/dev/null/kevin

Apparently, it's never too early to start worrying about bullies. This article on toddler bullies talks about how bullying starts young. Really young. As a parent, now I've got to figure out how to deal with this. This is hard for me because I never dealt with it much in my childhood. I was either lucky, or stupid, but I don't know how to pass on that lesson!

As a parent, I'm supposed to teach that violence is bad, no matter what. It takes a special person to be able to do this correctly. If someone really wants to bully you, you don't have too many choices. You can walk away, but that only works if the bully isn't targeting you directly. You can be Ghandi and be willing to take the punishment with no reaction with hopes that the bully tires of you. You can be Jim Carrey and try to use humor to diffuse the situation. You can be Dr. Phil and try to get into the bully's head and either change them or just make friends with them. All of these options require some real skills that can't be taught.

So, back to the "non violence" solution. I took lots of martial arts growing up, starting fairly young. As a result, I thought I was some badass dude who could take anything. I wasn't, but I thought I was. The result was an attitude that didn't project weakness, and I think that's what bullies look for in a target: weakness. Like dogs, they smell fear. As a result, I was mostly left alone. The problem is, how to you teach that to a kid? Should you teach that to a kid? I don't know.

Both my dad and I have been in only one fight (not with each other!). In his story he just ended up grabbing the guy's throat and that scared his opponent off. In mine, the guy punched me in the shoulder, but I didn't budge. I just looked at his hand and slowly pushed it aside. For whatever reason, he left me alone after that. I'm not sure what lesson can be learned from that ("be a big lummux!").

So, back to my 20 month old daughter. Again, I'm at a loss since she's a girl. Maybe I'm being chauvinistic, but it has to be different between girls. They seem to bully each other with words over fists. Do I teach her to fight back when attacked and to stand her ground? The schools seem to frown on that, but that does seem to be the way of things. The natual order of things suggests that if you don't defend yourself, you open yourself up to more attacks. On the other hand, violence begets violence, so it's a very thin line to walk if you choose this option.
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January 18, 2005 12:02 PM PST Permalink | Comments [1] |