Were you a bully or the bullied growing up? (boys, clothes, travel)

[Meyerland]

Girls are bullied differently than boys for the majority, although there may be some physical stuff too. It's more social, so to deal with it you need to have a circle of friends. Loner girls can be bullied much more than girls with lots of friends.

I try to foster friendships with my daughter by having lots of sleepovers and fun outings while she is in elementary school and hope to keep them throughout middle school. She had a bully in the younger grades that tried to make sure that no one played with her. By getting the kids on her side, the bullying stopped. Middle school will be tougher though. I'm not looking forward to that.

[SandyJet]

My day only one kid in school was 100% a bully and one kid in school 100% bullied.

The biggest and smallest kid in school. The rest of us we could bully someone and get beat up a few minutes later.

Worse bullies in my school was one year I had the Yager identical Triplets in my class. Mean nasty, violent and the fights were always three on one. Fun part to add in was the Dad was a Bully too so if you Dad went over there he would have a good chance of getting into it too.

My favorite bully story was I and this other guy was beating the snot out of each other over a bike. My Dad comes out undershirt and all with the belt out ready to go on both of us. The other kid stays outside belt range and yells I am going down the block to tell my Dad to which my Dad responded I got plenty of room on this belt for both you and your Dad, go get him and send him up here for a beating.

To this day I bet 99% that kid told his Dad nothing. And if he did he got the belt himself. Imagine hey Dad there is a large Drunk Irish Man with a belt up the block who caught me trying to steal his sons bike and he wants you to go up there so he can whip you with a belt. That kid never walked up the block again.

[wac_432]

Originally Posted by lenniel

Right or wrong, it's much better being the bully than the bullied. I know that sounds really bad and especially from a parent, but when I was a youngster, gradeschool, jr high, HS, my priorities were sports, girls, school, friends and being cool (in no particular order). I didn't realize the impact my actions could have on another person, it just wasn't part of my makeup.

I think it depends on the person.

I don't feel bad about any of the times I was bullied. I feel like it built character to know how to deal with jerkoffs without getting violent. Kids are way more vicious than adults, so if you can deal with that bullying without losing your cool, you can handle most anything adults will come up with.

I DO--to this day--feel bad about the kids I bullied, or the times I over-reacted to some small insult, or hazed a teammate or peer a little too much. I even feel bad about when I fought back or fought a friend's bullies. There was no reason, in almost all cases, for me not to blow them off. I let my anger get the best of me, or I let myself take horsing around too far.

In the adult world, if I did the things I did when I was being a bully, I wouldn't have gotten very far.

[jbgusa]

Originally Posted by Meyerland

I wasn't bullied or anything. I had no problem interfering and stopping a bully from attacking another student with sarcasm. I never interfered once a fight started, but I could settle one down before it started. (Males or females)

I was always smaller than anyone else, but confidant and people didn't mess with me. I'm not sure why the male bullies listened to me, as I was a 105 pound female. I was friends with everybody, though I wasn't "popular". I don't know why it worked.

I was bullied rather steadily from second to eighth grade. In Ninth it actually got worse. During that year's Christmas to New Year's break I was at a ski camp with some of my ninth grade "friends." The bullying got pretty bad.

An eighth grader that hung out with us was the one who tried the hardest to put a stop to it. His tactics were similar to yours. He never got involved in an actual fight but he sometimes settled them beforehand or afterwards, beore the inevitable retaliation set in.

By the way I repped this post, given the obvious courage on the part of the poster.

[Meyerland]

Originally Posted by jbgusa

I was bullied rather steadily from second to eighth grade. In Ninth it actually got worse. During that year's Christmas to New Year's break I was at a ski camp with some of my ninth grade "friends." The bullying got pretty bad.

An eighth grader that hung out with us was the one who tried the hardest to put a stop to it. His tactics were similar to yours. He never got involved in an actual fight but he sometimes settled them beforehand or afterwards, beore the inevitable retaliation set in.

By the way I repped this post, given the obvious courage on the part of the poster.

I'm sorry you had to go through that, and for such a long time. What happened to stop the bullying after ninth grade?

I think calming things down from the outside works sometimes because it's what most people in the group are thinking.

[jbgusa]

Originally Posted by Meyerland

I'm sorry you had to go through that, and for such a long time. What happened to stop the bullying after ninth grade?

I think calming things down from the outside works sometimes because it's what most people in the group are thinking.

Thanks for asking about what changed after ninth grade, which was academic 1971-2.

First there were two negative events:

1. I got thrown out of camp after I responded in kind to a bully; and
2. When I returned to school one of the worst bullies (let's call him "Charlie since there's a delightful little backstory on him I'll tell) pulled a high stool out from under me as I sat down in the school's meteorological center.

Transition from 9th to 10th Grade at High School (Spring and Fall 1972)

First the Charlie story, which happened during 9th Grade's final exams. At he school's meteorological center he threatened to "throw up all over me" if I touched him. I took him up on this rather interesting offer. Instead of puking, he pulled a bike chain out of his pocket and began to whirl it at my head. I took off, and after descending two flights of stairs and getting through a set of double-doors, I was able to hold the door against him. I was thus not hurt, but my parents were called into school and asked them to withdraw me for the next year. I didn't let it happen. Instead I received a battery of psychological tests which proved inconclusive, but yielded IQ results that were 27 points apart.

When I returned to school Charlie pulled the chair. My father, who came home from work early that day due to pain from what was to turn out to be a fatal cancer recurrence called Charlie's father. His bullying came to a dead stop. Meanwhile at my mother's instance, and as a condition to returning to public school I joined the Marching Band and the soccer team. Basically, that worked its magic socially, in addition to what I learned during the preceding summer. I was actually fairly popular. Still, I found I needed to "change over" my friends from my years at Elementary and Junior High School, since despite my popularity they were both unreliable and with one or two exceptions we had nothing in common.

