Bullying and the Misuses of Social Media
When I was at school, in my mid teens, I was relentlessly and pretty badly bullied for a couple of years. It was very bad stuff, mostly but not always psychological. I can see now, with the benefit of hindsight that being just a little bit autistic – on the scale as my beloved friend Dr Pesta puts it – I probably stood out a little from the “gang”, and that’s all it takes. How well I remember “Hate Gildas” day being scrawled in huge letters on the blackboard. Lots of stuff like that.
It followed what is probably a classic pattern: Picking on the socially gauche or inept one, organised by a snide and ill-favoured ringleader who got others to be his “enforcers”, the pack mentality of everyone going along for the ride. I am pleased to say that it also ended in a classic manner. After a couple of years of gruelling misery I made up my mind, and when the ringleader bad-mouthed me again I punched him in the face. It wasn’t much of a punch, but it was my best effort. He looked stunned. He said something like “Don’t so that again!” So, I did. From that moment the bullying just stopped. All his pals abandoned him and the pursuit. Later I took up kick boxing and other martial arts and I was never bullied again. That said, I have no doubt that it affected me and my social confidence. I have often wondered what the ramifications may have been.
Anyway, that is why I hate bullies. And why I got so enraged when I saw the video below on a social media site. I warn you, I found it profoundly upsetting, and I do mean enraged. It speaks for itself. The bully in chief, the amused onlookers too scared, weak-willed or entertained to intervene – and with the new angle of social media. What, I wonder were the motives of whoever took this? Were they to bring the wrongdoer to account, by furnishing evidence to the Police? I doubt it. But by a happy chance, this matter has been reported to Police Scotland. I have done so. I don’t know, but I assume many others have done so.
By the way I have a name for the bully, but I will not post it – suppose I am wrong. However, I hope social media can now be a powerful means of bringing swift justice to her, and all the misery she deserves.
https://www.facebook.com/itssamwbu/videos/504984466337090/
I can report that a 15 year-old girl has been charged by Cowdenbeath Police. This is evil. Evil is always ugly. We must always be watchful, for it renews itself. The struggle for good never ceases.
Gildas the Monk
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August 19, 2015 at 9:24 am -
From what I could make out the ‘bully’ was avenging a wrong that the ‘victim’ had made against the ‘bully’s’ family.
Children have always done this sort of thing and some continue to do it as adults.
What has changed is the way society has now effectively prevented non-related adults from intervening in these disputes.
Why are you trawling Facebook anyway? I thought this was now a significant part of police work anyway, please don’t encourage them.
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August 19, 2015 at 11:11 am -
August 19, 2015 at 8:35 pm -
First, I was not trawling Facebook. Amazingly I have a life, and I have no wish or desire to do so. The matter was referred to me by a good man with a kind heart.
Second, if I wished to trawl Facebook, I am at liberty to do so.
Third, I am entitled to my point of view.
Fourth, whatever the alleged cause, this does not have the smell of an avenged wrong – at least not in the sense you suggest. It has the sense of cruelty, arrogance, and if anything, someone who has been pulled up for bad conduct and takes out vengeance because they believe they are beyond consequences.
Apart from that, thank you for your comment.-
August 19, 2015 at 9:45 pm -
So you were trawling then? Beam or drag net
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August 19, 2015 at 9:26 am -
I hated being 12 – the kids are nearly all equally insecure and many are horrifically immature and vicious.
Last year it struck me how t’interweb and social networking has basically suspended generations in that awful period of life for all who are ‘online’ at an early age, all the worst aspects of that time in ones life carried forward into adulthood. http://retardedkingdom.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/schools-not-out.html -
August 19, 2015 at 9:39 am -
I have written before about the day this particular worm not just turned but went F**King POSTAL , hospitalizing his tormentors and tormentresses, with a degree of violence that would these days not only have gotten me expelled but charged , convicted and placed on the ‘Sex Offender’s Register’ for life (I kid you not, apparently it has happen to school children who have simply defended themselves against a physical attack).
Those years of being bullied did me a lot of mental damage. I went from being ‘top dog’ at Primary school to the lowest, well almost the lowest, on the Secondary School food chain. I can’t blame the bullying for all my mental and physical problems but it played a huge part. Even to this day I will awaken screaming and punching from nightmares about it.
