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."

Comments

Re:No

[sonicmerlin]

Try not to overgeneralize. You're taking a screwed up, social Darwinistic approach based on your personal experience.

Re:No

[gurps_npc]

First of all, note I am a liberal. Second of all, you were the victim of a liberal falacy - that "fighting never solved anything". In the 60s this falacy was popular. In modern times it has become much less popular, because as you discovered, fighting DOES solve things. Please note that the most common problem that can be easily solved by violence is overpopulation. The solution is not the 'nicest' one, but violence (war in particular) is EXTREMELY effective in solving overpopulation.

For example if you have too twice as many people as you can feed (fammine), why if you go to war with your neighbor and both of you kill 1/2 your population, you no longer have the famine. Also note that even if you 'lose' the war, you still solve the problem of overpopulation (famine).

Re:No

[cyphercell]

Whaddya' want a fuckin' medal?

Nope, sorry, real heroes don't get medals. They're heroes because they pay the price that others cannot bear.

Recently had this discussion...

[MindlessAutomata]

...recently had this discussion with a friend, except more about teacher bullies and less about children bullies. I am unhappy with myself to this day over how I didn't have the guts to stand up to all the humiliation, emotional abuse, and overall nonsense (like requiring us to say the pledge of alliegance) in high school. All the little things, like teachers wasting time with education by sending students to the dean for saying words that they have us read in assigned books. How government class was skewed greatly not just for pro-America crap but was biased for the democratic and republican parties (that is, assignments regarding political parties did not allow us to focus on any of the third parties).

As for student bullies, school administrations are often composed of people so stupid that the military wouldn't ever take them, yet they have every bit of the authoritarian mindset typical of many military personnel. They're the kind of people with strong political opinions that only shout out slogans and respond to having their views challenged with these weak slogans (like how creationists will respond to anything with, "it's only a theory" without them understanding at all what a theory is). In my view, putting these adults in charge of the children's well-being and punishment is itself child abuse.

Re:Or could it be

[brainboyz]

Gargamel is chickenshit. I'll one up this even: don't limit it to things that won't permanently injure or maim. Break bones, twist joints, bite, gouge eyes, and use choke-holds before stomping their face. After an overwhelming win, then get the bully to the nurse. Why? Because barely winning is not an option. Bullies need to realize that despite being bigger than you, you will fuck them up and they need to be afraid. They need to know that bullying will have serious consequences. It's only fair: their emotional attacks on the weak cause many permanent emotional scars. Bullies don't like the idea of receiving pain in return, but they absolutely fear being unable to compete in sports or hobbies (bad body, bad eyesight). Being out for a season and dealing with a cast for months because little Timmy shattered your knee means you probably won't be picking on anyone for a long time.

Why don't we just invade crazies like Iran and North Korea? Because they're crazy and have no problem causing massive damage just to make sure there is pain involved in taking them down despite the fact that we could trounce either nation in a war (current debt not withstanding, though the nuclear option would be monetarily cheap). Number one fear of adult criminals? Victims that don't play the victim. Why? The thought of getting shot over a car or TV is frightening from BOTH sides.