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Bully Gets In Trouble With School
The Miami Dade school district is moving to pressure Rockstar games over its upcoming game Bully. From the Next Generation article: "Last Thursday, a board committee unanimously approved the resolution. A full board vote is expected this Wednesday. Rockstar issued a written statement to the Herald, which said, 'We all have different opinions about art and entertainment, but everyone agrees that real-life school violence is a serious issue which lacks easy answers.'"
What will it take to make sure the First Amendment is no longer trampled here and there???? Here, the school district is acting like a bully...
Anything that could cause future slashdot readers to get bullied more can't be a good thing.......
In undeveloped countries, the consumer controls the market. In capitalist America, the market controls you.
I'm usually a pretty free mind when it comes to game or media content. I've played, but am not a huge fan of the GTA series. I think, like movies, these games should be rated (accurately, no hiding content!), and minors not allowed to buy M, or R, or whatever the rating is, games. However, I don't like the idea of this bully game at all. Maybe because I was bullied as a child, and the thought of kids playing as a bully really turns my stomach. In any case, I don't think children should be allowed to purchase this game without parental supervision. I would also wonder about the parenting technicques of anyone who bought this for their child.
So instead of fighting the bully problem within their own school district, they're fighting a video game company?
What's the matter, James? No glib remark? No pithy comeback?
Is it a good game? If it is then the content really shouldn't matter, if it isn't then all this hype is going to sell it even better.
A lot of slashdotters were probably bullied (I was) and although it may bring up some bad memories, we don't play GTA because we're secretly drug dealers, or black guys riding a bike through the street as we shoot people. We play them because they're fun, which is what games should be about.
People never complained Mario is full of drug refrences (You can't deny it, please don't try), or that killing aliens in Contra is too violent for children. Back when games were mostly aimed at kids (or geeks with an Amiga), we never heard any of this shit.. Makes me really wonder.
I'd love to meet these people complaining and go "Jump off a bridge" so they could tell me "no" and I could reply with "Well if I can't influence you in person how the hell are games ment to convince me when I have full control of them?
I like muppets.
'We all have different opinions about art and entertainment, but everyone agrees that real-life school violence is a serious issue which lacks easy answers.'
So is war, but that hasn't stopped people from playing games based on war for at least thousands of years.
Chess, anyone?
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Again with the 'Rockstar Bully game will create bullies' meme.
For fucks sake; it is a game where you play a kid being bullied. If people play the game, they will understand what it's like to be bullied. If anything, that will reduce the number of bullies (and might even convert bullies who play the game and see what the're doing).
If I where Rockstar, I'd elevate the profile of that game by sueing legislators for defamation/slander/incorrect reporting/lying.
I'm just still amazed that newspapers and politicians can get away with not just distorting the truth but actively lying about something.
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
Rockstar couldn't buy publicity like this. What do they care if some school district has a problem with it? The "uproar" is small in comparison to the benefits they will reap from this publicity. The types of people that were going to buy the game are still going to, and in addition now more and more people are hearing about it and potentially will also buy it.
nothing
What people fail to realize is that you're not a bully in the game. Here's the game synopsis:
As a troublesome schoolboy, you'll laugh and cringe as you stand up to bullies, get picked on by teachers, play pranks on malicious kids, win or lose the girl, and ultimately learn to navigate the obstacles of the fictitious reform school, Bullworth Academy.
And since when was this "real-life school violence?" Last I checked, this was a video game.
is a school board gonna exert... none, ABSOLUTELY NONE. they will release a statement to parents that will be ignored... I really wish Rockstar would just come out and say "Hey you are not our custumers, why dont you go screw yourself because you do not matter"
The phrase "more better" is acceptable English. suck it grammar Nazis
Let me fix that up for you:
"...but everyone agrees that real-life school violence is a serious issue which teachers and parents of bullies don't appear to give a damn about."
I've not played it. Has anyone who doesn't work for Rockstar?
Mario is an antagonist. Bowser stole his woman, so he runs through forty levels of turtles and goombas and stuff to save her? Those poor saps didn't have anything to do with it. He's just a jerk.
Virtual bullying is bad. Virtual spraypainting is bad. Virtual gangsterism is bad. Yet, a lot of these school districts hand out virtual diplomas every year. What's up with that?
They're RIGHT! Violence in video games does translate to violence in real life!
Why, just yesterday I flew a Cobra attack helicopter in real life against MEC foes! Not only did BF2 cause me to learn how to fly Cobra attack helicopters, it also helped me to learn racism against Middle Easterns and Chinese! Damned foreigners keep trying to take my fu*king base! Die, die, DIE!!
My hatred for minotaurs and other such creatures has SOARED because of so many times playing NeverWinter Nights. My +2 Longsword (nothing to do with Viagara, thank you) should be in in a few days, and if it's not I'll slash the delivery person with it when it finally arrives. If he's Chinese or Middle Eastern, he's really in trouble.