HOWEVER the , perhaps, interesting thing to note though is that my sociopathic response ALSO damaged my soul. The narcotic rush of The Violence coming upon me, the feeling of POWER over others, the sheer exhilarating Joy of hurting others. It is a heady, heady mix and addictive …makes heroin look like Junior Disprin . Why do you think so many abusees go on to be abusers? Cocaine? Acid? All good fun stuff but nothing compares to the thrill of beating a bully so badly they become a weeping shivering wreck, pissing themselves in fear of the next blow, of the next humiliation.
Yes, I am a very damaged individual.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:22 am -
It all changed for me too around the same age. Within a fortnight of enrolling at high school, I went from being fairly ‘popular’ and quite easy-going to being a mouse. One incident that stands out is being forced to kiss the feet of a bully as the entire school was emptying at home-time. Hard to think of a more humiliating obliteration of self-esteem. I remember his surname was Spivey and I hope he’s six feet under.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:52 am -
One incident that stands out is being forced to kiss the feet of a bully as the entire school was emptying at home-time.
Let us just suppose that after kissing his feet you had put one arm around his legs and hammered a sharpened HB pencil into his groin. Can you imagine what a ‘rush’ that would have been? To stand there watching as he writhed SCREAMING wie a gut shot rabbit and bleeding. The girls watching would have looked at you anew with that dazed awestruck ‘Evolutionary Biology’ look of limbic induced wet knickers, primevally soaked panties and you would have ‘ridden’ that feeling for the rest of your life.
But as with all drugs, there’s a downside. Usually about 3am…or when dawns breaks and you find you’ve just watched the entire series of Game Of Thrones and still don’t know the names of any of the characters but the Dwarf .
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August 19, 2015 at 10:53 am -
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August 19, 2015 at 11:36 am -
It is a topic which brings back many dark memories for some.I tend to file the memories away in mental box marked “do not open”, but this opened it. It is interesting, perhaps, that all my studies into philosophy, Christianity and the metaphysical teach forgiveness as a principle, in essence saying that it benefits the person doing or giving the forgiveness. Yet, all these years on, if I had the power to see the ringleader and his mate hanged at dawn, I’d turn up with popcorn and a party hat, and taunt him as he dangled. Such is the scar that this behaviour causes.
On another note, it is perhaps why I so passionately hate animal cruelty. I regard it as another form of bullying, even worse, as generally some unworthy and inadequate specimen of “humanity” abuses mankind’s power to torment a beast with no defence. In that sense it is a sin, which is not a word I use regularly. But I digress.-
August 19, 2015 at 11:40 am -
But I digress.
No not really, why do you think that I, and others, always ask you for Cat based News?
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August 19, 2015 at 12:00 pm -
Old Cat continues to be a challenge. After trying to take him to the vet, which as you know ended up with me in casualty needing a tetanus, he still seems a bit paranoid around me at times. However, I continue to look after him with all my might. He got raw fresh salmon for breakfast – he likes a change and it was on offer in Tesco. He is sunning himself in the garden. He occasional bowel misfunctions make it difficult for him to be allowed in the main part of the house,but I have fixed him a comfortable cushion in the porch.
Young Cat From Next Door remains a joy and a concern. He is as beautiful and naughty and charming as any cat has a right to be. He brought me a present last week – a wood pigeon. Bloody hell. Although it is nature’s way it did make me sad for it, and its mate if it had one.
I worry about him because he is a bit nervy and jumpy and I don’t trust his owners one little bit. Therefore, I have created a sanctuary here for him. Always arrives about 8 in the morning and I provide breakfast. He likes to look out at the world for a bit from behind the front room curtains. He is, as I write, spark out asleep on my bed, safe and cared for.-
August 19, 2015 at 12:25 pm -
He brought me a present last week
My youngest brother had a cat, ‘Horus’, after I had left the parental Dwarf Hovel for pastures and beds anew. Horus liked to shwo his affection by bringing home ‘gifts of love’…preferably Endangered Species like bats or, one very special token of his esteem, a kestrel! He was a one cat Environmental Disaster, the higher up something was on the ‘Extinction’ list …indeed locals still believe he didn’t really die but is out somewhere hunting Norfolk Wallabies or the North Norfolk Leopard .
