The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence • Hacker News Board

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#401

Post by themacguffinman » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 10:58 AM UTC

jimkleiber wrote: post #375

themacguffinman wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but at what point do we then become the bully trying to instill fear in them? This isn't really as ambiguous as you present it to be, the obvious answer is "when you do it to them unprovoked, that's what distinguishes bullying from self-defense". There are scores of comments here describing a strategy that worked for them, it's evidently effective. Have you ever tried what you're preaching with real childhood bulli…

> This isn't really as ambiguous as you present it to be, the obvious answer is "when you do it to them unprovoked, that's what distinguishes bullying from self-defense". I agree if I believe I did it to them unprovoked, then it would be bullying; however, how often do you think a person believes they're doing it to someone unprovoked? The receiver may believe it's unprovoked, but I'd imagine the person delivering th…

> The receiver may believe it's unprovoked, but I'd imagine the person delivering the blow in that moment may think it was provoked. I don't think most people will self-identify as a bully, but I may be wrong about that.

Practically every story in this thread, notably including your own, was unprovoked. An extremely common theme is that bullies pick weak targets, if the victim fights back they pick another target. There's no provocation involved.

It doesn't matter whether a bully internally believes their actions are justified, there are basic facts and societal standards. If I beat you up for looking at me funny and I say it's justified because you provoked me with your glance, that's unreasonable nonsense and claiming subjectivity doesn't suddenly make me sympathetic.

> there's a lot of talk about legality of self-defense and how if one's actions tip over into being too aggressive, it can go from being self-defense to assault very quickly and become illegal

The legal world of adults actually has teeth in penalizing violence which doesn't really apply to the world of children. Not only would child victims be exempt from adult laws when fighting back, it is in their best interest to do so because their bullies are also exempt from adult laws in their violence against the victim. That means that victims can expect to be bullied in the future since they aren't protected by laws like adults are.

If your only point here is that fighting back can go too far, guess what, so can bullying.

> I think it may show that there are ways to resolve such conflicts with words

I don't think anyone here is saying that conflicts cannot be resolved with words, the point in contention here is whether it solves anything for bullied children. I can't even honestly characterize your anecdote as bullying, at no point was harm threatened or even implied. When a group of teen classmates corner you and threaten to beat you up if you don't give them your lunch money, do you honestly believe a confident remark about mutual respect can be a solution there?

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#402

Post by vintermann » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 10:59 AM UTC

wrycoder wrote: post #286

WalterBright wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of children discover how to deal with bullies effectively. This can be taught to them.

It’s traditional for a father to teach his son that he should defend himself. He may lose the fight, but respect is gained. And, you’d be surprised, many bullies are actually cowards and will fold early. There are many novels directed at young people that show how to behave in these situations. It’s not clear that anyone reads them anymore. It’s important to work these things out early in life, before the “events” ge…

You should learn about bullying from science, not from out of fashion novels. Try out your intervention in a dozen randomly selected schools, try a different one (or do nothing) in the others.

This has in fact been done, and nothing resembling your approach, what one might call the "Manhood YouTube channel" approach, has done well at all.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#403

Post by RalfWausE » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 11:42 AM UTC

twiddling wrote: post #288

XorNot wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep wondering what you think bullying is, at the school level? Because at my level, it was physically violent - and I was not in a school where this was considered "a problem". Everyone knew who the bullies were, and there was a collective culture of silence because the school could not possibly enforce proper physical safety on the grounds or around it. You avoided them and stayed away from them, because they abs…

I knew one kid who stood up to the bully and then was jumped by the whole gang after school. They used steel pipes to break a leg and knock out teeth. Of course there were no "witnesses" as "snitches get stitches" in that old neighborhood.

Now... i was also heavily bullied at school and at some point my solution was to show everyone of the "gang" (not in the US sense... more a clique of 13 - 15 year old wannabe-gansters) that i am total psycho. I waited for weeks until i got the chance to grab the main bully alone and unprepared, surprised him, beat him heavily while keeping total silent while doing so only to tell him afterwards in a somewhat calm way that it could be weeks, months or years, but i would GET him if he continues to harass me.

Worked for me, never had any problems with his clique afterwards.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#404

Post by JoeAltmaier » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 1:20 PM UTC

If the student isn't being bullied, then the parents are. If they try to participate in their child's education beyond volunteering for the teachers' pet projects they get slapped down and criticized and told they aren't good enough and should butt out.

Home schooling is an alternative, if you have the opportunity. Not just for religious nuts; it's for anybody that wants to see their kid get more than But good luck trying to check out a curriculum from your public school - you'll get glared at and lectured to and forbidden from checking out any curriculum that isn't 'age-appropriate' even though your child did all that stuff 2 years ago.

Anyway, sorry, hot button.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#405

Post by haswell » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 1:37 PM UTC

P5fRxh5kUvp2th wrote: post #339

haswell wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's the same thing, this is clearly harmful. This is a deeply fallacious argument, and these are not equivalent things. You seem to be concluding that the only thing that matters is outcome, not intent. Comparing a parent who makes a well intentioned mistake with a parent who intentionally puts their child in the care of a predator is ridiculous. One of these parents may even be criminally liable for their actions…

I'm not reading all of that, sorry. If a parent isn't preparing children for life as an adult they're bad parents. I'm a bad basketball player and my intent has fuckall to do with that judgement.