Of course, my absolute hatred for Nazis was at its peak during the days of Castle Wolfenstein. I want to kill all of them because of that game. In fact, my flight to Brazil leaves in a few days. I found out that some survivors are hiding down there and my Wolfenstein-induced blood rage is starting to take over. Grrrrr....
And you don't know how many people died in my neighborhood with a crowbar after I played HL and HL2.
So, I'm quite certain that when I play Bully I'll want to go to the local high school and just beat the sh*t out of the kids until there's nothing but a pasty, red film on the basketball court. And, hey, with violent video games as my scapegoat, I'll get off with a warning while the Bully developers go to jail!
No, that's not my right eyelid twinging. It's your imagination. { wiping drool off of chin }
Disclaimer: To Jack Thompson and the DHS, this is what's called "sarcasm". Look it up.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
I've played this game before. It was 20 years ago, and it was called Skool Daze, and it was perhaps the best game there had ever been at the time. Utterly, utterly amazing.
I've thought for years that Skool Daze could be remade today and be something special. If Rockstar's description here is accurate, I'm really, really looking forward to this game.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Who cares? I mean.. come on. When are people going to realize that games are just that.. games.. not real life. Who cares if you beat the crap out of some nerd on a video game. Unless that video game is controlling some robot on the other side of the earth that is really beating the crap out of some kid, it's harmless!
http://boards.jp.nyud.net:8090/forums/archive/ind
Included there was the following poll:
I think the problem with bullying is that it's not "critical enough" to get noticed by authorities (unlike breaking someone's leg for example), while it damages the victim's psyche. So, if you accuse someone of bullying, nothing can be done because bullying's not against the school's laws. But if you get even, you end up getting suspended.
Read what the game is about: YOU DO NOT PLAY A BULLY BUT A KID BEING BULLIED!!!
It might even reform the bullies who are bound to play the game.
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
How about, before going all out on a game that enacts it, you take care of the real fucking bullies that abound in your schools? Perhaps if you, ya know, punished them for their bullying, the intensity of such would decrease.
Instead, almost every teacher or other school faculty (except the cliche cool janitor) who sees bullying just turns a blind eye as long as someone's tooth isn't knocked out. Maybe if we actually did something about it, we wouldn't have to worry as much about games like this, or people shooting up schools. I can't say I condone Rockstar's game, but there are more immediate (and local) ways to stem this than to try and pressure them.
Yes, I was bullied in school. Thankfully, I didn't get the worst that could happen, but it was still enough to seriously drive me to a point of doing some shooting of my own. The problem is that the bullies turn out to be jocks, or the son of the mayor, and the principal is afraid of punishing them, because heaven forbid our football team lose another game, but it's a-okay that people fail remedial math.
Our schools are messed up because people have the wrong priorities. They push social achievement (sports, arts, etc.) and defer money to that over intellectual achievement. Not that schools sports or band is a bad thing- but when it's taking away from the real purpose of a school, which is education, then they become a problem.
rant rant rant
You're just like the school board. You don't research and get your facts straight! YOU assume the game has the player bullying kids. WHY would you ASSUME this? What's wrong with you?? The game is about being the one picked on and OVERCOMING these sorts of trials and tribulations of school life. GET YOUR FACTS STRAIGHT!
I've heard the mushrooms [in Super Mario Bros.] to be more of a phallic reference, but that's about it.
Then read this criticism.
...don't think bullying is any worse than carjacking, random street violence, sex with prostitutes, beheading police officers, gang warfare or any of the other stuff that went on in any of the GTA games. That aside, we've had films and comics and tv shows about children inflicting various levels of violence on each other for years - everything from Dennis the Menace, through Lord of the Flies, to Stand By Me. Or take your pick of any film with some jocks-vs-nerds bullying, for that matter.
I got bullied. I don't see how this game has anything to do with that.
Game dev and music blog
Anyone remember Skool Daze on the c64? http://www.mobygames.com/game/c64/skool-daze The objective, to steal back your awful school paper from the headmaster's office. Common activities include: Beating up fellow classmates, fighting with the school bully, shooting anyone you like with your slingshot and hoping someone else gets blamed, skipping classes, writing obscenities on the blackboard and more. Why are the school's piping up now? This type of game has been done before, granted with not as much exposure until now.
Right after he has apparently slid down a flagpole (a strong reference to receiving anal sex), he finds himself in the proverbial sewers, already feeling a deep low from his initial hits wearing off. But after more anal sex, he is high in the mountains, which psychedelically appear as gigantic mushrooms, an obvious result of his hallucinatory state. And then, after even more anal sex, he finds himself in a castle, but it is of his own imagination, built up of his drug-induced isolation, for at the end he thinks he has confronted the kingpin Koopa, but he quickly finds that it is but another hallucination, merely a pusher goomba, though he only discovers this after, in a drug-crazed rage, he kills this apparition of his nemesis.