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August 19, 2015 at 3:50 pm
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August 19, 2015 at 1:29 pm -
That’s no doubt what happened in my head after the event. In reality, it was an all-boys school, alas – so we’re talking soiled undies rather than knickers! The immediate consequence was truancy on my part, something that continued until I was finally released. And the consequence of that was two visits from the local education authority to inform my parents, resulting in the confiscation of my ‘luxury items’, which in 1982 consisted of a record player and tape recorder.
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August 19, 2015 at 1:49 pm -
The immediate consequence was truancy on my part
That is the really nasty thing about bullying, no matter how the victim responds- they end up damaged. They either become victims for the rest of their lives…or at least until they realise that drugs/alcohol/sex orgies/ Harry Potter aren’t the answer or, if they fight back, they run the risk of becoming that which they so detested. So it could be, as much as you may have dreamt of meting mega-death and destruction, you choose the better path. Not that that is any consolation to that sobbing little boy crouching at the feet of his tormenter..but I wish sometimes someone had told me what breaking the faces and bodies of my own bullies would do… to ME.
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August 19, 2015 at 3:47 pm -
I always found the old advice of ‘standing up to the bullies’ a tad hollow, for they tend to have lots of mates in higher years who are happy to do the dirty work on their behalf. It was like the bloody Mafia at my school. As you say, the experience can lead you down many paths. Perhaps you can take some small solace from the fact that you’re in a better place now?
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August 19, 2015 at 6:46 pm -
for they tend to have lots of mates in higher years who are happy to do the dirty work on their behalf.
For your future reference (God I hope not! If the OAP home is anything like school…) or for anyone still at school who has somehow ended up here whilst researching Raccoons for Biology homework ; The ‘trick’ to dealing with bullies what have older larger ‘mates’ is to use enough mindless violence…mindless but surgical..to command , if not fear, then respect from your elders and betters. Separating some poor bully’s pubescent vas deferens with a particularly pointy HB or 2B is a nice example. A carelessly handled chisel in the woodwork lesson will go through a 13 year old’s hand with ease..if you can manage a Bondian quip or at least a Micheal Cain (look him up on Wiki,Kids, he’s an actor) style “‘Ere you should put a plaster on that” then that’s just putting cream on it.
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August 19, 2015 at 8:37 pm -
I was probably a bit lucky with the results of my punching. It is true that in my case, as in a romantic novel, turning on the bully broke the spell, so to speak. But I suspect in many cases that is not the case. My only point really is: I bloody hate bullies.
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August 19, 2015 at 9:50 pm -
So did you join the police force?
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August 19, 2015 at 9:44 am -
You did the right thing. The bully needs correcting, and the crowd need reminding it isn’t normal behaviour to drag a child through the streets by her hair. She was enjoying it all way too much.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:21 am -
I seem to recall that early publicity about Childline was that circa 80% of their calls were about bullying. Perhaps I need to wash my brain out with soap and get with the programming.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:50 am -
Well, the Frankfurt School agenda now being played out has stopped parents from disciplining their children and given us schools that are left wing propaganda centres, also without discipline. If an adult had interfered in this bullying they would almost certainly have been charged with something by a Common Purpose educated police farce. All is well with the progress of the dissolution of Britain including it’s feral children.
But don’t worry, we will soon be given another tougher code of morality when Islam takes over and children will be properly trained.
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August 19, 2015 at 11:15 am -
Is this ‘bullying’, or common assault?
If I went up to Gildas in the street and did this to him, no-one would regard it as ‘bullying’. So why do we have a separate word for it when two children do it?
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August 19, 2015 at 11:28 am -
It is both. Children have, of course, always behaved in nasty ways – it is part of the human condition. But that does not make it acceptable. Th perpetrator struck me as particularly nasty. She will, of course, get a conditional discharge and be made to go on a course, or some such. Such is the modern world.
