Friday, 22 October 2010
Congratulations.
You joined the parents tv council and complained that everything was dumbed down nowadays and over sexualised. You intend to wrap your child up in cotton wool and tell them sex is an extension of holding hands with their "special friend." Congratulations, bravo and by the way, when exactly do you realistically think your child starts masturbating? Oh wait, that's paedophillia *rolls eyes*
Thursday, 21 October 2010
Oh please.
Clearly, I'm in the wrong job. I should write about Twilight sucking and market it at every adult with a beer gut and the complete list of Stephen King dvds, sorry books. Because at least I could write an original critique after you know having actually read the books and not just imitating what the media says about Twilight.
Wednesday, 20 October 2010
Here's what I read about bullying.
http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/907474.html
"Imagine an adult man working in an office environment. Some of his peers, who are the same age, regularly mock his interests and hobbies. He is a very good worker, and is praised by the supervisor; this brings more ire from his colleagues. Occasionally they physically assault him - slaps or shoves, mostly. They assure him that if he doesn't report this to the supervisor, they will be his friend. He feels isolated and wants friends, so he doesn't report it, but this promise is always broken.
When he does report the abuse, it stops for a few days, and then begins again. Although the abusers are occasionally punished, they are never removed from the workplace. And while the man is never directly told that he is partly to blame for the harassment, he receives mixed messages. He is sometimes told by supervisors that he should ignore the abuse. At other times he is told that if he made more of an effort to be friendly towards his abusers, they would stop. Once he is told that if he stopped being so obviously proud of his prowess in the workplace, his work life would become much, much easier.
Most people can understand that a workplace that condones or fails to prevent this kind of harassment is clearly unsafe. The man's colleagues are not ordinary people doing what ordinary people do; they are viciously pursuing a course of emotional and physical assault on someone they don't like. A supervisor informed of this abuse would be negligent in not coming down like the hammer of Thor on the abusers and making it very clear that this behaviour was unacceptable, in this workplace, or anywhere at all.
For some reason, if the victim and the harassers are nine years old, all bets are off.
Bullying is awful. It ought to be totally unacceptable. But far too often, it is accepted. We allow vulnerable children to be placed in danger, emotional and physical, that adults, with all the resources and experience of adults, would find oppressive and intensely painful. Then we excuse it as "just kids" doing what "just kids" do.
Child bullies aren't just kids. They are kids, who are bullies. They need to be stopped, not tolerated.
People bullied me, off and on, from when I was six until I was about sixteen, through two towns and four different schools. That is ten years of intermittent verbal, and rare physical, abuse. You bet it left a mark on my psyche. I often felt isolated and desperately lonely; I often cried from how terrible I felt. I never seriously contemplated suicide, but I did have suicidal fantasies, of the vengeful, "and THEN they'll realise they shouldn't be mean to me" type. At one point in my early teens, I plucked out all my lower eyelashes - it was very painful, which was kind of the point - and waited for someone to notice. They didn't, so I told them, in what I now recognise as a typical cry for help. Of course, I just got teased more for doing something so weird.
Many years later, when we were all more mature and I was friendlier with a number of these people, they expressed regret that I hadn't told them about how I'd felt earlier.
I had told them, of course. I'd asked, "Why are you mean to me?" And they said, "Because you make it so easy."
Awesome acceptance of your own faults there, guys!
But I believed them, because after all, people had told me over and over that it was partly my fault; for being weird, for being proud of my own abilities (was I supposed to not notice them?), for caring about things they didn't and vice versa. For being a victim.
The truth, of course, is that I was never even partly to blame. They did it to me, and they should not have, and they should have been stopped.
So if I do not hesitate to say that people bullied me, nor to describe the effects it had on me, why have I been hesitating over this post?
1) Like my experiences with sexual harassment - also not secret - I often have a completely erroneous feeling that the crimes perpetuated on me were not that bad. No one ever raped me; only groped me. No one ever broke my bones; only kicked me. No one ever spread disgusting lies about me behind my back (that I know of); only said cruel things to my face in an attempt to make me cry.
This is bullshit, of course. A crime does not become any less a crime because a crime visited upon someone else was more violent or repulsive. But the "other people have/had it so much worse" notion keeps going through my head at times like this, making me feel like my own experiences are somehow inauthentic or unhelpful.
2) When bullies target people at school, the victims are often told to report to teachers. Unfortunately, teachers, constrained by regulations or poorly thought out policy, lack of opportunity, lack of witnesses, or a lack of understanding, compassion or will, often fail those kids.
When I was eight, and living in a very small town, I was beaten up walking home from the shop with a bottle of milk. I wasn't badly hurt - pushed around and kicked a few times while I curled up and cried. I told the kids that the school principal would get them to make them leave me alone. The principal, when informed of this bullying, said he couldn't do anything about it because it hadn't been during school time or on school grounds.
I once told a teacher that I'd had a dream that he'd hidden under the desk and seen exactly how badly I was being teased, and then he'd come out and punished the perpetrators so they wouldn't do it again. He told me that he was sorry I was having a tough time, but if I just ignored the teasing, it'd get better.
In high school, when we were all pretty friendly in Year 13 (small class) some of the students who had teased me less when we were younger told me that when we'd all been at intermediate school together, a teacher had approached and asked them to be friends with me. I was humiliated at the thought that their past approaches had not been sincere, as I had assumed, but based on deception. The teacher had never told me he was taking this action.
In all three of these examples the teacher/principal is my dad.
I couldn't see a way to make this post without saying that, and so I have hesitated. I love my parents very much. I think they did a fantastic job raising me in most respects - here I am, being awesome and as ethical as I know how, and a lot of the credit goes to the people who gave me my first ethical frameworks. Be kind. Be generous. Listen. I dedicated my first book to my best friend, for supporting the story from infancy, and to my parents, for doing the same for me. Because they are wonderfully supportive, and they love me, and are proud of me, and want me to be happy.
My dad is a wonderful man, and I think that if he knew that I thought he'd failed me as a student in need of protection, he'd be very hurt. I don't want to hurt him, and it's completely unnecessary to do so: He's retired now, so it wouldn't be a teaching moment for him or help other kids in pain. I don't doubt that my dad looked out for me in a lot of little ways, and I blame the wider culture of bullying acceptance much more than I do him. He did try to help me, even with that awful plan of asking other kids to befriend me.
But even with him being the lovely man he is, and loving him as I do, I can still say that he messed it up sometimes. Even the people who love us can fail us.
The memories of being bullied are not so painful now; they just make me a little bit sad. But at the time, these were wounds I thought would never heal.
If I had been hurt more, if I had been depressed, if I had not had the outlets I did in books and drama, I might have decided to stop being a victim in the most permanent way possible.
I'm glad I didn't. Here I am, being awesome! There is a lot of awesome to be, and I want lots and lots of time in which to be it.
And I want that for everyone, which is why I think bullying is hideous and inexcusable, why I am certain that bullying should not be tolerated under any circumstances, and why I want to give hope to those whom people are bullying.
If that's you, please know this: You are not to blame. You are not the failure. You are being failed.
I am on your side, and I am so, so sorry.
Please, do whatever you can to keep yourself as safe as you can. The future awaits, and you can be awesome.
And if you are someone who is not being bullied, but wants to help, here are some things you can do:
- Stop using hurtful language, like "gay", "retard", "lame" etc. (It'll take a while if you're used to saying these words, but it's never too early to start stopping.) When you can, object to those words being used in your presence. This kind of language, even when not directed at people, normalises the idea that being gay or having a disability is bad.
- Don't tell fat jokes or Maori jokes, or any jokes where the humour is based in someone in an oppressed group to which you don't belong being perceived as inferior (that is a LOT of jokes, because we have a sick culture, but you'll cope). And try not to respond with laughter if someone who isn't part of the group the jokes target - someone who isn't entitled to meet pain with humour - tells them to you.
- Make your opinion on bullying clear, and when you can, refuse to tolerate or excuse it. You don't have to like everyone you know. You don't even have to be nice to them. But part of being the absolute baseline of a decent human being is not causing harm to them.
- Encourage anti-bullying programs in schools and communities. Donate your time and/or money to them. (The Alannah and Madeline Foundation Better Buddies program is a good choice for Australians.)