That made my day. Thanks to the GP :)
The purpose of blaming Rockstar is to direct attention away from themselves, and it's working. If it wasn't Rockstar, they would be blaming Bush, or Harry Potter, or anything else but themselves for how they are taking our tax dollars and failing our children.
... Hollywood continued to churn out pure trash.
My saying is, Own the Media (tv), Own the World
.sigs are for post^Hers.
You'll have to forgive me, I can't read the review because I'm at work. I posted this based on only the old information I had from the last time I heard about the game. Which was from a Gamestop employee who was over excited about the game concept. I had heard about the game a few times after that and everthing I had seen and heard (obviously not enough) seemed to confirm to me that the game was about bullying kids. Bad post on my part.
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
Although there is not legal grounds for the school board to do anything, there is a moral standpoint here.
Beating hookers in a game is ok, but this is where draw the line?
There is really no reason for a game like this.
Sure there is; i bet its a fun game to play. Personally I believe there's no reason for the Bible. It serves no real purpose (except to allow weakminded people to be controlled by those who 'spread the word'). Certainly its caused more problems than its solved.
I've got a big problem playing a game that puts me in the position of an antagonist like this (I know, and I don't plan on playing it).
Well, for one, you're not, you're the victim. Can't be bothered to do a little reading though I guess. Secondly, you mention GTA later in your post, what do you think you are there? The good guy?
They are acting upon thier surroundings and developing.
I guess kids just dont' have free will at all.
It is a pity that some turn out to be bullies.
No, its a pity parents are lazy and don't take the time to properly raise their kids. This also manfests itself in other places, such as movie theaters, where you have 13 yr old girls talking through the whole movie.
I'm not equating schoolyard violence to, say, rapists and murderers, but I am equating the exploition there of to be equal. Make a game about harnessing your ability to beat the tar out of (relatively innoccent) school kids, and, in my mind, you may as well be developing a game that lets you rape and murder kids. Developing a vice either way.
You start off saying you're not going to equate the two and finish your paragraph by equating the two. Nice work.
Like I said, one is definately worse than the other, but in my mind exploiting childhood violence, fear, and the feeling that you don't want to go to school because of what's happening to you is just wrong.
You don't even know anything about the game. Shut up already.
But I guess you won't, and you'll continue to just ignore that fact that millions of kids play all kinds of games with people like you deam inappropriate, but yet haven't turned into muggers, rapists and murderers. Just keep pointing to people that are already messed up in the head and say it was the games fault, not the person. Good plan.
1) How about respecting the right of self-defense of victims of bullying. How about congradulating the victim for beating the hell out of the bully when the bully picks a fight and brings violence instead of the school rather than suspending the victim. Strangely, feminists who scream OMG HE'S BLAMING THE VICTIM!!! whenever someone suggests that a rape victim partially instigated her rape by dressing like a whore in a very bad section of town while drunk at 2AM, are eerily silent about this which is the ultimate "blame the victim" card. Yes, little johnny or susy was violently assaulted by a bully, but the pushed the bully back so that makes them bad too. That's how the schools see it. You get repeatedly punched and kicked in the face, but if you touch the aggressor, you're now suspended for fighting. Fascism, brought to you by America's "education system."
2) Expel the violent and disruptive students.
3) Enforce the rules fairly, even if the parents are insanely rich or part of one of those untouchable, Always Noble Protected Classes Whose Shit Never Stinks Especially In Front of An Oppressor Class(tm).
4) Finally, and I know this will be the most controversial one, how you about show no love to the wannabe thugs who attack the black and hispanic kids who actually want to learn. If the thugs want to keep it real, they can do that on someone else's dime, on the street where they won't harass the minorities who want to be something other than street trash.
Regardless of what descriptions claim, this game so far looks like GTA set in a school. It could be argued that the main character in San Andreas technically wasn't a bad guy, except that almost immediately he ends up committing some serious crimes. The few screenshots available show a kid who looks like a troublemaker and a group of kids beating the crap out of each other. Given Rockstar's consistency in developing violent games I would expect more of the same here.
I do think that these people are over-reacting. There's plenty of crap out there outside of games. This attention games are getting is pretty much a ploy by politicians to win votes. Parents dont seem to want the responsibility of raising their own kids anymore. If they're concerned about this game, don't let them play it. Don't expect the government to raise your kids for you.
On the other hand, I can't help but think Rockstar is simply looking to get a rise out of people. They're using controversey to sell their games. They certainly aren't creating art here, they just seem to be obsessed with excessive violence. So now they're developing a game which hits closer to home for many people and will be certain to grab plenty of attention.
There were plenty of games with questionable subject matter back in the early days of gaming. However, there's a big difference today. Those old games had crappy, blocky graphics and relatively simplistic gameplay. Games today look fairly realistic, and they provide gameplay that is a reasonable facsimile of real life. It's all polygons and textures, but the experience has a stronger impact than pixelated sprites.