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August 19, 2015 at 11:36 am -
She will, of course, get a conditional discharge
Of course she will. Girls not being capable of being anything other than victims. In my own case I said there were ‘tormenteresses’ and they were the worst, far nastier (or just plain ‘evil’) than the boys. Yet after I rebelled and hospitalized one of the tormenteresses , I was ‘in trouble’ for hitting (ok I pounded her head into an oak desk) a girl…something british boys didn’t do.
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August 19, 2015 at 11:45 am -
Sounds like you did exactly the right thing to me. My own view is a rather simplistic, perhaps traditional one. Bullies respect only one thing: retribution. We can, perhaps, broaden this out into the general field of non violence, pacifism and so forth. I actually have respect for took that line in WW2. My father told me that there were many pacifists who acted as stretcher bearers and were braver than the brave – they simply took the line that they did not want to hurt another human being. I can see that as a principled stance. But if we all took that line, would Hitler have prevailed. I understand that Ghandi took the view that it was wrong to oppose Hitler by arms, that radical pacifism and “love” would have prevailed. I think that view is just silly.
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August 19, 2015 at 12:40 pm -
Bullies respect only one thing: retribution.
When I was 9 years old and in the ‘annexe’ – a separate school site for years 4 and 5 – one boy and his gang reigned supreme. Respect and submission were demanded and any dissenters were mercilessly tormented, especially on the way home. Few of his offences were found out and detentions had little effect beyond making the streets safer for the rest of us.
Eventually this came to the attention of the management back at the main school and we were all summoned into the hall to watch the boy being marched onto the stage and told to hold out his hand. He did so with a smirk at the rest of us – he was tough!
I – and, I suspect, most of the others present – will never forget the change that came over his face as he snatched his hand back at the first hit of the belt* and tried to hide behind the blackboard to avoid a second stroke. That stroke never came; the job was done once we had seen his cowardice and he had lost the respect of his followers.
By comparison, when a similar boy had been dominating my children’s school for some months, a group of concerned mothers went to see the Head who pointed, with a helpless air, to a chair in the corner of his office; “That’s X’s chair; he sits there whenever there has been an incident and we discuss ways in which we can improve his behaviour. That’s all I can do, unless we exclude him, which is a last resort.”
While the move away from ritualised punishment in schools and beatings behind closed doors was undoubtedly necessary, I can’t help feeling that the virtual removal of any effective punishments (except detention with prior arrangement – and even that is likely to bring down the wrath of belligerent parents these days) and the substitution of ‘discussion sessions’ to deal with pupils manipulative enough to run rings round any well-meaning liberal teacher has left the field open for bullies to prosper.
*or tawse; a purpose-made heavy leather strap with a split down the middle, standard equipment in Scottish schools at the time (although rarely used at Primary level)
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August 19, 2015 at 12:46 pm -
Alf Tupper saw it all coming
“… the school was run by a Head with weird ideas… ”
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August 19, 2015 at 10:34 pm -
Not used regularly at Primary school? Don’t kid yourself. We covered our ‘Spelling Book’ twice, from Primary 3 through to Primary 7. Ten words each day. Tested every morning. And if you made a mistake in Primary 6 or 7, you got belted.
Some kids were belted every day. Nowadays, someone would recognise them as being those that were dyslexic
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August 19, 2015 at 12:00 pm
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August 19, 2015 at 2:05 pm -
A truly shocking video.
I don’t think much bullying could have taken place at my secondary school. I remember no Flashmans and to the best of my recollection I never saw any overt bullying. Certainly I was never bullied myself. But that was a long time ago (1938-43) when we boys were strictly disciplined and could expect a painful whacking if we stepped out of line. Rough justice was dealt out and accepted; I once had my ears boxed by a passing policeman who caught me emerging from an orchard with a bag of scrumped apples which I was made to discard. Perhaps the war caused us to grow up more quickly? I have a photograph of my school form at around age 15 in which 14 of the 18 boys are wearing RAF cadet uniforms.
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August 19, 2015 at 8:39 pm -
Stricter times, and harder but better people. Well said, Mr. Pooter.
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August 19, 2015 at 3:04 pm -
Being small of stature, I would have been easy pickings for the bully-types but I was also quick on my feet, and you only need to be quicker than the next smallest target – it’s jungle-rules out there.