So there are some concrete actions you can undertake to help stop bullying. And hurrah for you! I am on your side also.
* I would LOVE Savage to recognise and own that his fatphobia and other issues are also propagating hate and contributing to the bullying of kids, including fat queer kids, and then, you know, stop doing it, but I don't think that's going to happen. As matters stand, however, I cannot deny the value of any attempt to give hope to bullied and potentially suicidal LGBTQ kids, however problematic the source.
Thank you. This is--yes. I agree. I'm mulling over my own post, but I can say this: the one time I told a school official that I was feeling, um, very isolated, she told me it was all in my head. This being the school counselor that I'd been seeing for a couple of months, it didn't exactly encourage me to pursue anything further (I also quit seeing her).
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derryderrydown wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 03:52 pm (UTC)
I was bullied by two groups at school, and the most painful was the people who were supposed to be my friends. It took me five years to realise that they were toxic and they weren't going to stop being toxic.
While I did make new friends (several of whom I'm still very close to), most of them were in the years above and below me, or in a different house, which meant I had people to hang out with at breaks/lunch, but not during lessons.
So I stopped going to lessons.
Which isn't the ideal solution, but it got me out of school alive, which was looking increasingly unlikely up to that point.
Teachers knew I was being bullied - mostly verbal but some physical. At one point, a teacher watched another girl punch me to the ground and kick me, and just told the other girl she should learn to control her temper. The only thing they did about the verbal bullying was for my head of year to go into my form (while I was in hospital recovering from a suicide attempt) and tell everybody that they should be nice to me. As you can imagine, that didn't do a great deal of good.
I was referred to two psychologists. The first was through the hospital for the various suicide attempts. He spent ten minutes talking to me and decided it was all due to my parents divorcing a decade earlier. Which made my mother feel horrifically and pointlessly guilty and did absolutely nothing about the real problem.
The other was through school, for the amount of lessons I was missing. His solution was for me to be kept in the school office at breaks/lunchtime and walked to classes. Which just meant I didn't go to school at all, because it removed the only non-miserable portions of my day.
I'm still incredibly untrusting if people I meet are nice to me, without obviously wanting something in return. There's a part of me that expects them to turn on me. I am gradually learning that's not the case but it's been a long, hard slog and it's not over yet.
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themadpoker wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 04:26 pm (UTC)
I had told them, of course. I'd asked, "Why are you mean to me?" And they said, "Because you make it so easy."
That attitude is the WORST thing. In sixth grade a former friend of mine made it her life mission to make my life hell and I never let my parents know how bad it got because some part of me was ashamed that I was being bullied. Like I should have been able to do something about it right? And I tried all the solutions they always tell you to do like ignoring her (didn't work, made her worse). I basically made it through that year by separating myself into two people, the one at school who always carried at least two books to start reading so I could avoid talking to anyone and the one at home who was chatty and had fun with her family and cousins.
I think the biggest thing people can do to stop bullying is what you said, make it clear it's not tolerated. The girl I mentioned was the ringleader but the rest of my class was perfectly willing to join in or pretend like she wasn't doing anything. Bystanders can make a huge difference.
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 04:58 pm (UTC)
All of the anti-bullying stuff also hits a little close to home, because for a few short months, I did engage in bullying. Despite being a nerdy timid kid, I never actually was bullied much, mostly because I was bigger than everyone else. I only had a couple of close friends in middle school, so I'd also felt relatively isolated from my peers.
But there was one semester, my freshman year of high school. In the last period of the day, there was a kid who everyone in the class would mock ceaselessly before the final bell rang. I participated in this. It was for all the standard, shitty reasons, trying to fit in, feeling better about myself, all that garbage.
After I actually made some friends in high school, I stopped. Then for the next several years I justified what I had done to this kid as "not that bad", because I hadn't been orchestrating anything. I went to great lengths to rationalize to myself why I wasn't a huge piece of shit who had engaged in the abuse of another human being.
A few years into college, I came home for a break and went and apologized to the kid we all mocked. He seemed to be fine, but the thing is, I know that the things I said to him were still there. I could not and cannot ever take those things back, but I can try and move forward and do something about this kind of shit.
The problem is, it was so damn easy at the time. Not because the bullied make it easy, that's also just another justification. Hell, there was nothing in particular that made the kid we bullied stand out for abuse. But it was easy because of that sense of the group against the outsider, it was easy because there was a petty, childish thrill in giving into the worst of ourselves.
Anyway, that's just a word out there to anyone who bullied others. Remember that you will always have been a person who listened to the lizard part of your brain, and that you have to work harder than anyone to keep kids from doing this to others in the future.
And to the bullied, this is an apology. Even though I'd experienced the same sense of isolation and loneliness, I chose to inflict that on someone else. It remains the worst thing I have ever done to another human being, and if I could take it all back, I would. But there isn't any way to undo the things done, only to move forward and prevent it from happening again.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:20 am (UTC)
I saw a post on tumblr today that talks about how bullying is a thing people DO, not a thing people ARE. It is possible to be both a bully and a victim of bullying. And to kids that bully, we should make clear that it is their behavior that we find unacceptable, and not write them off completely as "bad kids." Your comment made me think about that. It IS easy to join in bullying, even when you've been bullied yourself. That doesn't make it okay but it also doesn't make you a bad person who can never do anything good.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:42 am (UTC)
I agree, but I think a lot of tolerance comes from the "but they're really *good* kids" defence.
ALSO OMG KITTY.
(Also, I just clicked through to that tumblr post and, uh, the VERY FIRST LINE made me roll my eyes.)
Edited at 2010-10-19 07:43 am (UTC)
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 04:23 pm (UTC)
The "good kid" defense reminds me of the similar one for rape. "He's such a nice boy, he would never rape anybody." Well, maybe he did, and in that case he's not such a nice boy. It's possible for someone to be nice to some people and really, really awful to others. I've probably engaged in bullying behavior, although I don't remember individual instances. But I've also been a victim of bullying many times over, and a bystander when bullying was happening.
I guess what I am saying with linking to the tumblr post is that it's the behavior that's the problem. I think one reason parents and teachers jump to the "really good kids" defense is that they are thinking a kid can only be either a good kid or a bully, just like people think you can either be a good person or a racist, or you can be a nice guy or a rapist. In all of these cases judging people's "goodness" or "badness" doesn't help anything and in fact just adds to that dichotomy, so I'd rather focus on what the person did that was harmful.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 11:41 pm (UTC)
Excellent point.
(KITTY!)
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 04:43 am (UTC)
I can agree somewhat that you don't want to immediately demonize demonize kids who participate or those who do nothing, but the issue here is that I knew full well at the time that what I was doing was flat out wrong. I honestly like to think that I would have stopped if there had just been someone to say to me, "Knock that the fuck off," or even just something as simple as getting me to think about the consequences.
I would completely agree with the assessment that I was a bad kid. Sure, I only did it for a semester, sure other people did more than me, but for that semester and the subsequent years of rationalization, I was being a bad fucking kid. If I couldn't figure that out my own dumbass self, I really wished someone would have told me.
(Not that I'm saying it was other people's fault that I bullied a kid when I knew it wasn't right. My actions were my own responsibility.)
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knastymike wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 05:25 pm (UTC)
Oh my word, I love that post by Kate Harding. Especially the criticism of "Just ignore it."
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shogunsquirrel wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 05:57 pm (UTC)
HUG! To you as your awesome self now (I fully mean that word, I'm a little in awe of you) and also a time-machine hug to the young Karen who was in the middle of being failed, and didn't really know how awesome present day Karen could be.
Man... that resonates. And THANK YOU for sharing Marianne's post too. Perfect metaphor... wish I'd had it to read in high school.
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stormantia wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:31 pm (UTC)
Thank you. Your point about sexual harassment is something I can relate to. I was stalked twice (once in high school and once in college) and have been touched inappropriately at two different jobs, and I always find myself saying that it wasn't that bad, when yes, it was. You don't want to detract from another person's painful experience, but...it was painful.
It's really disjointed and awkward, and I'm sorry for that, but I just wanted t say thank you. This post helped me a lot.
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windancer wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:33 pm (UTC)
Thank you for posting this. I Tweeted the link to your entry, because this needs to be addressed and addressed and addressed until the situation improves.
