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Study Shows Standing Up To Bullies Is Good For You
It will come as no surprise to anyone who's ever talked to my grandpa, but a recent study has shown that standing up to a bully is good for you. Although being bullied can be stressful and lead to depression, children who returned hostility were found more likely to develop healthy social and emotional skills. From the article: "In a study of American children aged 11 and 12, researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, compared those who stood up to aggressors with those who did not. Children who returned hostility with hostility appeared to be the most mature, the researchers found. Boys who stood up to bullies and schoolyard enemies were judged more socially competent by their teachers. Girls who did the same were more popular and more admired by teachers and peers, the researchers found."
until it isn't.
That only those of good mental and emotional health have the strength to stand up to bullies?
Emotions! In your brain!
The problem is schools try their hardest to reduce attacks against bullies. For some reason the natural process of growing up has been demonized. Guess what? Kids fight. Guess what? They go home with a bloody nose and are made all the stronger because of it. These studies only confirm what everyone already knows that the natural process of growing up is just that: natural and beneficial.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
When you've got it, everyone knows it; you're better at everything because you believe in yourself.
When you don't, you're living in your own shadow.
Humans always admire those who stand up to injustice, especially if they succeed. Look at the founding fathers of the US, Civil War "heroes", etc. It makes no difference if you are 8 fighting the school bully or if you are 28 fighting against tyranny, or if you are 78 and fighting injustice in the legal system.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
If you don't stand up to a bully, you'll only look like an attractive target to other bullies, and other non-bullies who might feel inclined to bully you because they know you won't respond.
There's not just physical bullying either. Look at just about any teenage girl today. They're the most vile, fire-breathing, hostile creatures that walk the face of the Earth today, and they won't think twice about emotionally bullying a peer to the point of suicide.
Failing to stand up just means you get bullied more, with sometimes fatal results.
Once again we mix correlation with causuation. It's not like if a timid person will stand up a bully and become socially sucessfull. Non timid and socially healthy people usually stands up. The arrows that represents cause is pointing to the wrong direction
-- dnl
Because we know everything is genetic?
What I find to be quite humorous is that the scientific processes used to dismiss things like the "divine right of kings" and the like is now using genetics to form basic predestination which basic observation using the scientific method disproved.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
No they don't. There is a significant number of people, probably even a majority, who think that people who stand up to injustice just don't know their place. That they are "uppity." Maybe they just don't consider the injustice serious enough to warrant a conflict or they think social order is more important than righting a wrong or, and I see this one a lot, they think the person who is speaking truth to power is going to get squashed in response and that they are fools for even trying. I think the last is a projection of their own cowardice - at the very least they could be cheering the guy on, but instead they feel like they have to denigrate him as a way to justify their own inaction.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
On the contrary, most children would murder someone if they had the chance.
Why do you think child soldiers are so popular? Because you want a soldier who can barely lift a rifle? or because you want someone who murders without compassion or feeling?
Children are NOT nice.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
While I am somewhere in between socially adept and not, I can safely say that I have had my run-ins with bullies. Some I stood up to and others I did not. On one occasion, I got the crap beat out of me. This particular bully later on causing severe permanent injury to another kid.
The point is, it's risky to say "this is more healthy" when it could potentially lead to severe injury or even death. These days, depending on where you live, bullies carry guns and other weapons, travel in gangs and don't take well to humiliation even if you win the first time around.
I always backed down / ran away from bullies as I thought that was the right thing to do. Got the crap beat out of me every day for 12 years because they knew I wouldn't hit back. Now that I have a 2yr old of my own, I'll be teaching him that if anyone punches him in the shoulder and laughs his response should be to punch them square in the face. I'll deal with the teachers when I get called in. If they can't control their class room my kid will defend himself.
Hitting back only works if it's your first response. If you've already led on a ton of times, then hitting back seems like an escalation. It has to come out of nowhere in order to work. Also, don't hit back without really meaning it, you have to have the 'will of the warrior' and hit like your life depends on it. Unfortunately, you will probably get expelled if you do this now, because any bully willing to push someone that far is likely going to make an even bigger joke out of getting you expelled for fighting back.