For what it's worth, it's a ~50 second read.

> I'm a bad basketball player and my intent has fuckall to do with that judgement.

Being a bad basketball player doesn't automatically mean you're bad at all sports. And it certainly doesn't mean you're a bad person.

> If a parent isn't preparing children for life as an adult they're bad parents.

I mostly agree with this statement, but this isn't where we started.

And just like failing at basketball doesn't mean you're failing at all athletic or sporting endeavors, failing at one aspect of parenting doesn't mean you're failing all aspects of parenting (an enormously complicated and diverse set of responsibilities).

If a parent is failing the most critical aspects, or most aspects, yeah, they're bad parents.

Bad parents still aren't automatically bad people.

At this point, I think the horse has been beaten sufficiently.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#406

Post by coldtea » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 1:56 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #208

corobo wrote: post #52

Heh, decent timing. My last CBT session ended with me realising one of my issues may be a lasting effect of bullying. Essentially I was trying to find out why I procrastinate, beyond "it's just the ADHD lol" Boiled it down and down and down until we hit the core of the issue and realised I don't want to poke my head up and ship code/sites/ideas/etc because I believe I'll be bullied for it. In school doing anything th…

I wonder if private schools are a way that rich kids can afford to be different but poor kids can't. See https://sfstandard.com/business/inside-ftx-founder-sam-bankm... Would rich kids be facing much more competition for elite spots from poor but smart kids if bullying wasn't part of the curriculum in the public schools? Given that only 10% of kids get to go to a school where dignity is assured, it could be that 90%…

I don't know about the US, but bullying in "schools for rich kids" is legendary in the UK

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#407

Post by coldtea » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 1:59 PM UTC

vintermann wrote: post #394

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private schools are an instance of opportunity hoarding, and "opportunity" should be understood in a number of ways. The opportunity to buy a certain level of freedom from bullying in favour of a "selective" crowd, for instance. Though I doubt there is less bullying in private schools, more that it manifests in different ways; if I had to hypothesize, I might suppose the bullying is of a different intensity though.

> Though I doubt there is less bullying in private schools Why wouldn't there be? Wouldn't safe, comfortable kids have less to win and more to lose from aggression?

Kids don't bully because they're poor. They bully because the other kid is different (e.g. jocks vs geeks), they bully to gain peer points, and for many other reasons, that are orthogonal to public vs privaye, or poor vs rich kid.

As for taking to others bad home experiences, like mimicking an abusive parent, that can happen to rich as well as to poor kids...

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#408

Post by Dracophoenix » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 2:23 PM UTC

jrgoff wrote: post #240

SoftTalker wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? Bringing beer/wine/snacks to parties is just polite.

There is a difference between choosing to do something like that because it is polite (or whatever other reason you find compelling) and feeling like you have to do it to be acceptable.

If there's a difference, it's only in degree.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#409

Post by vintermann » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 2:36 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #407

vintermann wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Though I doubt there is less bullying in private schools Why wouldn't there be? Wouldn't safe, comfortable kids have less to win and more to lose from aggression?

Kids don't bully because they're poor. They bully because the other kid is different (e.g. jocks vs geeks), they bully to gain peer points, and for many other reasons, that are orthogonal to public vs privaye, or poor vs rich kid. As for taking to others bad home experiences, like mimicking an abusive parent, that can happen to rich as well as to poor kids...

Yes, of course bullying will happen in better off schools as well. I just think there will be less of it, since some bullying probably happens because it's more "reasonable" to be a bully when your circumstances are worse.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#410

Post by GoblinSlayer » Thu, Dec 01, 2022, 2:53 PM UTC

a1pulley wrote: post #251

corobo wrote: post #52

Heh, decent timing. My last CBT session ended with me realising one of my issues may be a lasting effect of bullying. Essentially I was trying to find out why I procrastinate, beyond "it's just the ADHD lol" Boiled it down and down and down until we hit the core of the issue and realised I don't want to poke my head up and ship code/sites/ideas/etc because I believe I'll be bullied for it. In school doing anything th…

Does anyone have experience with going to a "school within a school" for "gifted and talented" kids? I was trying to figure out why I don't remember any bullying from my middle school or high school, when it dawned on me that I might have been insulated from it by taking classes exclusively with gifted and talented kids —i.e., kids from stable/whole/educated households. I went to a high school where kids came from a…

First I went to an average middle school an I remember many delinquents, but they had something like their own hierarchy independent from grades, so I guess nerds were no threat to their hierarchy, so they didn't care about nerds. Rather nobody cared about nerds to such extent that I didn't even know some animosity to nerds even exists. Standard grades were undefinable either, because ironically delinquents were below any standard, as a consequence nonstandard grades were undefinable either, so I guess separation based on grades was impossible as marginals were too numerous and visible. Then I went to an elite school for gifted kids (elite in terms of academic performance), but I didn't see anyone stereotypically rich there, and I'm not sure that a school for gifted kids is the same as a school for rich kids, I think they have very different goals. There was some kind of internment school for orphans nearby or something like that, so we got some flak from them, funnily I was once stopped by a girl and she tried to seduce me - a tomboy - I blushed, lol.