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sour_idealist wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:51 pm (UTC)
I don't think I have a single memory of a teacher not failing a student. Maybe, if a teacher rules the classroom with an iron fist, nothing will happen in that particular class because nobody dares to talk. But I have no memory, ever, of a teacher, counselor, or anyone else stopping anything beyond the confines of a classroom. And the teachers who didn't run that tight a ship? Usually, that meant things going on literally under their noses. My freshman year of high school, I was being harassed in gym and the teacher teased me about it.
And what derryderrydown said about still feeling the effects? I still can't tell whether people are genuinely being nice to me, or being mocking. I just can't see the difference, and I tend to assume the second.
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aliette_rowan wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 08:45 pm (UTC)
I was small for my age, dressed unfashionably and was very bright. Social politics did not come naturally to me for quite some time.
I was bullied through isolation. I started out as the kid that thought the entire world was her friend. I quickly realised this was not the case and ended up withdrawing.
My solution was the school library at about age 7. Nobody bothered me there, books were awesome and I was safe. This carried on until I was about 12.
I too have known the shame of a teacher asking kids to be my friend. In my case I only found out the next school year when I went to college with the same group of people and sat down with them, only to be told I wasn't welcome anymore and that they were never really my friends.
Luckily I found a kindred spirit in form 3 and we propped each other up for the rest of college and at university I discovered the geek crowd and found my home.
For a long time I thought there was something wrong with me because nobody liked me. Now I know that there wasn't anything wrong with me at all. I was and am awesome.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:44 am (UTC)
"I started out as the kid that thought the entire world was her friend."
I was that kid too. Now I'm an introvert bordering on hermit. It's sad.
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aliette_rowan wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:59 am (UTC)
*hugs*
Unless I am around 'safe' people, I turn into a complete introvert. I am so lucky to have safe people now.
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jessikast wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:05 pm (UTC)
I was bullied in primary school and secondary school - never so badly that it affected my school work, and I always had a small circle of friends so I never felt terribly isolated.
Anyway, two incidences stand out which I wanted to share since they are kind of good memories for me.
When I was in primary school, maybe eight or nine, I was physically bullied by a few boys who would tease and push me. I don't recall particarly taking this to the teachers, but I think the boys were the known "trouble makers". One day one of the boys decided to push me while the class were going down stairs...this ended badly. Obviously.
So the next day I limp into class, my badly sprained ankle strapped and bandaged, and I have this lovely memory of the teacher loudly exclaiming "Michael, look what you've done!"
Highschool was a private girls school. I wasn't popular and don't recall a lot of overt bullying, but more name calling and snickers behind my back. In forth form or so the cliques and bitchiness and bullying came to a head, and we had a bunch of those kind of sharing sessions where the teachers get us to sit in a cicle and Say Positive Things or play trust games.
A little while earlier we had been out in the field for some kind of exercise, and had been told to stand in a circle and hold hands. The girl next to me (not popular, but on the fringe of the popular group and desperate to be included) made it obvious how horrified she was at having to touch me, and pulled her sleeve over hand. One of the popular girls brought this up at the "Please Get On" session and said, I noticed you did this, and it wasn't okay. And basically the whole form agreed. The bitchy bully was shamed, and it was an awesome moment of vindication for me.
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wanderingdreamr wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:11 pm (UTC)
It's been years since I was bullied but reading this post is definitely bringing up some old memories and it really vocalizes a few thoughts I've had over the years too. I went to the teachers about being bullied, they had to know about it and they liked me, yet they just couldn't get this one girl to stop bullying me and my mom said she probably would've made me change schools if we hadn't moved when we did. And for the life of me I can't figure out what else could've been done. I went to teachers (don't think I had the "let's be friends" intervention but I do recall my teacher yelling at the kids on my behalf at least once), I don't remember if I tried standing up to the girl or ignoring her but I'm pretty sure I did both and neither helped, I had friends who didn't make fun of me, hell I just wish they could've sent this elementary kid for counciling since my mom agrees that she had problems. Part of me says "It's a bit extreme to kick a ten year old out of school" and the other half of me says "eff that, all her friends managed to grow up in the same time, if you can't play nice then you can't play at all!"
Geez, from reading the comments it really hits home for just how many people have been bullied over the years, why hasn't anyone figured out better techniques to deal with this?!?
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nentuaby wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:50 pm (UTC)
An anti-bullying campaign is badly, badly needed... But I really do wish it wasn't Dan Savage behind it. If you're not aware, aside from fatphobia he's also particularly binarist... He's said some dramatically biphobic things and, though I've never heard anything in particularly, I'd project from them with pretty fair certainty that he almost has to be transphobic too.
The effect for me of constantly hearing "Dan Savage's It Gets Better" is kind of "well, that's nice for the Gay and Lesbian kids. Too bad I'm from the tail end of the alphabet soup."
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 01:13 am (UTC)
I am aware, and yeah, agreed again.
But the thing is, it *is* nice for those kids!
I wish someone more involved in intersectional social justice had come up with the campaign, but they didn't. And the kids who are getting hope from it are getting real hope.
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nentuaby wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:06 am (UTC)
I know, believe me... Got to take these things on their own merits, or gods know there'd be about 8 people on the planet qualified to start them. Just... Something I needed to vent about a bit.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:43 am (UTC)
Indeed, and your venting is completely justified.
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:08 am (UTC)
I'm in the same boat. I think this project is a great idea, but sometimes it seems like the "BT" in "GLBT" is neglected.
I'd also stopped reading Savage shortly after he joined the chorus of people saying that black people were responsible for upholding Prop 8. Short answer: No they weren't. There aren't actually that many black people in California. Prop 8 MIGHT have been struck down if literally every registered black voter voted against it, but that's a big "might".
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puzzlement wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 10:14 pm (UTC)
I call my own bad school experiences largely "sexual harassment" and "sexual assault" now.
It tended not to occur to me to tell teachers, I guess part of the thing about that is that they get away with it because it's difficult to tell a teacher "J keeps talking to me about 'blow jobs'... and, is that something sexual? He acts like it is." (I can think of various teachers who would have had trouble not laughing in my face.) My parents at times took action when I was a teenager (and I think they must have brought merry hell down on the school because the reaction was as if they had threatened to burn it down) but as a littler kid, when I didn't tell them it was sexual either, I got "just ignore it/just look like you don't care."
And in this case, it's inter-generational problems. My parents, particularly my mother, were both badly bullied. My father eventually grew to 195cm tall and dished out some violence (I know several tall men who eventually did this), my mother... eventually went to university and was happy. In some ways, they were unable to help partly because they had never found something useful I could do when in the same victim position they'd been in.
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lirazel wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 02:02 am (UTC)
That really speaks to me -- I was unable to help my son when he was bullied, because I never learned to deal with bullies myself. And even though he's 30 now and tremendously happy and we're close, I am still angry at myself that I couldn't help him much, and even angrier at the attitudes which make it OK to bully.
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writerjenn wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 11:42 pm (UTC)
The posts I've been reading are amazing, and I applaud all my fellow bully-survivors who have been able to tell their stories. I still haven't been able to tell mine yet.
One thing I notice, though--in the comments of many of these posts, people often give "reasons" for why they themselves were bullied--they were overweight, or too small, or had braces, or were shy. Or maybe they got good grades, or--on the other end of the spectrum--they couldn't keep up in school. And I want to give a group hug to everyone and say:
That wasn't why.
You were not the cause of it.
I saw an interesting thing happen in one of my classes, where girls ganged up on one another in turn. First one girl would be the odd one out, then another who had formerly been in would be out, then another. It was like a round robin (although I was out the longest). The victims didn't cause it, and it could happen to anyone, and for a while there it was happening to just about everyone.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 01:11 am (UTC)
I appreciate the thought behind this comment, but I do think there's a difference between thinking something about you was so *wrong* that of course you're going to get bullied, and identifying a point of difference that kids jumped on because they could.
Because a LOT of tolerance of bullying is rooted in a world full of classism/fatphobia/heterosexism/racism, etc etc. Sometimes there really are reasons why particular people are targeted - not reasons that are their fault, not excuses for bullies' behaviour - but reasons that stem from the massive imbalances in our intolerant society.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:48 am (UTC)
yes, this. and letting the bullying continue just reinforces those imbalances.