At some point we're going to have games that look absolutely real and when we reach that point we're going to see some serious debates regarding what is permissible. Are we going to allow games where you can tear people to pieces and experience it in all its graphic detail? When will everyone agree that enough is enough? Certainly developers have to be responsible to some extent for the content they produce.
For the most part, such subject may not necessarily drive anyone to reproduce what they've seen. However, it certainly does desensitize people. It makes them indifferent to atrocities. That, I believe, is a greater danger than a bunch of kids suddenly turning into bullies or being inspired to run around carjacking.
The reason the bully picked you out is that you were perceived as weak. You may not actually be weak. And cunning and deviousness, plus the element of surprise, makes for an excellent equalizer.
I discovered this the time I finally snapped. I waited until the bully was totally unsuspecting, leaning against a car talking to someone. Then I ran up and smashed his head backwards into the metal edge of the car roof. Could have killed him, probably gave him a good headache for the rest of the day. He never bothered me again.
Bullies don't want to go near someone who will randomly and unexpectedly snap and hit back with potentially life-threatening violence. They can't be on their guard 24x7. They'll move on to an easier target.
School violence doesn't lack easy answers. The answers are very easy, they're just not good for the powers at the school.
If funds for the teachers union were tied to eliminating school violence, there would be no school violence. Those funds are what schools are about, and it's the only thing about them that matters.
If education were about the students rather than payroll, it would be very different than what happens at schools these days.
Its easy enough: Just make school administrators liable for damages resulting from school bullying including psychological damage.
Science Daily reports that: "In addition to triggering a depression-like social withdrawal syndrome, repeated defeat by dominant animals leaves a mouse with an enduring "molecular scar" in its brain that could help to explain why depression is so difficult to cure".
Seastead this.
So this is what my school district is doing? Worrying over a damn video game, and here I thought they was working on smaller class sizes maybe even improve our schools from the mole problems we had in 2003-2004 broken A/C units, and maybe throw away some unlicensed teachers. Go back to LAX Rudolph Crew!
We all know how once you got in office the entire executive floor was remodeled with new furniture and equipment where that money could of easy been put to good use in getting elementary students some brand new books or even providing at least CHALK!! For god sakes man!
...in the real world, bullies NEVER gets in trouble with schools.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
Winning the football game is more important than your stupid nerd 'values.'
Don't you ever FUCK with the status quo. Learn your place, nerd.
I disagree wholeheartedly. My son (and other kids) were being bullied by a kid in his school. I tried talking to the teachers, but they said that their punishments weren't having much effect and the kid's parents weren't interested.
So, I taught my son three rules:
I also directly informed the teachers about our plan (their one-word reaction: "good!").
That was two months ago, and after two good smacks in the snout (and one miss - my son missed and nailed him in the eye), the bully is no more. My son wasn't the only one to benefit, either: the other kids realized that this worked pretty well.
I made it clear to my boy that I never, ever condone him starting fights. However, neither will I ever punish him for defending himself.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Why should the Miami-Dade school board feel that it is so special that it believes that it can censor video games? Come on, this should not have been a news item.
How about paying attention to the problem? I only have my own school experiences to base this off of, but I can't imagine that mine were unique. Administrators and teachers seemed to go out of their way to ignore obvious harassment.
Luckily, this never resulted in anything Columbine-like in nature happening at my school. However I have no doubt at all that should that have happened, they would claim to have never saw it coming.
http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/2004/Bills/S2500/2222 _I1.PDF
NJ just passed an expanded "in-school harassment" law, which now prohibits any form of electronic harrassment. Electronic Bullies are not allowed here, either!
OK, first off everyone take a look at this other article:
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=25065
From that:
"Rockstar Games describes the upcoming title as one where gamers play a "troublesome schoolboy" who "stands up to bullies, gets picked on by teachers, plays pranks on malicious kids, wins or loses the girl, and ultimately learns to navigate the obstacles of the fictitious reform school.""
Side note: From personal experience I'd say that 90% of bullying is non-physical.
That said, it seems that this game might or might not increase the amount of bullying that goes on in schools.
Now, the problem lies, once again, with the school administration and the parents of the bullies, not with the game.
The parents of the bullies are willing to defend their child to the death with "well, it couldn't be my child, it was those other kids".
So naturally, the school administration chooses to obey the parents and not punish the bully. Assuming however, that the administration ignores the parent and tries to punish the bully in-school, you end up with that parent signing forms exempting the child from any type of punishment.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
I was once bullied in high school. Punched in the face, twice, bleeding from a cut lip. I did nothing to my assailant, and instead headed to my class and then to the nurse. I didn't want to be suspended, because I was a good student and didn't feel like making up classwork.