But, on account of also being the school’s ‘Del Boy’ trader in anything profitable and contraband: cigs, lighters, porn, Embassy Coupons, condoms etc., I wasn’t short of ready cash, which usually granted a place at the top-table alongside the erstwhile bullies. Not that they ever got to the cash, but its allure and proximity seemed to have a protecting effect. Others were not so lucky in that testosterone-rich sub-culture and no doubt were damaged as a result.
That said, it’s what kids do and what kids have always done: gangs and cliques form, outsiders are targeted, stuff happens – part of the non-academic education process is about learning to survive it and handle it, most of us do. We than carry that learning forward into our adult lives where more subtle forms of bullying occur in almost every workplace and society – it’s the human condition. -
August 19, 2015 at 3:06 pm -
When I was at school, there was only a couple of kids smaller than me in my year. That said I was reasonably handy, but that didn’t stop the bullying. It was never a one on one thing but groups/gangs of others. In hindsight, (The old if I knew then what I know now thing) I should have just banged out the ringleader, but confidence and fear of the others joining in stopped me.
School bullies always tend to be the type who are head and shoulders above the other kids, but thing is once all the others have caught up, that’s the end of them. I started filling out a bit when I turned 18, and had several “Do’s” with with the old school bullies after leaving school, that left them laid out on the floor. Word soon gets around, and people tend to leave you alone.
My kids were taught that if someone hits them to hit them back twice as hard, the eldest is still soft as shite, the middle one Sam is 26 and still looks like “Hermione” in Harry Potter, I’ve seen her leather a few. Her son who is 5, is as hard as nails. Daughter had just moved to new house, and the kid next door who was 6 at the time and grandson was about 2. The daughter was upstairs and heard a commotion outside, and the kid next door was hitting the grandson. She got downstairs, and opened the back door to find the grandson knocking hell out of the kid next door.
I remember when she was still at school about 14, a girl who lived on the street was one for starting, and when she got into a bit of bother, her brothers would jump in. They did it once too often one day, and I went out and said “Right, sort her out now, as her brothers wont be jumping in whilst I’m here”. She gave her a slapping, Police were called, parents didn’t like it, and neighbours were giving it “That’s horrific” and “Barbaric”. But in those circumstances, they can just fuck off.
I’ve also had call to sort out a few “Dads” too of bullying little shits who gave it the “I’m only a minor, and you touch me and I’ll have the law on you”. Once explained that Jnr can do what the hell he likes, but when he steps out of line, I’ll be round here to sort you out. For some reason all the shit stops.
My main problem was the unruly bastard kids of single mothers, there’s not an awful lot I can do with them. However, once they reach that magic age of 18, away go the snide comments and the shit eye looks when you pass them in the street, and it’s head down not wanting to make eye contact with you.
Bullies, I fucking hate them.
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August 19, 2015 at 4:03 pm -
My kids were taught that if someone hits them to hit them back twice as hard,
A large chunk of my Kids’ schooling was in Germany, where any form of pupil violence anywhere was already a ‘no no’ or ‘verboten’. But my Eldest and Youngest were given the same advice on Papa Dwarf’s knee: “If someone attacks you then it’s up to you to decide if you want to fight back or run an tell an adult as you should. But bear in mind, bullies rarely stop and there is no reason for a school bully to fear the teachers, let alone the Playground Supervisoress (it being beneath a german teacher to do Playground Duty). If you see someone attacking someone smaller then you go between them, and if anyone attacks your brother, especially your crippled brother, then you beat the crap out of them and I’ll back you all the way”
The result being, no one at their schools(s) wanted to tangle with the 3 Dwarf Boys and anyone picking on the little cripple was liable to find the cripple’s younger brother (who even at age 8 was of a size that commanded the gravitation pull of a small planet) and the cripple’s older Bro (a sneaky nasty fighter) explaining the error of the ways to them with whatever solid object was at hand….usually their crippled brother’s leg splints…with him still in them.
“You wanna start something?”http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b116/horta/img865_zpsdszjsbye.jpg
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August 19, 2015 at 8:54 pm -
I am with you all the way, BD. See my comment below.