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lirazel wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 02:59 am (UTC)
Oh, yes. Yes, indeed.
I wrote about this once, and kept it friendslocked, because I was looking for work at the time and was concerned about how a potential employer might read it. I have unlocked it today. Thank you.
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mysterysquid wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 08:25 am (UTC)
Beautifully put. I feel lie i spent half my time as a teacher pulling kids up for insults and putdowns, but I don't regret a moment of it.
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narrelle wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 09:05 am (UTC)
I was very moved by this piece, having been bullied a lot at all the different schools I attended over the years, primary through to high. It was hideous. However, it did get me reading a lot of books, and now I'm a writer and practising Awesome as hard as I can, so guess it wasn't a total write-off.
May I link to this post from my Mortal Words blog?
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:42 am (UTC)
Oh, absolutely. All public posts on this blog are free for linking.
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suzycat wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 06:19 am (UTC)
"Just ignore them", how many times did I hear that... It is exactly the same as with rape/sexual abuse: we need to stop teaching potential victims what to do to lessen their chances of being victims (for example, don't have any distinguishing features, don't be a different colour, have a different accent, have a disability; don't cry easily) and start teaching people NOT TO DO IT.
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eyebrowofdoom wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 11:46 am (UTC)
possibly I am imposing with this long and tangential comment
I have been thinking about teacher's kids recently. My parents were both teachers when they were younger. And it is funny how many of my friends' parents are also teachers. It's got to the point where if I meet someone new that I click with, I am surprised to learn that they are not a teacher's kid. The thing I think about teachers - and this is partly from observing my own friends who have been teaching high school since we left Uni - is that it makes them into really pretty flinty characters over time. They are just fucking sick of whining children by the time they get home in the evening. So their kids get a pretty strong message to sit down, shut up and do as they're told, and stop bothering the parent. So we grow up into quiet, diligent, fairly self-effacing people, and I suspect we flock together because it doesn't work to be friends with louder, more self-important people, because they steam-roller us and hog the agenda.
I think being quiet and self-effacing is quite a good way to be, but I have a certain sadness about it for myself. It could be kind of awesome to be self-important, and go around demanding things from people.
I don't want to impose unwelcome interpretations on your life, obviously. But there is something quite extraordinary in the contrast between the degree to which you are protective of your dad, struggling about whether to tell this story, and the degree to which he was protective of you - which is, not at all. Given that he's the parent and you're the child, that seems strange.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 02:23 pm (UTC)
Re: possibly I am imposing with this long and tangential comment
Oh dear, I think I might have misrepresented my dad. He was extremely protective of me in many ways - indeed, telling people to be friends with me was an act of attempted protection, if one that made me feel humiliated and small. Part of the reason we moved from the very small country town in which I was most tormented as a kid was because I was being bullied, and my parents wanted better for me.
But I think he got caught up in not wanting to show me favouritism when we were at the same schools. And of not wanting to abuse his authority. Both of which are good instincts, but unfortunately I still think he let me down."
"Imagine an adult man working in an office environment. Some of his peers, who are the same age, regularly mock his interests and hobbies. He is a very good worker, and is praised by the supervisor; this brings more ire from his colleagues. Occasionally they physically assault him - slaps or shoves, mostly. They assure him that if he doesn't report this to the supervisor, they will be his friend. He feels isolated and wants friends, so he doesn't report it, but this promise is always broken.
When he does report the abuse, it stops for a few days, and then begins again. Although the abusers are occasionally punished, they are never removed from the workplace. And while the man is never directly told that he is partly to blame for the harassment, he receives mixed messages. He is sometimes told by supervisors that he should ignore the abuse. At other times he is told that if he made more of an effort to be friendly towards his abusers, they would stop. Once he is told that if he stopped being so obviously proud of his prowess in the workplace, his work life would become much, much easier.
Most people can understand that a workplace that condones or fails to prevent this kind of harassment is clearly unsafe. The man's colleagues are not ordinary people doing what ordinary people do; they are viciously pursuing a course of emotional and physical assault on someone they don't like. A supervisor informed of this abuse would be negligent in not coming down like the hammer of Thor on the abusers and making it very clear that this behaviour was unacceptable, in this workplace, or anywhere at all.
For some reason, if the victim and the harassers are nine years old, all bets are off.
Bullying is awful. It ought to be totally unacceptable. But far too often, it is accepted. We allow vulnerable children to be placed in danger, emotional and physical, that adults, with all the resources and experience of adults, would find oppressive and intensely painful. Then we excuse it as "just kids" doing what "just kids" do.
Child bullies aren't just kids. They are kids, who are bullies. They need to be stopped, not tolerated.
People bullied me, off and on, from when I was six until I was about sixteen, through two towns and four different schools. That is ten years of intermittent verbal, and rare physical, abuse. You bet it left a mark on my psyche. I often felt isolated and desperately lonely; I often cried from how terrible I felt. I never seriously contemplated suicide, but I did have suicidal fantasies, of the vengeful, "and THEN they'll realise they shouldn't be mean to me" type. At one point in my early teens, I plucked out all my lower eyelashes - it was very painful, which was kind of the point - and waited for someone to notice. They didn't, so I told them, in what I now recognise as a typical cry for help. Of course, I just got teased more for doing something so weird.
Many years later, when we were all more mature and I was friendlier with a number of these people, they expressed regret that I hadn't told them about how I'd felt earlier.
I had told them, of course. I'd asked, "Why are you mean to me?" And they said, "Because you make it so easy."
Awesome acceptance of your own faults there, guys!
But I believed them, because after all, people had told me over and over that it was partly my fault; for being weird, for being proud of my own abilities (was I supposed to not notice them?), for caring about things they didn't and vice versa. For being a victim.
The truth, of course, is that I was never even partly to blame. They did it to me, and they should not have, and they should have been stopped.
So if I do not hesitate to say that people bullied me, nor to describe the effects it had on me, why have I been hesitating over this post?
1) Like my experiences with sexual harassment - also not secret - I often have a completely erroneous feeling that the crimes perpetuated on me were not that bad. No one ever raped me; only groped me. No one ever broke my bones; only kicked me. No one ever spread disgusting lies about me behind my back (that I know of); only said cruel things to my face in an attempt to make me cry.
This is bullshit, of course. A crime does not become any less a crime because a crime visited upon someone else was more violent or repulsive. But the "other people have/had it so much worse" notion keeps going through my head at times like this, making me feel like my own experiences are somehow inauthentic or unhelpful.
2) When bullies target people at school, the victims are often told to report to teachers. Unfortunately, teachers, constrained by regulations or poorly thought out policy, lack of opportunity, lack of witnesses, or a lack of understanding, compassion or will, often fail those kids.
When I was eight, and living in a very small town, I was beaten up walking home from the shop with a bottle of milk. I wasn't badly hurt - pushed around and kicked a few times while I curled up and cried. I told the kids that the school principal would get them to make them leave me alone. The principal, when informed of this bullying, said he couldn't do anything about it because it hadn't been during school time or on school grounds.
I once told a teacher that I'd had a dream that he'd hidden under the desk and seen exactly how badly I was being teased, and then he'd come out and punished the perpetrators so they wouldn't do it again. He told me that he was sorry I was having a tough time, but if I just ignored the teasing, it'd get better.
In high school, when we were all pretty friendly in Year 13 (small class) some of the students who had teased me less when we were younger told me that when we'd all been at intermediate school together, a teacher had approached and asked them to be friends with me. I was humiliated at the thought that their past approaches had not been sincere, as I had assumed, but based on deception. The teacher had never told me he was taking this action.
In all three of these examples the teacher/principal is my dad.
I couldn't see a way to make this post without saying that, and so I have hesitated. I love my parents very much. I think they did a fantastic job raising me in most respects - here I am, being awesome and as ethical as I know how, and a lot of the credit goes to the people who gave me my first ethical frameworks. Be kind. Be generous. Listen. I dedicated my first book to my best friend, for supporting the story from infancy, and to my parents, for doing the same for me. Because they are wonderfully supportive, and they love me, and are proud of me, and want me to be happy.