I was suspended for three days, and I didn't fight back. The other kid was suspended for three days, too. I was punished because I was attacked, even though I didn't fight back.
I was supposed to be fined for fighting in school, too. But when the magistrate heard the story and heard that I didn't fight back, he made the bully pay my fine. So, in a way, things worked out.
I remember getting bullied back in middle school. It had nothing to do with my being weak, in fact, quite the contrary. I had a reupation for being one of the more physically intimidating people on campus. I was bullied precisely because I was the kind of person who didn't fight back. It looks damned impressive when a kid can taunt someone bigger than they are with impunity. I suspect that, had I ever stood up for myself, chances are I wouldn't have dealt with nearly the amount of crap I did. I honestly regret never punching the kid in the face. Escalation? Bruises heal, and once someone learns you're not easily trifled with they'll lay off.
It reminds me of something Kevin Mitnick said about his time in prison, during an interview on the ill-fated show "The Broken". When another prisoner wanted his shoes, he fought for them even knowing he was going to lose. The point wasn't to get his shoes back, so much as to make it known that anyone trying to take advantage of him would have to pay a price to do it.
I believe that this escalation you're concerned about is more a result of not fighting back than anything else.
Sorry bud, but I was a rather small until partway into high school, and suffered all sorts of violence from Gr2 onward. The only thing that toned it down a bit was when I grew some. It didn't stop immediatedly though, people still found me an easy target just because I had always been so. Headlocking a few annoyances for extended periods of time, grinding a few faces into the snow, etc tended to change their minds. After that, I was bothered a whole lot less.
It's a lovely mentality to teach the "walk away" strategy, but the fact is that a determined "bully" will lie in wait for you, or sneak up on you. They don't all respond to school punishment (suspension = time off school), in fact most don't.
I would tend to agree with you that violence begets escalation in some cases, so my advice would be to not start something you don't think you can finish. If somebody needs to be tuned in, make sure you can hold your own, otherwise you're just going to get beaten worse. In fact, as mentioned about, most times it doesn't require that you break somebody's nose, just demonstrate that you can and will handle them. Getting into a full-on fistfight often involves having the guy's friends jump in when he gets hurt... so pick your time to stand wisely.
I was excited when I read the title of this story and thought it was about a school taking a stand against bullying. Sadly, it's about a school taking a stand against a game about bullying.
I'd be more impressed by the former.
Godwin trumps all.
But let's look at some of these arguments, just in case Godwin is on vacation:
"hyperbole"
You have a government body trying to remove content they don't like.
This isn't hyperbole at all. This is a government body trying to pressure local businesses into removing content from store shelves. I can think of very few ways in which this might be less hyperbolic.
"straw man"
Are car manufacturers irresponsible for selling a product that some people use to kill others? Or is it the person driving the car thats (sic) responsible?
I'd have to say that this is an attempt at a straw man, but misses the mark by largely superceding the argument in question. Anyone who actually uses Bully to kill, or even harm, someone is laudably/laughably determined. The product just plainly isn't going to help you in the commission of a crime.
"ad hominem"
People like you really piss me off.
This is a common (possibly only common on the internet) misunderstanding of argumenta ad hominem. He didn't say "People like you really piss me off, therefore, you are wrong." He merely stated that he reacts a certain way to a group with which he associates the parent poster. He drew no logical conclusion from this.
I typically like to categorize arguments such as these, that falsely cite logical fallacies, as argumenta reproba rectum , which, for latin nerds, is hopefully funny at least once.
...that Fight Club isn't about fighting per se - it's about someone who has a psychotic break and invents a world where he can be in awe of his imaginary friend Tyler Durden and vanquish his real life, all in a movie that was rated so that adults who mostly could 'get' the plot device would appreciate the film, while kids - who mostly wouldn't get the subtlety would either see it as an unspeakable reality or a really cool cartoon, or who knows what.
In a perfect world, parents don't buy adult games for their kids, kids see the humor instead of the malice, kids don't take is as an instructional video, and tiny bluebirds follow us around all day chirping as we think lovely wonderful thoughts. So much for perfect worlds.
It took the youth of America a non-zero time to stop thinking that Bart Simpson was a spokesmodel and realize he was a sardonic cartoon character. Ditto college students (and I was there) when Animal House came out.
If you've been a teacher in a K-12 school you realize fast that there are certain kids who will try almost anything regardless of the effects on others. Any 100 level psychology course can tell you why. The understood parts of it involve modeling behavior and kids' relative inability to think past the next immediate result involving themselves. Not every student, not all the time, but enough that if you'd been in a school (where despite the glib quoting of urban myths there's plenty of learning going on) things like this are closer than you think to shouting "fire" in a crowded theatre.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Please, somebody mod this funny! It's either a great joke or painfully ironic, but either way it's funny.
