5 ms·
It’s funny how the word “bully” is used in this context. When it’s your boss giving the orders, that’s legitimate, but if anybody else tells you want to do, it’
by viburnum 7y ago
It’s funny how the word “bully” is used in this context. When it’s your boss giving the orders, that’s legitimate, but if anybody else tells you want to do, it’s bullying. Are bosses just bullies by another name?
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoBosses have legitimate authority (authority with limits, but still legitimate). Bullies have no legitimate authority, but try to take it anyway.
- mempko 7y agolegitimate authority comes from following someone's advice not imposed upon. Does a worker have the option of not listening to their boss without material consequence? If not, then it isn't legitimate. If a doctor is an expert on lungs, do you listen to what they tell you which TV show to watch, or shoes to wear, or where to be at a certain time each day? Leadership is not a position, but a role anyone can take at any time.
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoI strongly disagree with your definition of legitimate authority. From your wrong definition, you are going to reach all kinds of wrong conclusions, which will to you seem to be right ones. But the police are not bullies when they arrest a mugger, rather than advising him to stop mugging people and stop by the jail.
- SiempreViernes 7y agoSo you mean the police always has legitimate authorithy?
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoI deny you the right to put words in my mouth. No, I did not say that, mean that, or think that. The police do not always have legitimate authority. But not never, either. In particular, the police have legitimate, legally-given authority. When they exceed that, they become illegitimate (and bullies).
- SiempreViernes 7y agoOk, but then it's not a criticism since you completely leave out the central issue of the source of authority. In particular, your clarification implies that you subscribe to the "will of the people" source for police authority, which is the sort of voluntary system you set out criticise.
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoWell, it's "will of some large subset of the people". It's probably not ever the will of the muggers. In particular, it's rarely voluntary on the part of the person being arrested. And that's kind of the point. We, the majority of the people, voluntarily bestow on the police the authority to act, within limits, on our behalf, up to and including the use of force. Having done so, however, those police have (within those limits) legitimate authority even over those of us who wanted there to be a police force, even when (in that encounter) we do not voluntarily submit to them. So: Is that a voluntary system? Yes and no. You could say it's voluntary that we set it up. But it's not voluntary when you're on the receiving end.
- pessimizer 7y agoBut you don't offer a right definition? "Police" isn't a definition of legitimate authority.
- viburnum 7y agoI think that's begging the question.
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoPerhaps. But "When anyone, including bosses, tells you what to do, that's bullying" is also begging the question, just from the other side. Or, to use my terms: Bullying is giving orders without legitimate authority. But then the question is, is there any legitimate authority, or is it all just bullying? I assert that there is. But this turns into an argument about the definition of "legitimate", and arguments about definitions are almost always a waste of time.
- tdb7893 7y agoDefinition of bullying: a person who habitually seeks to harm or intimidate those whom they perceive as vulnerable. I've been fortunate enough to never have been significantly harmed or intimidated by any of my bosses (I suppose they could fire me or something but they've never threatened anything like that at all) so in my experience it's pretty clear that not all bosses are bullies.