My dad is a wonderful man, and I think that if he knew that I thought he'd failed me as a student in need of protection, he'd be very hurt. I don't want to hurt him, and it's completely unnecessary to do so: He's retired now, so it wouldn't be a teaching moment for him or help other kids in pain. I don't doubt that my dad looked out for me in a lot of little ways, and I blame the wider culture of bullying acceptance much more than I do him. He did try to help me, even with that awful plan of asking other kids to befriend me.
But even with him being the lovely man he is, and loving him as I do, I can still say that he messed it up sometimes. Even the people who love us can fail us.
The memories of being bullied are not so painful now; they just make me a little bit sad. But at the time, these were wounds I thought would never heal.
If I had been hurt more, if I had been depressed, if I had not had the outlets I did in books and drama, I might have decided to stop being a victim in the most permanent way possible.
I'm glad I didn't. Here I am, being awesome! There is a lot of awesome to be, and I want lots and lots of time in which to be it.
And I want that for everyone, which is why I think bullying is hideous and inexcusable, why I am certain that bullying should not be tolerated under any circumstances, and why I want to give hope to those whom people are bullying.
If that's you, please know this: You are not to blame. You are not the failure. You are being failed.
I am on your side, and I am so, so sorry.
Please, do whatever you can to keep yourself as safe as you can. The future awaits, and you can be awesome.
And if you are someone who is not being bullied, but wants to help, here are some things you can do:
- Stop using hurtful language, like "gay", "retard", "lame" etc. (It'll take a while if you're used to saying these words, but it's never too early to start stopping.) When you can, object to those words being used in your presence. This kind of language, even when not directed at people, normalises the idea that being gay or having a disability is bad.
- Don't tell fat jokes or Maori jokes, or any jokes where the humour is based in someone in an oppressed group to which you don't belong being perceived as inferior (that is a LOT of jokes, because we have a sick culture, but you'll cope). And try not to respond with laughter if someone who isn't part of the group the jokes target - someone who isn't entitled to meet pain with humour - tells them to you.
- Make your opinion on bullying clear, and when you can, refuse to tolerate or excuse it. You don't have to like everyone you know. You don't even have to be nice to them. But part of being the absolute baseline of a decent human being is not causing harm to them.
- Encourage anti-bullying programs in schools and communities. Donate your time and/or money to them. (The Alannah and Madeline Foundation Better Buddies program is a good choice for Australians.)
So there are some concrete actions you can undertake to help stop bullying. And hurrah for you! I am on your side also.
* I would LOVE Savage to recognise and own that his fatphobia and other issues are also propagating hate and contributing to the bullying of kids, including fat queer kids, and then, you know, stop doing it, but I don't think that's going to happen. As matters stand, however, I cannot deny the value of any attempt to give hope to bullied and potentially suicidal LGBTQ kids, however problematic the source.
Thank you. This is--yes. I agree. I'm mulling over my own post, but I can say this: the one time I told a school official that I was feeling, um, very isolated, she told me it was all in my head. This being the school counselor that I'd been seeing for a couple of months, it didn't exactly encourage me to pursue anything further (I also quit seeing her).
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derryderrydown wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 03:52 pm (UTC)
I was bullied by two groups at school, and the most painful was the people who were supposed to be my friends. It took me five years to realise that they were toxic and they weren't going to stop being toxic.
While I did make new friends (several of whom I'm still very close to), most of them were in the years above and below me, or in a different house, which meant I had people to hang out with at breaks/lunch, but not during lessons.
So I stopped going to lessons.
Which isn't the ideal solution, but it got me out of school alive, which was looking increasingly unlikely up to that point.
Teachers knew I was being bullied - mostly verbal but some physical. At one point, a teacher watched another girl punch me to the ground and kick me, and just told the other girl she should learn to control her temper. The only thing they did about the verbal bullying was for my head of year to go into my form (while I was in hospital recovering from a suicide attempt) and tell everybody that they should be nice to me. As you can imagine, that didn't do a great deal of good.
I was referred to two psychologists. The first was through the hospital for the various suicide attempts. He spent ten minutes talking to me and decided it was all due to my parents divorcing a decade earlier. Which made my mother feel horrifically and pointlessly guilty and did absolutely nothing about the real problem.
The other was through school, for the amount of lessons I was missing. His solution was for me to be kept in the school office at breaks/lunchtime and walked to classes. Which just meant I didn't go to school at all, because it removed the only non-miserable portions of my day.
I'm still incredibly untrusting if people I meet are nice to me, without obviously wanting something in return. There's a part of me that expects them to turn on me. I am gradually learning that's not the case but it's been a long, hard slog and it's not over yet.
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themadpoker wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 04:26 pm (UTC)
I had told them, of course. I'd asked, "Why are you mean to me?" And they said, "Because you make it so easy."
That attitude is the WORST thing. In sixth grade a former friend of mine made it her life mission to make my life hell and I never let my parents know how bad it got because some part of me was ashamed that I was being bullied. Like I should have been able to do something about it right? And I tried all the solutions they always tell you to do like ignoring her (didn't work, made her worse). I basically made it through that year by separating myself into two people, the one at school who always carried at least two books to start reading so I could avoid talking to anyone and the one at home who was chatty and had fun with her family and cousins.
I think the biggest thing people can do to stop bullying is what you said, make it clear it's not tolerated. The girl I mentioned was the ringleader but the rest of my class was perfectly willing to join in or pretend like she wasn't doing anything. Bystanders can make a huge difference.
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 04:58 pm (UTC)
All of the anti-bullying stuff also hits a little close to home, because for a few short months, I did engage in bullying. Despite being a nerdy timid kid, I never actually was bullied much, mostly because I was bigger than everyone else. I only had a couple of close friends in middle school, so I'd also felt relatively isolated from my peers.
But there was one semester, my freshman year of high school. In the last period of the day, there was a kid who everyone in the class would mock ceaselessly before the final bell rang. I participated in this. It was for all the standard, shitty reasons, trying to fit in, feeling better about myself, all that garbage.
After I actually made some friends in high school, I stopped. Then for the next several years I justified what I had done to this kid as "not that bad", because I hadn't been orchestrating anything. I went to great lengths to rationalize to myself why I wasn't a huge piece of shit who had engaged in the abuse of another human being.
A few years into college, I came home for a break and went and apologized to the kid we all mocked. He seemed to be fine, but the thing is, I know that the things I said to him were still there. I could not and cannot ever take those things back, but I can try and move forward and do something about this kind of shit.
The problem is, it was so damn easy at the time. Not because the bullied make it easy, that's also just another justification. Hell, there was nothing in particular that made the kid we bullied stand out for abuse. But it was easy because of that sense of the group against the outsider, it was easy because there was a petty, childish thrill in giving into the worst of ourselves.
Anyway, that's just a word out there to anyone who bullied others. Remember that you will always have been a person who listened to the lizard part of your brain, and that you have to work harder than anyone to keep kids from doing this to others in the future.
And to the bullied, this is an apology. Even though I'd experienced the same sense of isolation and loneliness, I chose to inflict that on someone else. It remains the worst thing I have ever done to another human being, and if I could take it all back, I would. But there isn't any way to undo the things done, only to move forward and prevent it from happening again.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:20 am (UTC)
I saw a post on tumblr today that talks about how bullying is a thing people DO, not a thing people ARE. It is possible to be both a bully and a victim of bullying. And to kids that bully, we should make clear that it is their behavior that we find unacceptable, and not write them off completely as "bad kids." Your comment made me think about that. It IS easy to join in bullying, even when you've been bullied yourself. That doesn't make it okay but it also doesn't make you a bad person who can never do anything good.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:42 am (UTC)
I agree, but I think a lot of tolerance comes from the "but they're really *good* kids" defence.
ALSO OMG KITTY.
(Also, I just clicked through to that tumblr post and, uh, the VERY FIRST LINE made me roll my eyes.)
Edited at 2010-10-19 07:43 am (UTC)
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 04:23 pm (UTC)
The "good kid" defense reminds me of the similar one for rape. "He's such a nice boy, he would never rape anybody." Well, maybe he did, and in that case he's not such a nice boy. It's possible for someone to be nice to some people and really, really awful to others. I've probably engaged in bullying behavior, although I don't remember individual instances. But I've also been a victim of bullying many times over, and a bystander when bullying was happening.