Not so Hot Fun in (Part of) the Summertime 1972

Ironically one of the causes of the problems I had at all camp and school settings was that I was not athletic, but I did best at a super-athletic camp in the Berkshires in 1966, 1967 and 1968. In other words I did better going against rather than with the grain.

Still my parents and I felt I would do even better in a more mellow setting. Surprisingly, not true. During the summer of 1969 I went to a camp with a strong waterfront. That would have been perfect except that any follower of Woodstock (including the movie) knows that 1969 was a rainy summer. So I switched to the more mellow Berkshires camp. Bad move. 1970 was a disaster. 1971 was far better, since I had a better bunk with more mature kids. As I wrote above 1971-2 was a horrible year for me, personally and socially. My father had an operation just before that school year for what turned out to be terminal cancer, though he was still, on the surface well before the summer. I had done enough library reading to know that the doctor's statements about the cancer were bald lies. I went to camp in a sour mood and didn't make things any better.

I was thrown out after tossing a pair of scissors at the feet of another camper after he bullied me. Truthfully I aimed and hit a middy puddle (lots of rain early that summer too from Hurricane Agnes). Nevertheless, that kid felt "traumatized" and I was sent home. I have since learned that my parents had to fight to get half the camp tuition refunded.

My mother picked out Camp Lincoln Farm for me. It was not a therapeutic camp by it was different. It was a working farm and construction site. I did construction and drama, participating in Midsummer Night's Dream. The camp had an extensive travel program. During my four weeks there we hit, on overnight trips, Corning Glass Works (a lot of it still closed from Agnes-related flooding), Sturbridge Village, and Quintes Isle, in Ontario (where I developed my love for Canada). Most important, I learned to work harmoniously with people, and thus learned not to be bullied. That is what finally made 10th grade different from 9th.

This all paid some dividends as my father dwindled to his untimely death, at the age of 47, on January 5, 1973. My old "friends" from 2nd - 9th grade wrote condolence notes to be sure. Most of them were barely English, despite the fact that my district is affluent and high-performing. At that time, my return to at least a moderate interest in Judaism helped. Not that I ever became particularly religious. Just proud and participating.

Though my mother was not otherwise constructive on bullying, that summer she actually came through with some brilliant ideas.

I hope I did not write at too much length.

[Jayerdu]

I reluctantly write this because I do not want to get lambasted, but sometimes IMO, the term, bullying, is overused. It reminds me of the late 1990s and early 2000s when sexual harassment was overused.

By a lot of the accounts described by some of the posters, I don't doubt 100% that you were bullied. But there are also some that I would not use the word bullying.

IMO, I don't consider normal social interaction, i.e., being told something you don’t want to hear, being ribbed by your friends on one occasion, being treated cruelly one time, as bullying.

To me, the poor kids who are repeatedly harassed and taunted and attacked are bullied. I think that kids who get a snarky remark or a mean comment just need to stand up for themselves.

[Bluesmama]

I'd say that I was 'both', especially in grade school. I think I took the frustrations out by bullying back, even some kids that didn't really deserve it.

Not long ago I talked to a classmate that I grew up with since kindergarten, and she said that she always remembers me as "being so small, but didn't take $hit from anybody". I suppose that's true - just never really thought of it that way.

Junior high was a problem, too, but those are the years when I withdrew (and my worst years all-around). High-school was different. I avoided conflicts but pretty much carried on with a kiss-my-butt attitude. I don't think most of the popular, privileged girls in my class liked me so well during those final years.

[lenniel]

Originally Posted by Jayerdu

I reluctantly write this because I do not want to get lambasted, but sometimes IMO, the term, bullying, is overused. It reminds me of the late 1990s and early 2000s when sexual harassment was overused.

By a lot of the accounts described by some of the posters, I don't doubt 100% that you were bullied. But there are also some that I would not use the word bullying.

IMO, I don't consider normal social interaction, i.e., being told something you don’t want to hear, being ribbed by your friends on one occasion, being treated cruelly one time, as bullying.

To me, the poor kids who are repeatedly harassed and taunted and attacked are bullied. I think that kids who get a snarky remark or a mean comment just need to stand up for themselves.

I agree. There's definitely a difference between bullying and the normal, everyday ribbing people give each other.

I think social media has brought a whole new angle to this. Where as most bullying used to be face to face, now, some of it's done online. Adds an interesting dynamic.

But, you're right in that sometimes we need to tell a kid "hey, toughen up. If you let it bother you, it's only going to get worse"
I think getting a kid to stand up for themselves is one of the more important lessons you can teach in life.

[jbgusa]

Originally Posted by Jayerdu

I reluctantly write this because I do not want to get lambasted, but sometimes IMO, the term, bullying, is overused. It reminds me of the late 1990s and early 2000s when sexual harassment was overused.

By a lot of the accounts described by some of the posters, I don't doubt 100% that you were bullied. But there are also some that I would not use the word bullying.

IMO, I don't consider normal social interaction, i.e., being told something you don’t want to hear, being ribbed by your friends on one occasion, being treated cruelly one time, as bullying.

To me, the poor kids who are repeatedly harassed and taunted and attacked are bullied. I think that kids who get a snarky remark or a mean comment just need to stand up for themselves.

I am adopting the nomenclature "bullying" to incorporate some of the abuse I received. Mostly the abuse was mimicking my voice at inappropriate times, or not selecting me for teams in games. It was only rarely bullying in the sense of physical abuse, such as the "bicycle chain" incident.