The Glade 4.0

What would you do as a parent if you found out your kid was being bullied? Verbally, physically or both.

One of the guys at my gym was talking about being called into his 5 year old son's school regarding bullying. Apparently some boy was calling him names and it got physical. Got me to thinking about how I would handle it myself if it was my kid.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

If I ever got bullied, I would beat the **** out of the bully...or at least try to. I would advise my child to do the same.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick

It would depend greatly on the situation. Thhe first thing I would want to determine is whether and to what degree my child was instigating or provoking the bully (as opposed to defending himself).

Once I determined that as well as I could, I proceed from there.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Also, I think it would depend on the age. At a younger age, the kid's parents are probably a better option to get involved, once you've determined the things DE stated, and others of that nature.

At the high school age, not so much. Unless there was vandalism or physical violence involved, you'd probably have to pressure the school's administration to do whatever they could.

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"It's real, grew up in trife life, the times of white lines
The hype vice, murderous nighttimes and knife fights invite crimes" - Nasir Jones

I plan to enroll my boy into some sort of defence class, I plan to teach my girl to cry, really really cutely next to adults.
I also plan to have a boy before I have a girl but I can't control that >.<

Or have her cry in front of a large boy who took defense classes!

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Hmm... I'd do nothing and let the kid deal.

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"The map is not the territory."

Thankfully you have no children.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I hate bullies. HAAAAATE them. I actually used to hunt for them and give them as much hell as I could.

If my kid were being bullied I'd offer him as much advice as I could on how to handle the situation himself. Assuming he wasn't in real danger of course.

This.

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Raell Kromwell

Returning violence in a bullying situation should ONLY be done in self-defense. Promoting swinging fists first and asking questions later is terrible parenting, as it teaches the child that violence is the answer to violence. And these lessons stay with them later in life, which only makes for older bullies.

If you are being bullied, be the bigger person and walk away, tell someone in a position of authority.

That's workable up to a point. However, it can actually encourage bullying. The bully may stop briefly when confronted by an adult, but most bulllies will just redouble their effort, being more cagey, and will of course deny doing anything when confronted. It can also encourage other children to join in out of anger at a "snitch" or just the feeling that this kid can't defend himself, or that it will make them less attractive targets since they either look stronger or ingratiate themselves with the bully.

Being the bigger person is pretty meaningless to kids. They don't have the perspective on life yet to appreciate such things.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

The thing about bullies is that they will only bully those that won't fight back. Showing them that you will fight back will remove you from that list. So, in this case..violence is the answer.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick

I agree with others who said it's clearly dependent on the situation. I'd also agree with making sure it's not a swing first mentality in every conflict. Make sure to be careful you dont assume your little angel is completely innocent too, I can see how emotion could lead me to be over protective and blinded by bias. A lot of things you need to be able to shrug off as a kid, everyone gets a bit of teasing I would think and that's different than bullying. Then again, I dont know if I agree with an "only in self defense" attitude. I was tempted to say that myself, but if a kid is being verbally tormented daily, relentlessly, and other approaches havent worked, I'd be ok with my kid popping someone. Similarly if he saw someone else being bullied physically it would be ok to step in.

I vividly remember grade school being on a bus and watching a local bully beat up another student and not doing anything. It was quick and it was stopped early but I still regret that. Later on I saw something similar and did intervene and I was glad I did.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Usually that's true. Some bullies, however, are quite willing to fight because they think they'll win anyhow, either because they picked a much younger and/or smaller child, or because they just think they're that tough.

Sometimes they come in packs as well. They also aren't going to back down if someone fights back because they have a numerical advantage. These are the most dangerous too, because they can egg each other on to do far more damage than they individually intended to.

Generally, the best thing that can happen when a child is being bullied is for one or more other children to intervene, especially if they have an age or size advantage over the bully.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

That's true about the group thing. I would personally always get involved if there was a group against just one or two. But if it was one on one, I'd do more harm than good in helping the one kid out. If I did help them, they would begin to expect it every time and never learn to take care of them selves.

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Los Angeles Kings 2014 Stanley Cup Champions

"I love this **** team right here."
-Jonathan Quick

What if the one kid was, say, 6 and the other was 11? It sounds more like you're talking about a fight between kids that are more or less equal rather than bullying.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Bullied kids collect insecurities that make them extremely powerful later...

