tell her to fuck off if I was that kid's parents.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/03/17/mother-australian-bully-body-slammed-video-demands-apology-victim/

[The Brain]

Fair enough.

Here's a scenario:

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch, spread rumours about her being a slut; send her text messages calling her worthless; troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence; occasionally steal her homework and personal effects; react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter; and compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl.

You'd consider that cliqueishness rather than bullying? I mean, not that it matters what label we put on the behavior other than for clarity of communication.

In Scandinavia, the above scenario would be considered bullying. If actual violence was used by the girls against their victim, it'd still be considered bullying. The violence would of course be a very bad thing, but it would simply be considered one of many behaviours used to bully the victims (and one of the easier ones to deal with) rather than the line that divided bullying from a different sort of behaviour.

So when you hear people in Scandinavia speaking about work-place bullying (and no, I've never worked in a place where that happened either) that's what they mean, not someone punching someone or other physical stuff.

In short: yeah, language difference.

The thing is, the behaviors you describe range from quite reprehensible to something that it would be totally ridiculous to ban/prevent. E.g.

All (or most of) the girls in a class refuse to sit with one girl at lunch - would that be punishable in Scandinavia schools? 

spread rumours about her being a slut - probably bad but hardly actionable

send her text messages calling her worthless - a bit more actionable

troll her facebook/myspace/other online presence - so?

occasionally steal her homework and personal effects - actionable/bannable

react to everything she says and does with derision, insults and laughter - depends on the type of insults, but barring big ones, hardly actionable

compete amongst themselves to pull off minor pranks and humiliation targetted at that one girl - depends on the extent.

The problem is, with bullying defined as such as you get into the ridiculous area we got over the years with "fascism" and "genocide" - people stop taking these terms seriously anymore, because everything is dubbed thus.

I have this crazy mindset that stuff that I wouldn't accept at a workplace shouldn't be OK in school. I am prepared to cut kids some slack because kids will be kids etc, but not a lot.

But as a workplace bully you probably don't understand what the hell I'm talking about.