Bullying at school - Why is this a worldwide phenomenon?

Bullying is for weak-minded, cowardly kids. They crave attention, and get it that way. Sad. GQ bud.

It probably has to do with the psychology of kids, in general.
We’re all humans in the end, ya know.

Dominance hierarchies are a feature of many, many species, including genus homo.

People feel out of control everywhere?

stand up and fight I know is a terrible advice but that saved me!!!

Very interesting, I had never heard of this jigsaw approach.

I did not see too much bullying in school thank goodness. I do recall two instances of teasing fairly clearly, maybe that is the same thing? People seem to want to feel better about themselves by controlling others or putting other people down. I think it is learned behavior for the most part. If we teach children to treat others with respect, and it is reinforced at home there is less chance of this behavior, but you need it to be done in both places for it to work well I think.

I also found it interesting that your example dwelled on inter-racial strife, that does not jump into my mind when I think of bullying.

Fight the powers that be.

“Bullying is for weak-minded, cowardly kids”

And there are always some in every school.

Good question! True story…when i was in the fifth grade, i was the second biggest guy in the class. The biggest guy was a bully. He would walk up to people and just pushed them down on the playground. Knew someday, he would try it on me. So, was watching wrestling and saw where the wrestler would grab the person’s arms and pull the person down to his feet and throw the person over his head. awww…a light went off..would be a great move to use on this dude. Sure enough, the day came that Mr. Bully walked up to me and pushed out his arms and i grabbed his arms and pulled him to my feet and threw him over my head…he hit the ground with a huge UGGGGGGGGGGG…everyone died laughing…the say the least, he never bullied anyone again.

so, parents should teach their children how to protect themselves. a great movie to watch on this subject is the Bells of St Mary. The nun teaches one of the kids who was being pick on the art of fighting and self defense Love that movie..starring my favorite actor, Bing Crosby!

Great question..sorry that my answer is so long, but it brought back good memories.

It’s a worldwide phenomenon because people are fundamentally the same worldwide. Why does it happen? I don’t know.

Bullying doesn’t stop at the school yard gates. Teaching children how to deal with a bully should be part of the curriculum and it should be taught as a life skill to be applied to their adult life as well as their childhood.

All of our socially approved systems for the equitable distribution of power are plastered over our ancient instinctive urges to just grab power by force. Not so very long ago, the bullies of today would have been the tribal chieftans.

We still have our Alpha individuals. But, for the most part, they learn to seek dominance in less overtly destructive ways. Kids are still in the process of figuring out how to do that.

@Silhouette, you would be very correct! Parents should teach their children how to protect themselves emotionally and physically, that is a huge part of a child’s life.

Bullying is an international phenonmenon because institutional leaders allow it to go unchecked.

No one tries to stop bullying. Its like the survival of the fittest out there! Bully or get bullied. Great Question, informative!

Because kids are assholes?

I’m willing to bet it’s some type of evolutionary holdover: a sort of alpha domineering ritual carried out by the kids who somehow feel threatened otherwise.

I know nothing of the jigsaw method or any other method to allay bullying other than being able to stick up for one’s self. But I do know two things…

1) People are basically insecure and look to belong to a larger group…this is human nature
2) Kids are by definition immature.

If you put immaturity together with insecurity and a desire to belong, you have a recipe for the seeking of dominance by whatever crude methods a person of limited life experience can muster. Kids don’t have the tools to intellectually discuss their issues, so they act out physically to establish societal dominance and superiority. Again, just human nature.

I believe that a truly psychologically healthy individual does not generally bully others.
Those who bully have a need to be able to look down on someone they see as being of lesser worth. It helps them boost their own sense of worth.
There is a strong need to be part of an accepted group and it takes a very strong indididual to take up the cause or befriend someone who is seen as being outside the favoured group.
This sometimes happens in adulthood too. It isnt confined to children.

bullying stems from bad parenting, it starts in the home.

@moley_thecontrarydragon, very good answer my friend!

I find it interesting that most of the examples cited involve boys. In my experiences, both while I was in school and in my teaching career, girls are much more likely to bully others. It tends to be less physical, but often psychological bullying is more damaging.

As to what works while dealing with it, I feel like adults should take a proactive stance with the children in their lives. As teachers, we make an effort not to tolerate it, and to deal with the bullies (hopefully) privately in a way that does not embarrass their victims. However, I’ve found many parents who refuse to take issue with their child’s bullying behavior, saying that “he/she is just standing up for him/herself”.

People are alike all over.

because lame people need to feel they have power over someone.

26–33 students! That’s too many kids in one place, for a start!

But aside from that, teaching children how to get along with others who are different starts at home. If not at home then at pre-school, and repeatedly. Learning how to curb violent impulses also starts at home. But again, if parents are barely mature enough themselves to have self-control, then the community around the child, including school, needs to teach and reinforce proper behavior.

