Slashdot Mirror
Bullying Affects Social Status?
An anonymous reader wrote to mention a ScienceDaily article about the social status effects of bullying on mice and men. From the article: "The results reveal neural mechanisms by which social learning is shaped by psychosocial experience and how antidepressants act in this particular brain circuit. They also suggest new strategies for treating mood disorders such as depression, social phobia and post-traumatic stress disorder, in which social withdrawal is a prominent symptom ... He and his colleagues also discovered that social defeat triggered an upheaval in gene expression in the target area of the circuit, the nucleus accumbens, located deep in the front part of the brain -- 309 genes increased in expression while 17 decreased."
This article is saying that being bullied leads to social discouragement. This leads to social self-estrangement -- the person (mouse, actually, but by extensions it may apply to humans) who has been bullied repeatedly eventually gives up trying to form social relationships and becomes more of a hermit.
The implications are that this is a neurochemical change because some of the effects of this discouragement can be reversed either by genetic differences or by anti-depressents that probably repress the mechanisms that change the brain chemistry towards social isolationism.
---- I'm out of your mind!
That is because this slashdot-linked review is an over-simplification of the actual study. The mice lacking the gene probably have lost the ability to remember they were subjected to aggression previously. That is they are behaving naively. They aren't kissing up, they just don't know they were picked on previously. You should read the F study RTFS http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sci;311 /5762/864 but your conclusion is supported by the article, from what I can see, maybe the article should RTFS.
See John Taylor Gatto:h tmt m
"The Underground History of American Education: A Schoolteacher's Intimate Investigation
Into The Problem Of Modern Schooling"
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/index.
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.h
For example:
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/2e.htm
"I have little doubt the fantastic wealth of American big business is psychologically and procedurally grounded in our form of schooling. The training field for these grotesque human qualities is the classroom. Schools train individuals to respond as a mass. Boys and girls are drilled in being bored, frightened, envious, emotionally needy, generally incomplete. A successful mass production economy requires such a clientele. A small business, small farm economy like that of the Amish requires individual competence, thoughtfulness, compassion, and universal participation; our own requires a managed mass of leveled, spiritless, anxious, familyless, friendless, godless, and obedient people who believe the difference between Cheers and Seinfeld is a subject worth arguing about."
The biggest problem with compulsary "public" education is that unlike "public" libraries, you can't (easily) escape by just walking out the door. (Well, you could for a day or two and then the police machinery related to truancy will start grinding on you, unless it is appeased in other ways.) Most "private" education is little better in the compulsary aspects or preventing bullying.
While this may seem paradoxical, as you continue your quest for spritiual growth, consider the idea that the bullies you faced are in some sense just as much victims of those systems as you were.
A good resource:
http://www.bullyonline.org/
http://www.bullyonline.org/schoolbully/index.htm
http://www.bullyonline.org/schoolbully/myths.htm
Example from the myths page: "Children have it drummed into them from the moment they are born that they must not hit, punch, kick, bite, scratch, pull, push, poke or use any form of physical violence. Children are often punished - sometimes brutally and humiliatingly - for exhibiting any form of violent behaviour. Some adults then criticise children for not using violence when faced with a thug. Child targets of bullying also know (better than adults) that if they retaliate physically, the bully will feign victimhood (often with a convincing flood of tears) and the responsible adults will be fooled into believing that the target is the bully and the bully is the target. The (real) target is then punished by the adults whilst the bully looks on, enjoying every moment. Once the adults turn their backs, the bully starts on their target again. Targets are also people with high moral integrity, a well-developed sense of moral values, and a clear understanding of the need to resolve conflict with dialogue. This is how we teach children to behave and how society demands that children behave. We should therefore not be surprised when targets of bullying display their maturity by going to great lengths to resolve the violent acts committed towards them with dialogue rather than with fists or feet. Trying to resolving conflict with dialogue is a hallmark of integrity and strength of character. Bullying is a hallmark of lack of integrity and weakness of character."
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.