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"The map is not the territory."

I don't know whether your grasp of developmental issues or post hoc ergo propter hoc is the more appalling.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I was always a really skinny kid growing up, and generally pretty passive. A prime target of bullies.

There was a time in elementary school where I was in a headlock from one kid during recess, and the teacher in charge of monitoring recess activities broke it up. He then took me aside and said quietly, "Next time he does that, elbow him in the gut really hard." This is coming from the guy dedicated to keeping the peace.

And to be honest, he was right. The more you try to ignore bullies, the more it encourages them to pick on you. The only thing they respond to is if you stand up to them. That will never change, no matter how much the current Politically Correct society wants it to.

There was another bully who constantly tormented me in 6th grade. I later joined Pee Wee football, and it turned out he joined as well. I probably weighed around 90 pounds and he had at least 50 lbs on me. We were doing drills where people would form two lines. One person would have the ball and try to get punch through, the other guy was there to block and tackle him. I was the tackler, and wouldn't you know, I was paired up with the bully. He constantly bowled me over as I did my best to tackle him. Finally, I decided to focus all of my rage and hatred for the guy, and condense it as tightly as I could, and then unleashed it. I hit the kid so hard that both of his feet lifted off the ground and he was thrown back about 4 or 5 feet. I could tell he was seeing stars a little bit. The coach roared with glee over such a hit.

I was in shock over the tackle myself. The coaches liked it so much, they made me a Noseguard (which was a very bad idea). However, the kid I tackled came up to me afterwards and said quietly, "Good tackle." He never bothered me again.

So, in my honest opinion, as much as parents would like kids to ignore bullies or tell an adult on them.... the rules of the schoolyard are very much different and those very wishes will only make their children's life that much harder. I don't think kids should kick the living snot out of bullies.... but kids that push back and do so without showing fear will have a much higher chance of being left alone.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

I think everyone should just beat each other up, if they can get away with it.

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"The map is not the territory."

I remember in the 4th grade I was being bullied by this kid and a teacher caught him, and they took both of us and put us in the principal's office by ourselves for a while. The kid was crying and blubbering and begging me to lie and say he wasn't bullying me (which even in 4th grade I knew would be pointless by then). It was a very weird experience for a 4th grader.

Much later (either my freshman or sophmore year in high school) there was this kid that constantly teased me. I was a quiet sort, which is just what those types are looking for. Well I was also a manager for the football team (part time waterboy, helped tape up football players, prepare icepacks, help with equipment, hold ball for kicker during practice, filmed games, etc).

So I was in shop and the teacher had put us in teams and I was teamed with this fairly popular junior football player who I had helped out in the past. So this kid that's been teasing me the whole year comes up to me to give me crap, and says something to the football player about how the teacher stuck him with me. The football player says "Nah Aegnor's a cool guy." So the kid walks off, and I didn't think anything of it at the time. Well from that point forward, clear through senior year, he never teased me again and was always trying to be buddy buddy with me.

Both these events sort of exposed the psychie of the bully to me. Bullies are almost always compensating for feelings of inadequacies and lack of self confidence.

Exactly. And they specifically root out people whom they perceive to be weaker than them (physically or emotionally). When they meet strong resistance, it's not worth it to continue. There are some that will, but from what I've observed most will either not bother or at least gain some respect for you.

I guess bullies are a little like Klingons.

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Les Zombis et les Loups-Garous!

I agree with guys respecting you if you fight back, be it physically or verbally. I still see that to this day in office politics. You have to be smart about it of course.

Aegnor your story is a good example of why I want to be sure my son not only watches out for himself being bullied but doesnt join in or allow it to happen to other kids too.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Rofl, that's some situation. It reminds of this kid I knew who was half Japanese. This guy wanted to kick his ***, but he was afraid the kid knew Karate or something. So he got 4 or 5 of his friends to help him. Of course, he didn't know **** about fighting or anything so he just got his *** kicked extra severely.

Bullies kind of won that one...

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"It's real, grew up in trife life, the times of white lines
The hype vice, murderous nighttimes and knife fights invite crimes" - Nasir Jones