I rarely post here, but dammit this really got my ire up. Like a lot of geeky kids I was bullied a lot while I was in school. My parents tried to step in but that was to no avail. I'd complain about it to teachers and school administrators, and those complaints fell on deaf and apathetic ears. They were 100% unconcerned and one even suggested that I should just grow up and handle it myself.
So I did. The only reason I learned martial arts was because I got tired of getting pushed around and knocked around in the school yard while playground monitors and teachers looked away. It was even worse in junior high, when a budding athletic career starts and damned if they're going to screw around with some jockstrap who keeps winning basketball games.
The result? After I took one jock to the ground and made him cry uncle (arm bars solve a lot of problems), I got in trouble because I was fighting. When I pointed out that he swung first and I was defending myself, I still was in trouble because I was fighting. I got right in the principle's face and asked him why it was okay for the fucker who hit me on a regular basis to do so but it wasn't okay for me to hit back. And he told me that there are policies to deal with this. My parents, bless their hearts, got involved and told him to stick his polices in his ass. (That's a direct quote.) They also made it clear that next time, I wasn't to stop pressuring his arm until I broke or dislocated something.
The asshat finally stopped bullying me. So what did I learn? When it comes to school bullies, violence can solve a problem.
I look around and see news of kids taking guns to school and shooting up classmates. I can honestly say that thought occurred to me several times while I was in school, I just never had the balls to do it. When you get beat up on a regular basis, the idea of fixing a problem when no one else can or will is extremely appealing. I cannot condone what these school shooters do, but I can say I have some understanding of it.
Do video games make bullies powerful? No, uncaring, undereducated school employees make bullies powerful. Maybe, just maybe, instead of having a no tolerance policy towards weapons and having something like that towards bullies; that might just fix most of the problem.
I didn't RTFA.
The social sphere is exactly where they are operating; They aren't pushing legislation, just asking local business owners not to sell the game.
While I'm glad y'all are enthusiastic about putting this in the social sphere, I misled by suggesting that they weren't doing it. Nope! They're doing right! They're not trying to pass laws, or anything like that.
Not here, at least.
For all the free publicity they've given to the game. Why bother with expensive print and television ads when a school-board's disapproval automatically makes it a "must buy" for the kiddies? And these are the folks responsible for teaching kids? Sheesh!
Isaac Newton was bullied in school until one of his teachers suggested that Newton confront the bully in a fair fight. Newton won the fight, and improved academically so much that he became famous for it. Maybe Rockstar should include that.
I am the PTA treasurer for my kid's school.
If you are going to have a no holds barred Bully game,
it has to have Dylan Klingbold and the freaks from Columbine.
You get the milk money, and they shoot you.
The cops in GTA should have radios and be able
to use your cell phone to track you.
Fantasizing about standing up to a bully in a physical way is natural and inevitable of course, and harmless: provided you know better, safer and more effective strategies.
This to me gets at the heart of the matter. Games are fantasy. They are escapist, they are entertainment. The whole point of video games is to fire the imagination and step into a different life/world/experience for a little while.
A game where you get to play a student dealing with bullies is the perfect place to fight back against them as much as you want. Most folks who are bullied fight back in their mind later anyway. I know I used to. It's not like this video game is going to introduce entirely new thoughts into people's heads...revenge is one of the impulses and stories that seems common to every culture on earth.
Kids are already thinking it--they're already sitting and stewing their rooms. Whether or not there's a game controller in their hands is not a big difference IMO. And either way the key to coping with such strong feelings is good parenting and good friends. Video game or not does not change that.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
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google talk: recursive.genepool
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
First of all, I wouldn't say you did the wrong thing. It sounds to me like the right thing in this instance. You exhausted the preferable options, looked at what was left, and took a calculated risk. You were fortunate it worked out well. Even in benign conditions things could have been different.
I'm a martial artist. I help teach people how to fight. I'm aware that sometimes it's the best option, even if it is never a good option. I also know that that a lot of foolish people have a romantic notion of what fighting is like that makes them underestimate the downsides. They look at a story like yours, out of context, and say, "there, the solution to bullying is to pop the bully in the nose." They miss the fact that you tried your other options first. That you weighed the age and physical maturity of your son and the bully, and the probability that the bully would have friends who retaliated.
The notion that fighting is a sure-fire answer is attractive because righteous violence just feels good.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The kids' crazy parents.
Kick a kid out of school and you will face the wrath of one (usually not two) irate, belligerent, sometimes violent adult who will curse, cajole, and downright threaten you into reinstating the student. And often there will be, waiting in the wings, a lawyer who's willing to take on the case.
The American legal system has effectively bullied school districts into a very clear set of principles:
I had a friend who was a substitute teacher in the Oakland, California school district. He was usually called in to sub for teachers who were not sick, but who just needed time away from the school. He himself did not last more than a couple months -- which means no more than about eight class sessions. His case was not unusual.
The worst of American public schools are really, really bad -- and those places are nothing about education.
