3 ms·

>Bullying mostly targets the gifted I believe bullies target what is different. Intelligence or lack of it will make you a target in equal measure. Got a birt

>Bullying mostly targets the gifted I believe bullies target what is different. Intelligence or lack of it will make you a target in equal measure. Got a birthmark on your face? Boom, you're a target. My kids don't go to a school that accepts bullying. I don't think bullying was seen all that different when I was at school.

Lawtonfogle 11y ago
>I believe bullies target what is different. Fully agree. I think the problem is how people react to different differences. Kid who has clear physical disability getting bullied is seen immediately as a problem and dealt with.* Special education children getting bullied aren't quite as well responded to (lots of justification by adults that the children are treating them differently because society treats them differently), but any overt bullying is still squished. But being bullied for being different in just social skills but not other means... many adults will look at the bullying as a natural reaction to the victim being socially awkward instead of as bullying. And there is a bit of truth in that, because the difference between ostracizing someone who is socially awkward because you just don't want to be around them and ostracizing someone who is socially awkward as a way to bully them is not that clear cut. At the end of the day, the kid ends up ostracized either way. *If they recognize it. Many forms of treating someone differently are hard to recognize if you haven't experienced them. A classical example is people asking extra questions to gay people that they would never ask to straight people, even though the questions themselves are mostly benign. Regardless of how harmless the questions themselves are, it is still treating them differently, which has subconscious effects.
byuu 11y ago
> I believe bullies target what is different. Yeah, that was the reasoning behind school uniforms. A misguided belief that simply normalizing clothing would prevent bullying. But instead all that did was make them focus on something else. Your hair, your skin color, your height, your weight, your voice ... anything. I don't think it'd matter how conformant you got everyone. You have to address the underlying causes and change the mentality, and you also have to increase the severity of punishment for bullying. > Got a birthmark on your face? Boom, you're a target. For me it's a scar. > My kids don't go to a school that accepts bullying. All of mine completely and utterly ignored it. We learned pretty quickly that going to the adults only made matters worse.

Lawtonfogle 11y ago

>I believe bullies target what is different. Fully agree. I think the problem is how people react to different differences. Kid who has clear physical disability getting bullied is seen immediately as a problem and dealt with.* Special education children getting bullied aren't quite as well responded to (lots of justification by adults that the children are treating them differently because society treats them differently), but any overt bullying is still squished. But being bullied for being different in just social skills but not other means... many adults will look at the bullying as a natural reaction to the victim being socially awkward instead of as bullying. And there is a bit of truth in that, because the difference between ostracizing someone who is socially awkward because you just don't want to be around them and ostracizing someone who is socially awkward as a way to bully them is not that clear cut. At the end of the day, the kid ends up ostracized either way. *If they recognize it. Many forms of treating someone differently are hard to recognize if you haven't experienced them. A classical example is people asking extra questions to gay people that they would never ask to straight people, even though the questions themselves are mostly benign. Regardless of how harmless the questions themselves are, it is still treating them differently, which has subconscious effects.

byuu 11y ago

> I believe bullies target what is different. Yeah, that was the reasoning behind school uniforms. A misguided belief that simply normalizing clothing would prevent bullying. But instead all that did was make them focus on something else. Your hair, your skin color, your height, your weight, your voice ... anything. I don't think it'd matter how conformant you got everyone. You have to address the underlying causes and change the mentality, and you also have to increase the severity of punishment for bullying. > Got a birthmark on your face? Boom, you're a target. For me it's a scar. > My kids don't go to a school that accepts bullying. All of mine completely and utterly ignored it. We learned pretty quickly that going to the adults only made matters worse.