@aprilsimnel, yes it does start at home.

A teacher can only do so much with that many students. Always thought, our school system failed our children with this many students in the first three grades only. Those three grades are the foundation of those children. The best teachers in those critical years are needed in those grades.

Since it is a worldwide phenomenon, it has to be an inherent trait in the species, not a learned behavior. There are also studies that suggest a group dynamic where the group is more effective if their is one individual who is “identified” as the whipping boy or scapegoat for failure. Human beings are a curious lot.

Agrees with @Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard

I second what @dalepetrie said, plus you add in the factor of poor impulse control (child and adult bullies alike). I walked around with the label of “bully” for a while, even felt ashamed about it, until I realized I was only fighting back because the kids picked on me mercilessly. I didn’t go around clobbering people for no reason.

I did smack my friend in the head once, but she made me angry (see “poor impulse control”). That was in the 5th grade and really the only time I hit someone for no good reason.

Bullying is a variety of power. Shakedowns are bullying, salesmen bully, people who climb the corporate ladder often bully, lawyers bully constantly.

I suspect it’s a natural behavior for what we might call ‘second tier’ power. A natural leader (I am assuming here that there is such a thing) doesn’t need to bully. Gaining power over people without being a natural leader involves some strategizing. And if you don’t have the brains for that kind of thing, the skills to be indispensable, the charm to be accepted, the wit to be amusing…well, there’s always the strength to scare people into giving you____________.

It is the need for __________ that we are talking about here. The thing that makes people not diss you. The thing that means you don’t have to be on guard all the time. It’s not quite the same thing as self-esteem, nor is it just raw power. But it is something that bullies feel deficient in.

Some people who are insecure with an aspect of themselves need to cover for it or compensate for it by bullying, either physically or verbally.

It shouldn’t be allowed, but I remember watching teachers just letting the jock bullies and popular bullies get away with murder.

@Silhouette – I like your “idea”http://www.fluther.com/disc/65007/bullying-at-school-why-is-this-a-worldwide-phenomenon/#quip975389

@Harp nailed it. You can take us out of the jungle but you can’t take the jungle out of us.

I grew up in a small town in southern Germany. In my class the most usual kid was perhaps the one whose parents recently moved into town and his or her dialect sounded slightly different from the local one. But bullying was very common till around 10th grade. After that most students realized good grades are far more important than being in the top quarter of the pecking order.

There were cases when kids got bullied because of some arguments between parents. Certain professions made kids vulnerable, like, oh, you think you’re something better because your father is a professor or your mother is a member of the town council or your parents owned a large business. Some reasons were totally ridiculous. And of course there was a time when it looked suspicious having excellent grades.

Do I tread on dangerous turf here, if I’m asking for your opinion whether there’s a difference between boys and girls when it comes to bullying behavior? Are pecking orders or dominance hierarchies more important to boys than girls?

@mattbrowne You just wrote down my thoughts…is it different for gils and boys? I think it is. First, I think boys tend to bully and girls tend to tease. In my mind the bully is showing physical dominance and intimidation, and teasing is more verbal. Both work by trying to intimidate and shame the person I think. In terms of pecking order being more important in one gender, I tend to think it is men who are more susceptible to this, but there have been a lot of articles of late talking about how mean girls is a much bigger problem than people realize, and the pressures girls feel to be accepted is a big problem supposedly. The thing is I can only think of the two specific instances I mentioned above during my childhood, both were in elementary school; otherwise my memory is that even though there were cliques in my school, no one was outwardly cruel or exclusionary.

oh, now i know who Matt is…well again, Matt congrats to you! Being new here, trying to put faces with names! The respect for you here is noted!

We just had a case here where a girl was convicted of causing the death of another as she bullied her so badly the girl, a vicars daughter, killed herself. While this is extreme,it is by no means unique. girls bully as often but in different ways, They are generally less physical although that is changing and not for the better,
Bullying by text and threatening on Bebo or face book(cyber bullying) is getting more prevalent.

@JLeslie – Yes, I also think there are differences and I just learned that voicing an opinion about it can lead to serious accusations like in this thread

http://www.fluther.com/disc/63275/why-are-there-so-few-women-in-things-like-computer-science

I’ve never been accused of being a sexist, but there seems to be a first time for everything. This thread shows the negative side of online forums, but on Fluther it’s the exception.

I think being teased can feel like bullying, but yes, maybe on average girls use less fists and more words than boys, but of course there are cases of this as @moley_thecontrarydragon mentioned.

@Cotton101 – Thanks!

@moley_thecontrarydragon – One case in the US didn’t involve only young teenage girls, but a mother, an adult woman, posing as a teen, bullying online an ex-friend of her daughter’s so much that the girl killed herself as well. I don’t understand why people do such things. The slap on the wrist that this woman got horrified me.

i think some of the bullies are paranoid,collapsed or else