P.S. Ironically, my family moved to California in the 1970s for the good schools. California's schools are now something like 42nd in the nation.
Breakfast served all day!
It's real simple.
Abolish government schools (or at minimum do away with compulsory education laws -truancy).
Then when the kids are violent, they get thrown out. Most people don't understand that government schools are NOTHING more than a babysitting service.
With all of the kids that don't want to learn are gone, the ones that are there to learn will have an improved education. The quality of the overall program will improve because they won't have to "deal with" the problem kids more than once.
Libertas in infinitum
Why is it that we all immediately assume that this will involve playing the bully?
I mean, just because GTA does that, and just because GTA seems to be the benchmark for Evil in games...
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Here's another game I hadn't heard of before but am now interested in. I save money on gaming magazines this way.
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I was invited to teach a class recently, and there was one kid (a girl), who was really making things tough on all the other kids around her. She was big, and strong and had zero self-esteem, and was going to be damned if anybody else would be allowed to have any either, and from there proceeded to disrupt and make it hard for others to enjoy the class. --The few odd times I run a class, I make it fun, with lots of art supplies and such.
Girls are funny creatures; bullying happens on a much more psychological level. Brutality masked as praise, "Oh, that's so good. Let me see. I want to take this home. I wish I could do something that good. You're amazing. Can I have this? I'm taking this." This was one very angry kid; you could see the threat and anger baking off her, and the other 12-year olds didn't know how to deal with it. This kid also spent a lot of time diminishing others for their achievements in more direct ways. A few of the boys during a break period were jumping to see if they could grab on to the door frame in the gymnasium. (It looked like a lot of fun, actually.) When one of them consistently was able to make the leap and grab on, this same girl would cry out, "YOU FREAK!" He eventually felt self-conscious and stopped jumping to display his skill. Nobody was immune. She even tried her bullshit on me, trying to distract and disrupt the kids I was working one on one with by banging the table and being loud, etc.
She managed to pretty much ruin about half the day-long seminar for all the girls around her. Standing out made them an object of ridicule, and protection from that came from siding with her criticisms of the others. Luckily, the really talented ones were able to hunker down and ignore her and just follow their interests, but the girls who didn't have their own internal guiding lights were just miserable.
Anyway, at one point, I just had to do something about it. --I was just a visiting guest-teacher, if you will, and there were a couple of teen-aged counselors who were supposed to take care of this end of dealing with kids, but they weren't up to the task. My job was to be interesting and fun and friendly. But I can't stand bullies.
I wasn't angry, but I definitely growled. I pounced and dragged her chair with her in it halfway across the floor and said, "Okay! You're really bugging me. What's up? What's going on here?" A collective shudder went through the whole group. I can be quite alpha at times, and with 12-year old girls, a little bit goes an awfully long way.
I quickly toned it down and said: "This stuff can get boring after a couple of hours, so if it's not your thing, you can take a hike. --And I mean that literally. There's the great outdoors. If you're too hyped up to deal with this, then you should go and burn off some of your excess energy. That's what I do when I feel like bouncing off the walls. I find a wall and bounce off it. But not here."
The problem was that I could read the whole situation very clearly. This bully wasn't a bad kid. She was a hurting kid. I later made a chance to talk with her one-on-one and I cut to the chase.
"Why are you so down on yourself?"
"My work sucks."
"Nonsense. You've never done this kind of work before and you're still learning how. The kids here who are really good at it have been practicing on their own for years. And even though you haven't, I really like the stuff you've done so far. Anyway, that's not the point. I've heard nothing out of your mouth but you putting yourself down, saying, 'I'm no good. I suck. I can't do anything.' --You have to be careful, because first of all, none of that is even remotely true, and second, your subconscious listens to that kind of thing, and it will start believing you if you keep it up. And then you will be in trouble. So what's going on here? Why don't you have any self-esteme? You're easily one of the most charasmatic kids in this whole group. How come you're so angry with yourself?"
She st
Bullies have long enjoyed power in America's schools, and teachers and school administrations and school boards have done everything they can to preserve this status quo.
You are so amazingly full of crap. Is this just some sort of bitter defense mechanism over your time in school and the fact that you very obviously weren't a likeable person?
I'm the son of two teachers. Most of my parent's friends are teachers. My sister is a teacher at an inner city elementary school. I know what goes on behind the scenes, and I knew it even when I was in school getting bullied.
Teachers do care in general. They do try to stop it, but most bullying goes on out of sight of the administration, and they know that they have little power to stop it. You can punish bullies, but it does nothing to improve their thuggish attitudes since you can't use force against them. All you can do is slap them in a room by themselves for a few days to do nothing but homework (that they won't do anyway).