I guess what I am saying with linking to the tumblr post is that it's the behavior that's the problem. I think one reason parents and teachers jump to the "really good kids" defense is that they are thinking a kid can only be either a good kid or a bully, just like people think you can either be a good person or a racist, or you can be a nice guy or a rapist. In all of these cases judging people's "goodness" or "badness" doesn't help anything and in fact just adds to that dichotomy, so I'd rather focus on what the person did that was harmful.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 11:41 pm (UTC)
Excellent point.
(KITTY!)
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 04:43 am (UTC)
I can agree somewhat that you don't want to immediately demonize demonize kids who participate or those who do nothing, but the issue here is that I knew full well at the time that what I was doing was flat out wrong. I honestly like to think that I would have stopped if there had just been someone to say to me, "Knock that the fuck off," or even just something as simple as getting me to think about the consequences.
I would completely agree with the assessment that I was a bad kid. Sure, I only did it for a semester, sure other people did more than me, but for that semester and the subsequent years of rationalization, I was being a bad fucking kid. If I couldn't figure that out my own dumbass self, I really wished someone would have told me.
(Not that I'm saying it was other people's fault that I bullied a kid when I knew it wasn't right. My actions were my own responsibility.)
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knastymike wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 05:25 pm (UTC)
Oh my word, I love that post by Kate Harding. Especially the criticism of "Just ignore it."
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shogunsquirrel wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 05:57 pm (UTC)
HUG! To you as your awesome self now (I fully mean that word, I'm a little in awe of you) and also a time-machine hug to the young Karen who was in the middle of being failed, and didn't really know how awesome present day Karen could be.
Man... that resonates. And THANK YOU for sharing Marianne's post too. Perfect metaphor... wish I'd had it to read in high school.
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stormantia wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:31 pm (UTC)
Thank you. Your point about sexual harassment is something I can relate to. I was stalked twice (once in high school and once in college) and have been touched inappropriately at two different jobs, and I always find myself saying that it wasn't that bad, when yes, it was. You don't want to detract from another person's painful experience, but...it was painful.
It's really disjointed and awkward, and I'm sorry for that, but I just wanted t say thank you. This post helped me a lot.
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windancer wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:33 pm (UTC)
Thank you for posting this. I Tweeted the link to your entry, because this needs to be addressed and addressed and addressed until the situation improves.
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sour_idealist wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:51 pm (UTC)
I don't think I have a single memory of a teacher not failing a student. Maybe, if a teacher rules the classroom with an iron fist, nothing will happen in that particular class because nobody dares to talk. But I have no memory, ever, of a teacher, counselor, or anyone else stopping anything beyond the confines of a classroom. And the teachers who didn't run that tight a ship? Usually, that meant things going on literally under their noses. My freshman year of high school, I was being harassed in gym and the teacher teased me about it.
And what derryderrydown said about still feeling the effects? I still can't tell whether people are genuinely being nice to me, or being mocking. I just can't see the difference, and I tend to assume the second.
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aliette_rowan wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 08:45 pm (UTC)
I was small for my age, dressed unfashionably and was very bright. Social politics did not come naturally to me for quite some time.
I was bullied through isolation. I started out as the kid that thought the entire world was her friend. I quickly realised this was not the case and ended up withdrawing.
My solution was the school library at about age 7. Nobody bothered me there, books were awesome and I was safe. This carried on until I was about 12.
I too have known the shame of a teacher asking kids to be my friend. In my case I only found out the next school year when I went to college with the same group of people and sat down with them, only to be told I wasn't welcome anymore and that they were never really my friends.
Luckily I found a kindred spirit in form 3 and we propped each other up for the rest of college and at university I discovered the geek crowd and found my home.
For a long time I thought there was something wrong with me because nobody liked me. Now I know that there wasn't anything wrong with me at all. I was and am awesome.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:44 am (UTC)
"I started out as the kid that thought the entire world was her friend."
I was that kid too. Now I'm an introvert bordering on hermit. It's sad.
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aliette_rowan wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:59 am (UTC)
*hugs*
Unless I am around 'safe' people, I turn into a complete introvert. I am so lucky to have safe people now.
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jessikast wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:05 pm (UTC)
I was bullied in primary school and secondary school - never so badly that it affected my school work, and I always had a small circle of friends so I never felt terribly isolated.
Anyway, two incidences stand out which I wanted to share since they are kind of good memories for me.
When I was in primary school, maybe eight or nine, I was physically bullied by a few boys who would tease and push me. I don't recall particarly taking this to the teachers, but I think the boys were the known "trouble makers". One day one of the boys decided to push me while the class were going down stairs...this ended badly. Obviously.
So the next day I limp into class, my badly sprained ankle strapped and bandaged, and I have this lovely memory of the teacher loudly exclaiming "Michael, look what you've done!"
Highschool was a private girls school. I wasn't popular and don't recall a lot of overt bullying, but more name calling and snickers behind my back. In forth form or so the cliques and bitchiness and bullying came to a head, and we had a bunch of those kind of sharing sessions where the teachers get us to sit in a cicle and Say Positive Things or play trust games.
A little while earlier we had been out in the field for some kind of exercise, and had been told to stand in a circle and hold hands. The girl next to me (not popular, but on the fringe of the popular group and desperate to be included) made it obvious how horrified she was at having to touch me, and pulled her sleeve over hand. One of the popular girls brought this up at the "Please Get On" session and said, I noticed you did this, and it wasn't okay. And basically the whole form agreed. The bitchy bully was shamed, and it was an awesome moment of vindication for me.
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wanderingdreamr wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:11 pm (UTC)
It's been years since I was bullied but reading this post is definitely bringing up some old memories and it really vocalizes a few thoughts I've had over the years too. I went to the teachers about being bullied, they had to know about it and they liked me, yet they just couldn't get this one girl to stop bullying me and my mom said she probably would've made me change schools if we hadn't moved when we did. And for the life of me I can't figure out what else could've been done. I went to teachers (don't think I had the "let's be friends" intervention but I do recall my teacher yelling at the kids on my behalf at least once), I don't remember if I tried standing up to the girl or ignoring her but I'm pretty sure I did both and neither helped, I had friends who didn't make fun of me, hell I just wish they could've sent this elementary kid for counciling since my mom agrees that she had problems. Part of me says "It's a bit extreme to kick a ten year old out of school" and the other half of me says "eff that, all her friends managed to grow up in the same time, if you can't play nice then you can't play at all!"
Geez, from reading the comments it really hits home for just how many people have been bullied over the years, why hasn't anyone figured out better techniques to deal with this?!?
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nentuaby wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 09:50 pm (UTC)
An anti-bullying campaign is badly, badly needed... But I really do wish it wasn't Dan Savage behind it. If you're not aware, aside from fatphobia he's also particularly binarist... He's said some dramatically biphobic things and, though I've never heard anything in particularly, I'd project from them with pretty fair certainty that he almost has to be transphobic too.
The effect for me of constantly hearing "Dan Savage's It Gets Better" is kind of "well, that's nice for the Gay and Lesbian kids. Too bad I'm from the tail end of the alphabet soup."
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 01:13 am (UTC)
I am aware, and yeah, agreed again.
But the thing is, it *is* nice for those kids!
I wish someone more involved in intersectional social justice had come up with the campaign, but they didn't. And the kids who are getting hope from it are getting real hope.
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nentuaby wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:06 am (UTC)
I know, believe me... Got to take these things on their own merits, or gods know there'd be about 8 people on the planet qualified to start them. Just... Something I needed to vent about a bit.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:43 am (UTC)
Indeed, and your venting is completely justified.
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franzferdinand2 wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 07:08 am (UTC)
I'm in the same boat. I think this project is a great idea, but sometimes it seems like the "BT" in "GLBT" is neglected.
I'd also stopped reading Savage shortly after he joined the chorus of people saying that black people were responsible for upholding Prop 8. Short answer: No they weren't. There aren't actually that many black people in California. Prop 8 MIGHT have been struck down if literally every registered black voter voted against it, but that's a big "might".
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puzzlement wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 10:14 pm (UTC)
I call my own bad school experiences largely "sexual harassment" and "sexual assault" now.