So if you are willing to accept the consequences for YOU hitting THEM, and you are willing to go 110% of the distance in the fight, by all means go for it. Otherwise, just change classes or whatever and understand that high school will be over soon and you'll never see them again... until they are pumping your gas one day.
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This is the error so many doormats make.
The point isn't to win.
The point is to make sure that every time someone messes with you they go away from it with a black eye, a broken nose or some other painful or slow to heal injury.
It doesn't matter if you "lose" any particular encounter.
If you make sure you hurt them back every single time the bullying stops in no time at all.
As a child standing up to bullies is always the right thing to do.
It doesn't matter if you get hurt, it doesn't matter if you lose.
You are correct on most parts. The place that you are confused is that you got punished for fighting. Kids don't get punishied for fighting in school. They only get punished for making the faculty deal with fighting. Since you defended yourself, you were just as much to blame for making the faculty deal with the issue as the guy that attacked you.
Understand. Schools do NOT have a zero tolerance policy against violence. They have a zero tolerance policy against making them deal with the violence in their schools.
This confirms my suspicion that the town you grew up in was significantly more evolved/gentrified/enlightened than mine. A kick in the shin would have only inflamed the bullies in my town. In fact, "only girls kick in a fight" was something I used to hear from my classmates. Back then, using Asian martial arts in a fight was thought of as a species of cheating. Nope, I'm not kidding.
Real men (boys) were supposed to trade punches until one of them submitted or was incapacitated. Fighting meant boxing without gloves, basically.
This was the late nineteen-seventies in a Boston suburb. It was not a good time to be in Boston.
Damping absorbs vibrations. Dampening is caused by moisture.
Your analysis is spot on. I've seen this many times both as a child and an adult. And I've experienced it myself. The group will observe the fight (physical or otherwise) begin and start sizing up who the winner will be. Most will start siding with the projected winner. A few will tentatively stand on principle either siding with the projected loser or staying neutral but then as it becomes clearer and clearer who the winner will be they will all eventually line up with the winner.
I went through this very thing in adult life where a small group of people were abusing their power and I resisted. I kept pointing out to them that they were violating the law and behaving as bullies and that if they kept it up they would end up in court. I didn't take action for a very long time, years, because who wants to litigate against people you have to deal with on a daily basis? In hindsight that continuing reluctance to escalate was a mistake. But eventually I did launch an action against them.
One day the ring leader comes to talk to me and after trying and failing to scare me he asked what I would do if I lost (because I could lose everything I owned) and I told him "Then I guess I'll lose and start over - it's a matter of principle to me." Whooosh... the guy (who was quite a weasel) just couldn't understand that anyone would do that. They kept it up, perjured themselves, and took every opportunity, frequently illegal, to pressure me into quitting. Eventually they lost, settling out of court. My health suffered significantly, and probably permanently, and financially my costs were only partly covered (the lawyers for both sides did quite well). Somehow they have twisted this around in their minds that I'm somehow the wrong one, a bully (roflmao) etc. etc. That's despite the fact that when the bill came and they whined their own lawyer told them "Well you did something wrong and now you're paying the price."
Their anger is almost palpable. My take on it is that even though I had appealed to them on a regular basis, individually and as a group, to solve the problem without further conflict, that the facts showed they had repeatedly behaved atrociously and illegally, they are unwilling to think of themselves like that so some mental gymnastics occur so that they can believe they were in the right and I was just... evil? I just did what I thought my Dad would have done. As for the group they are continuing on with their old ways - just not trying to do it to me again. So far.
Standing up to bullies doesn't make them stop bullying, it just makes them pick an easier target.