You can call the parents, but the parents are usually the source of the problem in every single case of bullying that I've ever seen or heard about. They're either apathetic, believe that the school is out to persecute "their little angel", were bullies themselves and think it's funny, or have been beating the kid at home and feeding the violent frustration that leads them to pick on people weaker than them in the first place. (My personal bully was so obviously beaten at home that I even felt pity for him at the time.) This is really the problem -- the lack of positive parental involvement and the inability of teachers to do anything about the behavior of kids when the parents won't step up to the plate.
Teachers that I knew for the most part hate bullies (with the exception of some coaches that I knew) and honestly wish the school could be rid of them but don't want to see them fail to get an education and only further slip from decent society. You do get the occasional disciplinary administrator who like to hit the nail that sticks out or believes that "it takes two to fight," but most people I knew really did try to do something about it.
Also, anti-intellectualism isn't something that school systems encourage -- pop culture encourages it. Look back on how well smart kids (with a good attitude) were treated by everyone other than coaches compared kids who didn't do well or who were anti-social. It's the other kids that exclude you because you're different and don't conform. Young people are very succeptible to forming pecking orders and aversion to people who are different because their those parts of the brain are being activated for the first time in middle school and high school. Most teachers couldn't care less unless you're making an obvious effort to be an anti-social freak and lashing out at everyone around you.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Like I stated already, is there any school board in this country that is effectively meeting all the duties of their charter? Is there so much free time that they have moved on to video games? Have we finished leaving the child behind already ?
Even the Sun goes down.
I'm not sure what you're getting at, here.
I think it's appropriate for a school board to be concerned with cultural and social influences that have a negative impact on their student's ability to learn effectively. And I think it's appropriate for a school board to discuss their concerns with the community they serve. Which is exactly what they're doing.
You seem to think it's inappropriate for them to do this, on account of no school board being perfect and without error in the discharge of its duties. This seems like an unreasonable standard, and a rather bizarre method of prioritizing concerns. You seem to be saying that since a school board never gets everything right, they are not justified in trying to get anything right.
Perhaps the school board feels that it's more than just a single video game. Maybe they honestly believe that the culture of violence being marketed to their students is a major factor in the dynamic that leaves them behind in the first place. Maybe their whole purpose in raising this issue is to encourage parents to reconsider the environment in which their children are maturing and learning, and work to improve it.
And maybe their concerns are completely wrong-headed. I don't think they are, but either way, raising those concerns and seeking a dialogue with the community they serve seems to me to be the ideal way to go about addressing them.
Your arguement pretty much amounts to "if I ran the zoo, I'd do things differently". But are you on a school board? Do you know what is involved in managing a school district? Have you studied lots of data on performance of students in your district? Have you listened to feedback from teachers, administrators, and parents in your district? Between your assessment of the situation, and the school board's assessment of the situation, which one should I expect to be more knowledgeable and trustworthy on this issue?
And, finally: In principle, what is wrong with a school board saying "we believe we have identified a cultural phenomenon that significantly impacts our students' learning, and we'd like the community, the manufacturer, and the retailer to all consider what we have to say on the matter"? I mean, isn't that what we should want in a school board? An organization that's engaged with the community, and willing to think outside the box of the classroom itself?
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
First, I want to thank you for this back and forth, very valuable. You are reminding me that I need to refine my comments so that I can express my points efficently.
I believe that school boards exist to support school districts; and as such should exercise no influence beyond that. School board should remain largely behind the scenes where the real work gets done. This may seem unrealistic, however in our current state where school board seats are incubators for petty politicians or at best peppered with personal agendas, I expect focus or at least lip service to the task at hand: supporting the efforts of the school district.
I accept that not all municipalities and counties sit their boards the same way. Some are elected, others appointed. Some boards are comprised of educators, parents and community stakeholders, others a motley crew of cut-throats, brigands and know-nothings. Maybe compensated, or maybe not. Regardless the job is the same: support the school district.
Nothing the school board says or does should speak to anything other than supporting the school district. If the trends toward ultra realistic violence in popular media is counter to the efforts of the school district, then I want to hear it from the district officials. If the CEO of my district says violent video game are negatively impacting the education of youth in my district, he is speaking from a position of authority. This opinion matters much more to me than a board who may or may not be capable of interpreting trends and research accurately. That is what educators do, all day every day. Political appointees and boards come and go.
I am willing to offer that my reaction may result from my lack of patience with the manner in which education is administered throughout my country, and the band aid approach to oversight that has resulted. Leadership, vision, and consistency could do wonders for pointing things in the right direction, and at least for the times that I pay attention, school boards don't even come close; and any that do luck into it. This school board's need to make a public resolution appears to me to demonstrate their need to appear to effect things that I feel are beyond their control, thereby gaining the spotlight and all those non-tangibles that brings. Why not concentrate on those things they can control, and work from the other side to quietly combat the problem? Through their policies, appropriations, and appointments have influence upon ALL the youth of the community. Excercise it. I guess that is not quite so newsworthy or action packed.
Even the Sun goes down.