It tended not to occur to me to tell teachers, I guess part of the thing about that is that they get away with it because it's difficult to tell a teacher "J keeps talking to me about 'blow jobs'... and, is that something sexual? He acts like it is." (I can think of various teachers who would have had trouble not laughing in my face.) My parents at times took action when I was a teenager (and I think they must have brought merry hell down on the school because the reaction was as if they had threatened to burn it down) but as a littler kid, when I didn't tell them it was sexual either, I got "just ignore it/just look like you don't care."
And in this case, it's inter-generational problems. My parents, particularly my mother, were both badly bullied. My father eventually grew to 195cm tall and dished out some violence (I know several tall men who eventually did this), my mother... eventually went to university and was happy. In some ways, they were unable to help partly because they had never found something useful I could do when in the same victim position they'd been in.
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lirazel wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 02:02 am (UTC)
That really speaks to me -- I was unable to help my son when he was bullied, because I never learned to deal with bullies myself. And even though he's 30 now and tremendously happy and we're close, I am still angry at myself that I couldn't help him much, and even angrier at the attitudes which make it OK to bully.
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writerjenn wrote:
Oct. 18th, 2010 11:42 pm (UTC)
The posts I've been reading are amazing, and I applaud all my fellow bully-survivors who have been able to tell their stories. I still haven't been able to tell mine yet.
One thing I notice, though--in the comments of many of these posts, people often give "reasons" for why they themselves were bullied--they were overweight, or too small, or had braces, or were shy. Or maybe they got good grades, or--on the other end of the spectrum--they couldn't keep up in school. And I want to give a group hug to everyone and say:
That wasn't why.
You were not the cause of it.
I saw an interesting thing happen in one of my classes, where girls ganged up on one another in turn. First one girl would be the odd one out, then another who had formerly been in would be out, then another. It was like a round robin (although I was out the longest). The victims didn't cause it, and it could happen to anyone, and for a while there it was happening to just about everyone.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 01:11 am (UTC)
I appreciate the thought behind this comment, but I do think there's a difference between thinking something about you was so *wrong* that of course you're going to get bullied, and identifying a point of difference that kids jumped on because they could.
Because a LOT of tolerance of bullying is rooted in a world full of classism/fatphobia/heterosexism/racism, etc etc. Sometimes there really are reasons why particular people are targeted - not reasons that are their fault, not excuses for bullies' behaviour - but reasons that stem from the massive imbalances in our intolerant society.
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notemily wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 06:48 am (UTC)
yes, this. and letting the bullying continue just reinforces those imbalances.
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lirazel wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 02:59 am (UTC)
Oh, yes. Yes, indeed.
I wrote about this once, and kept it friendslocked, because I was looking for work at the time and was concerned about how a potential employer might read it. I have unlocked it today. Thank you.
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mysterysquid wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 08:25 am (UTC)
Beautifully put. I feel lie i spent half my time as a teacher pulling kids up for insults and putdowns, but I don't regret a moment of it.
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narrelle wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 09:05 am (UTC)
I was very moved by this piece, having been bullied a lot at all the different schools I attended over the years, primary through to high. It was hideous. However, it did get me reading a lot of books, and now I'm a writer and practising Awesome as hard as I can, so guess it wasn't a total write-off.
May I link to this post from my Mortal Words blog?
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 19th, 2010 10:42 am (UTC)
Oh, absolutely. All public posts on this blog are free for linking.
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suzycat wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 06:19 am (UTC)
"Just ignore them", how many times did I hear that... It is exactly the same as with rape/sexual abuse: we need to stop teaching potential victims what to do to lessen their chances of being victims (for example, don't have any distinguishing features, don't be a different colour, have a different accent, have a disability; don't cry easily) and start teaching people NOT TO DO IT.
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eyebrowofdoom wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 11:46 am (UTC)
possibly I am imposing with this long and tangential comment
I have been thinking about teacher's kids recently. My parents were both teachers when they were younger. And it is funny how many of my friends' parents are also teachers. It's got to the point where if I meet someone new that I click with, I am surprised to learn that they are not a teacher's kid. The thing I think about teachers - and this is partly from observing my own friends who have been teaching high school since we left Uni - is that it makes them into really pretty flinty characters over time. They are just fucking sick of whining children by the time they get home in the evening. So their kids get a pretty strong message to sit down, shut up and do as they're told, and stop bothering the parent. So we grow up into quiet, diligent, fairly self-effacing people, and I suspect we flock together because it doesn't work to be friends with louder, more self-important people, because they steam-roller us and hog the agenda.
I think being quiet and self-effacing is quite a good way to be, but I have a certain sadness about it for myself. It could be kind of awesome to be self-important, and go around demanding things from people.
I don't want to impose unwelcome interpretations on your life, obviously. But there is something quite extraordinary in the contrast between the degree to which you are protective of your dad, struggling about whether to tell this story, and the degree to which he was protective of you - which is, not at all. Given that he's the parent and you're the child, that seems strange.
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karenhealey wrote:
Oct. 20th, 2010 02:23 pm (UTC)
Re: possibly I am imposing with this long and tangential comment
Oh dear, I think I might have misrepresented my dad. He was extremely protective of me in many ways - indeed, telling people to be friends with me was an act of attempted protection, if one that made me feel humiliated and small. Part of the reason we moved from the very small country town in which I was most tormented as a kid was because I was being bullied, and my parents wanted better for me.
But I think he got caught up in not wanting to show me favouritism when we were at the same schools. And of not wanting to abuse his authority. Both of which are good instincts, but unfortunately I still think he let me down."
I read something today about bullying.
I'm going to start a few posts here.
First, I'll post my own thoughts. And please feel free to contribute.
I agreed with what I read that bullying shouldn't be the "norm." How many posts have I read about bullying where the person starts off, I was a weird kid. What are the bullies then? What are people who pick on someone and show no humanity towards them? They're normal? Their behaviour is acceptable? In my opinion, it's these people who are weird. They're not being assertive or proactive by them thinking they are "putting someone in their place" and "acknowledging social status." They're not showing survival of the strongest or fittest.
And if they happen to be popular..whether in school, at work, in a club, that doesn't make them a proactive and good person straight away and if people find them proactive and good, they lose any of those qualities in bullying someone whether it's "just one" person. So they may be great to other people but if they're making someone else's life hard, then they're not great at all.
No more excuses.
No more this is just the way it is.
Bullying doesn't make people stronger. The people who are bullied work their damned hardest to make themselves stronger.
It's not tough love.
It may make for some drama on Glee but in reality, people lose lives and if someone is "only" being kicked a few times or called names, things which are referred to as "minor" it is still bullying. You know when you are just gently teasing someone and you ought to know the difference between that and seeing your actions and or words have caused them harm. Even the most seemingly self confident person.
No one "deserves" to be bullied. It's an ego trip for the bully perhaps and if so it's the weirdest most delusional trip. Being a bully is not a qualification or something to be proud of. "Oh I used to bully the boys at my school." What a magnificent way to assert yourself, making people call you a bitch or afraid of you.
Know what bullying is. It's not standing up for yourself. It's not giving your opinion. It's putting someone down.
No one is perfect. I was called a hyprocrite and the girl who called me that knew what I went through on a daily basis. I was being bullied in 3/5 classes in the day every day, I was also bullied at lunch, teachers didn't know where to look. I didn't deserve the bullying but that doesn't mean I haven't been guilty of saying things about people. The difference and it's a huge difference, is that I didn't make toilet and animal sounds every time that person entered the room, whereas I got those melodic sounds for no reason when I came into the room in every class the bullies were there. I was picked on for every detail and I noticed that whilst the bullies disliked my appearance from the start, they started picking on it after some time and also the voice, the words, it goes on and on, they got everything. To this day I can't make proper eye contact with someone, it's either too much or too little and I can't look around a room without my heart banging in my chest. I never had that problem before being bullied and I got that problem from having every little thing scrutinised by the bullies. It was a hobby for them to torment me, it was like stalking, and torment is something I could never be accused of towards anyone. I'm not justifying my words about people by the way but thinking that I deserve what I got and not knowing when it's become extreme, is something I will never forgive that girl who called me hypocrite for. If I ever meet her in this lifetime, I will treat her the same as those bullies and it's not some revenge act I get delight out of.
This is what I read. http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/907474.html
First, I'll post my own thoughts. And please feel free to contribute.