The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny - Aesop
Another blanket generalisation based on spurious research. After the age of about fifteen the world's a lot darker and less simplistic than when you're eight. The bullies I knew were psychopaths. One, at the end of his teen years, ended up beating up an 80-year-old, hospitalising him then robbing his flat after taking his key. Another one who made my life miserable locked a teacher out of his own class during a lesson and then taunted the guy through the glass of the window. If the adults in charge could not control them, then I'm not sure what a scrawny geek like myself was supposed to do, despite studying martial arts for three years. At no point did I fight back against these guys, despite being spat at, abused and punched for - quite literally - years. I don't believe it would have worked particularly well when the guys were certifiably crazy, dangerously violent and went on to enjoy prison sentences. I would probably have been hospitalised after the first attempt, and then a second time (with his gang helping) after the guy was expelled for GBH and blamed me for his 'misfortune'. Sociopaths aren't really all that clear on the whole cause-effect thing. There were plenty of other mean kids who seemed to make up a sizeable chunk of pubescent youth. These 'bullies' were never really a problem. Nor were any kids an issue at the ages when 'fighting back' actually has some effect. To say 'bullying is natural - watch puppies', or that 'being bullied is just part of growing up' is ridiculous. Not all kids are bullied: only those who stand out. To suggest that reacting violently to being bullied is a necessary part of the maturing process presumably means that all the beautiful kids who never suffered from bullying are somehow under-developed. Back to causality: I loathe conflict to this day, and have still have difficulty dealing with it. I don't think beating up a bully or two would have helped here, and most importantly - nor is violence in my nature. Despite not being violent myself - and suffering from mild Asperger's - I went on to run a successful company and managed to retire at 38 without ever having to beat someone up just because we have an atavistic fixation with physical force. Those who avoid physical confrontation are not 'weak', 'losers' or 'more likely to do well' - whatever that's supposed to mean. Let's try and let go of the neanderthal trappings and reinforce acting like a civilised, technologically advanced species rather than wishing we could all be Christian Slater in 'Heathers'.
You couldn't be more right. Often the teachers know the kids are being bullied, they just do nothing about it because the problem is not "necessary" to intervene in.
So why weren't you armed? Oh yeah, because you FOLLOWED THE LAW. Gun control FAIL.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Unfortunately, I received the same punishment as the thug who hit me. This is not right.
Dude, I'm all for standing up for yourself, but you don't get away with beating someone into unconsciousness for just punching you once.
Seriously, what were you thinking?
If little Victor Victim was allowed to scrap it up in the 2nd grade with Bobby Bully, while they are equally matched, then maybe Victor won't try to take Bobby out with an AK47 in the 9th grade? Perhaps both would learn the lesson back when they are 7?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
Man, what a terrible, terrible example - supporting the US army is supporting standing up to injustice? That's EXACTLY the kind of falling in line with the strong over the weak I was talking about. Support the whistle-blowers in the military - those are the weak who speak truth to power and frequently get squashed for it, despite all the PR about not obeying unlawful orders. The regular troops? They are just the means of corporate american bullying of the rest of the world. They are the most powerful force of violence in the whole world bar none, in no way are they the weak standing up to bullies stronger than themselves.
Maybe I did pull it out of my ass, but you've just demonstrated the precise mindset that enables people to support bullies over the bullied and still feel like they are the good guys.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Kids today have no place to channel aggression. Thus we get things like columbine happening.
There were more school shootings in the 80s than there were in the 90s or 00s. School shootings have been on a decline since 1993 - the problem is 24 hour news networks sensationalizing the few shootings that did occur making them high profile. But the actual numbers have been going down for quite a few years now.
The whole "kids are more violent and less respectful now" theme has probably been going on for as long as there have been children.
"But this one goes to 11!"
What utter bollocks.
Non-violent means work better then violent means. The British didn't let Gandhi do his thing, they couldn't stop Gandhi without turning him into a martyr. Imprison him and protests will continue, he will gain more supporters. Kill him and he becomes a martyr, he will gain a lot more supporters.
Gandhi succeeded because he had the support of the people, not because of the British. All successful revolutions occur because the people supported it.
The Government of India turned out for the better, it took them half the time of China to reach the same (and in many ways superior) industrial capabilities. Compare this to violent revolutions that provided us with governments like, China, Soviet Russia, Iran, Burma, Taliban, most of whom are totalitarian and dirt poor.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.