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August 19, 2015 at 8:46 pm -
I completely agree. Here is a thing. My old man was a good man – never drank, never swore, good Catholic – and hard as nails. Wartime Commando. I suspect because of the latter factor he was over protective. I had extra lessons to try to get me into Grammar school. What I should have had was ju -jitsu lessons. I carry a part of the family gene pool (fit, military on both sides) but only really tapped into it when I went to Uni and discovered rowing, where my unusual lung power and long limbs started to have an outlet. I don’t blame him. What more natural than for a man who had seen the rough side of life to try to protect his life. But a mistake. As for your last comment – I agree. My point exactly.
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August 19, 2015 at 3:23 pm -
I went to an all boys school. My christian name was always feminised by other boys and in later years, as we were called by our surnames, the alliterative pre-fix “Pouffy” was added to mine. I’m not sure I’d call it bullying but it was a deliberate attempt to belittle and undermine.
It stopped the day I turned up with a make-up kit and started applying it during break time. When asked what I was doing, I told them that as they called me a pouf, I might as well act like one.
The intimidation may then have stopped, but funnily enough, that’s the point I embraced the fact I probably was gay (though didn’t become sexually active for another couple of years). I carried on with the make-up though.
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August 19, 2015 at 3:55 pm -
May I be so presumptuous as to sing a well-known 1973 chart-topper by Peters and Lee?
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August 19, 2015 at 6:31 pm -
Thank you Petunia. Well, I have been listening to Slade’s greatest hits which include another chart topper with a similar theme…
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August 19, 2015 at 7:02 pm -
‘Take Me Back Ome’?
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August 19, 2015 at 7:03 pm -
In one!
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August 19, 2015 at 7:05 pm -
Could’ve been ‘Coz I Luv You’…
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August 19, 2015 at 7:22 pm -
Or even “Look Wot You Dun”
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August 19, 2015 at 8:46 pm -
Respect, windsock.
I can imagine that scene playing out at my all-boys school, but I can’t imagine any of the victimised ‘less macho’ boys having the balls to pull the make-up stunt.-
August 19, 2015 at 8:56 pm -
Thanks Mudplugger.
As an epilogue: at our school leavers’ party, I turned up in a floppy fedora, yellow chiffon scarf, jeans rolled up to the knee and baseball boots (orange)… and made it clear my first ever boyfriend was picking me up to whisk me away on holiday (that’s a disaster story for another day). Anyway, another boy at the party got punched in the face by one of the bully tendency for “being a pouf”.
I asked the bully why he’d punched the other lad but not me. He said: “We know who you are and you don’t deny it. He’s a hypocrite. We respect you for coming out. He hasn’t.” A lesson learned on my part – people don’t like not knowing where they stand (and I never knew if the other lad was hay or not). A way to defanging bullies is to say “I’m not ashamed to be the person you think I am”.
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August 19, 2015 at 9:04 pm -
Windsock! You and Gildas reappear in the same week – its made my week…
‘Ere, you’re not one and the same person are you? There’s a thought.
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August 19, 2015 at 9:08 pm -
Well, we both care for two cats, live solitary lives and are prone to our idiosyncracies (no offence, Gildas)… but I haven’t worked behind the bar.
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August 19, 2015 at 9:16 pm -
Gildas swears blind he’s never worn orange baseball boots, but I’m not totally convinced yet…
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August 19, 2015 at 9:37 pm -
The monk could just about get away with the orange baseball boots beneath his capacious habit, but the floppy fedora and yellow chiffon scarf would probably have got the abbott all of a fluster.
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August 19, 2015 at 6:55 pm -
Turning to the ‘Social Media’ bit of the post, I went to school before the advent of it but I know for a fact that every bit of ‘aggro’ my teenage sons had- from falling out with mates, bullying or he said/ she said- started on, had it’s origins in or at least was magnified by, Bebo & Faceparty (before there was Fecesbook and hashtags were just how Americans wrote numbers).
It’s good to talk? Is it ? Bollocks!
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August 19, 2015 at 8:50 pm -
I think we can agree that “social meeja” is a “genie” that can be a good, and can be a dangerous thing. It needs careful management
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August 19, 2015 at 9:26 pm -
I was only ever ‘bullied’ at the age of 15 and I was ‘bullied’ for only 4 days. On the 4th day I was beaten so badly that I was kicked unconscious. I received injuries to my spine which required surgery 6 years after the attack and the injuries to my spine & neck continue to bother me as I get older.
The issue behind the beating blew up on a Friday afternoon at school (day 1). All over the weekend (days 2 & 3) I could barely breathe with the fear of knowing what was going to happen at school on Monday. By Monday morning breaktime (day 4) word had spread throughout the school that I was going to be ‘beaten up’ and by Monday lunchtime a huge crowd of pupils spanning 3 year-groups had gathered outside the temporary classroom (which was my form room) to watch the spectacle. I think it must have been a spectacle. I know it went on for a long and painful time & that other pupils joined in the attack to stamp on my face and kick me repeatedly in the head, neck and lower back. I don’t remember the blow that knocked me out but I do remember I couldn’t balance my head on my neck when I later found myself propped up in a chair in the Deputy Head’s office, being told that my mum would come & collect me. The school didn’t even call an ambulance, let alone the police. Even my parents didn’t call the police. Mind you, this was 1977. I never set foot in that school again after that day.
I am female. I watched the link Gildas put up with horror. I was in my mid 30s before I felt I had recovered from the trauma of the 4th of those 4 days in 1977. Whoever I was before I was beaten unconscious was, in effect, killed on that day and the person I am today is 15 years younger than the age on my birth certificate. There was no trauma-counselling back then and I still had to take my O levels at another school where I was a stranger just a month after having seven shades of sh*t kicked out of me. I have none of the murderous resentment that BD or Gildas have expressed towards their attackers, nor have I ever had. Ironically, it was only after I was beaten to the point of possible brain damage that I realised my dad saw me as an individual rather than just one of his brood. He took two days off work just to sit by my bedside until I woke up – and my dad had never, ever missed one day, let alone two, off work before. In one sense that assault on me began my relationship with my dad.
It seems to me that things are not so much more spiteful or violent today, it might just seem more violent because it is filmed on a mobile phone & posted on YouFaceTube for the world to like or dislike. There is no footage of my head being kicked until I blacked out and I have no way of knowing whether the attack stopped because I was kicked unconscious or whether, finally, the staff at the school got wind of what was going on and intervened & stopped the attack. I will never know.
All I know is I did not die, I did not prosecute, I did not resent, I did not retaliate. I had to grow again afterwards and I grew better and stronger than I was before, without any malice or hatred in me.
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August 19, 2015 at 9:37 pm -
I salute you babel6.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:21 pm -
Bullying has surely always been with us and I see no reason why it will ever stop and in any case our children will continue to discover it anew regardless of what we think.
The use of social media adds a new dimension, especial within the circle within which the bullying is practised but I don’t see the point of third-parties making comments as they don’t know the provenance, the context or the veracity of what they think they see. In this particular instance some of the comments are in German but in spite of recent mass immigration I doubt if they are from residents of Cowdenbeath so they know not on which they comment.
My experience of bullying as a child was that the bully generally avoided an audience unless they were part of their gang. Another memory of childhood is that we had a keen sense of justice and the impression that I got from the link is that the other children accepted that the ‘victim’ had ‘something coming to her’. That sense of justice also kicks in when the others decide that the ‘prosecution’ is going too far. This, of course, is just my impression, I don’t know the provenance etc.
One could spend all day watching horrific videos on the internet, such as ‘ordinary’ Africans kicking ‘witches’ into a ditch and setting fire to them, (or so it seems, caveat as above.), but to what purpose? One could also spend time out among one’s fellow humans extending common courtesies, exchanging friendly greetings and keeping an eye out for the ‘village’ kids. I’m sure that will do more good than fretting about online videos.
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August 19, 2015 at 10:48 pm -
I was really tiny at school but was fortunate to have a very sharp tongue which served me well. In those far off days there was not a lot of bullying and very minor compared to today. Plus teachers and parents would soon sort it out if it was bad enough to complain about.
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