I agreed with what I read that bullying shouldn't be the "norm." How many posts have I read about bullying where the person starts off, I was a weird kid. What are the bullies then? What are people who pick on someone and show no humanity towards them? They're normal? Their behaviour is acceptable? In my opinion, it's these people who are weird. They're not being assertive or proactive by them thinking they are "putting someone in their place" and "acknowledging social status." They're not showing survival of the strongest or fittest.
And if they happen to be popular..whether in school, at work, in a club, that doesn't make them a proactive and good person straight away and if people find them proactive and good, they lose any of those qualities in bullying someone whether it's "just one" person. So they may be great to other people but if they're making someone else's life hard, then they're not great at all.
No more excuses.
No more this is just the way it is.
Bullying doesn't make people stronger. The people who are bullied work their damned hardest to make themselves stronger.
It's not tough love.
It may make for some drama on Glee but in reality, people lose lives and if someone is "only" being kicked a few times or called names, things which are referred to as "minor" it is still bullying. You know when you are just gently teasing someone and you ought to know the difference between that and seeing your actions and or words have caused them harm. Even the most seemingly self confident person.
No one "deserves" to be bullied. It's an ego trip for the bully perhaps and if so it's the weirdest most delusional trip. Being a bully is not a qualification or something to be proud of. "Oh I used to bully the boys at my school." What a magnificent way to assert yourself, making people call you a bitch or afraid of you.
Know what bullying is. It's not standing up for yourself. It's not giving your opinion. It's putting someone down.
No one is perfect. I was called a hyprocrite and the girl who called me that knew what I went through on a daily basis. I was being bullied in 3/5 classes in the day every day, I was also bullied at lunch, teachers didn't know where to look. I didn't deserve the bullying but that doesn't mean I haven't been guilty of saying things about people. The difference and it's a huge difference, is that I didn't make toilet and animal sounds every time that person entered the room, whereas I got those melodic sounds for no reason when I came into the room in every class the bullies were there. I was picked on for every detail and I noticed that whilst the bullies disliked my appearance from the start, they started picking on it after some time and also the voice, the words, it goes on and on, they got everything. To this day I can't make proper eye contact with someone, it's either too much or too little and I can't look around a room without my heart banging in my chest. I never had that problem before being bullied and I got that problem from having every little thing scrutinised by the bullies. It was a hobby for them to torment me, it was like stalking, and torment is something I could never be accused of towards anyone. I'm not justifying my words about people by the way but thinking that I deserve what I got and not knowing when it's become extreme, is something I will never forgive that girl who called me hypocrite for. If I ever meet her in this lifetime, I will treat her the same as those bullies and it's not some revenge act I get delight out of.
This is what I read. http://karenhealey.livejournal.com/907474.html
Tuesday, 19 October 2010
Hair.
I know it's a little pretentious of me but yes, I love the Mona Lisa painting, her expression and her face.
Sometimes I feel that different things about a woman's appearance would take so long to discuss that they should be done seperately. I'm not into black and white. I've been around enough to know that appearance is important and that an attitude of like it or lump it is not doing yourselves any favours says the patronising auntie that is me. I've been in the like or lump it situations and for me it wasn't about acceptance, it was the fact I was hurting. It does seem women are lumped into two categories; beautiful, skinny and long hair. The other category being alternative.
I honestly only until this year thought about hair the way other women do. Up till then, I have always wanted to play with my hair. In terms of length, I once told a hairdresser, ideally I'd have my hair down to my ass. The more hair I have, the more styles I can get it in, it's fun and silly and great. But the longest I ever got to was just touching my shoulders. I wanted to hack my hair off. It's not this natural long flowing thing, it's slightly coarse mixed with fly aways, shiny and thick except it looks flat without the aid of a hairdryer and round brush. It doesn't obey any of the rules, the back of my hair grows longer than the sides, which starts resembling mumsy mullet as opposed to ooh your hair is growing long. I'm not complaining. What if I didn't have hair? What if i had to go out in the world faced with what women who are bald or losing hair are faced with? I know how people work. I know that if someone makes a bad comment about you it doesn't make you feel good no matter how much bravado you put on. You can rise above it. But the way people are, the way society is, the fuckers that are the media, print a picture of a bald woman and you'll get people clicking on it posting things you can already guess. And I'll click to see what they're saying..and then I think, why? Why did I waste my time on what I already knew these so called people would say?
I never equated femininity with hair in the past. I sort of only thought about faces. A short hair cut made me look prettier, that's why I've mostly always had it bob length. I got bored and thought about going super short or "fantasised" about growing it shoulder length and having some good layering going on. I never thought about my body too that much. Only until I started doing excersises that surprised me. They worked. For me it's about taking chances, exploring, yes this superficial, I'm not a spoilt brat, I know that I am very lucky in terms of health, lifestyle and desires, but I also think was I living in a coma before? I read all the stuff on the internet, the magazines which I've purposely stopped buying now, decades ago, only until I really thought about myself, did I see my potential. And that potential is not to be society's version of anything. It's to be the person who I value's best. That person is me and my Master owns me.
So don't think about what suits you. Think about doing. If I'm being something I am not according to someone else, then it's too bad they can't see all the different sides to me.
I posted some comments below following a mini sort of discussion between myself and someone who I shall keep anon cos I haven't asked their permission! I thought what they said was worth posting here.
Anon; Not buying women's magazines is one of the best things you can do for yourself as a woman. I seriously believe that. But you're right. It's good to be creative with your looks. it's not superficial. It's part of yourself. Your whole self. There's nothing wrong with this. Or makeup. It's the way we are manipulated to believe it is everything that is the problem.
Me; I completely agree. There is so much manipulation from media, society and im sorry to say people who i thought would know better- friends, family, not my family but women who have had daughters , youd think they would know better than posting a rude comment on a website saying "some girl is supposed to be fat and why is she trying to be skinny?" thats just one example.
Anon; Yes. The whole body image thing is fucked up. People don't know how to behave any more. Because a lot of people take their ideas from the media. And the media is now giving mixed messages.
Me; So true. I just hope some of those arseholes get their just deserts.
*starts chanting*
Movie time.
Movies are a big passion of mine. As is naked gardening. (In your dreams).
Movies I want to seeeeee,
Everyone's hearing about this Social Networking movie. I'd like to see it for Jessie Eisenberg's performance. I really liked his work in The Squid and The Whale which made me laugh so damn hard, like a more realistic, less quirky Royal Tenenbaums. I think Social Network will be sensationalist, different to the real character of Mark Zuckerberg (creator of Facebook. Oh no, stick pins in him) who I think does have more social skills than the character Eisenberg portrays in SN but it's a movie, drama, a story, it should be fun and thought provoking and it's already provoking me. I want to see it. And I don't get the comparison between Michael Cera who I also like and Jessie Eisenberg, it's a bit of a dumb comparison.
The Squid and The Whale. Since throwing my dvd away or leaving it at my parents house in a move, hell no probably just an impulse, I have distanced myself from a family so dysfunctional and from a dad so hilariously -from afar- up himself. And that sucks and I may have to sing Hey You a song I could have written.
Secretary. But only with a certain person. I've seen it many a time, perhaps Spader did another movie with Maggie Gyllenhaal called Worms get you Spankings. Or was that just a directing fantasy of mine. We saw Story of O. Maybe another BDSM movie? No because aside from the Image, Sec and O, there's bloody nothing! The Pianist but she's crazy! Maybe, I'll settle for Madame Bovary, as long as it is exquisite looking. I actually just want to see something dark and provocative. Dogtooth was a good one about conditioning, oddball, not sexy at all..I want to see something, maybe like Lolita mixed with that and The Town. No I just want to see a sexy kidnap movie. Don't mention that Gerard Butler Jenn Aniston movie, I don't like Butler's teeth.
Well I'm off to make a few enemies as I've made 500 million friends.
Nice trailer for The Social Network http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB95KLmpLR4
A scene from Squid and The Whale. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRsc6yh76o8
Friday, 15 October 2010
Too much self importance.
It seems there's a lot of justification going. Defending oneself. I got thinking yesterday big time about abortion and religion, the two seperated. I feel sometimes people think they are disciple of someone or they think they are really special, like they are here on Earth for a reason other than to live. I myself have never followed a religion but I don't actively disbelieve in any religion. I don't agree with a few things I have heard quoted to me but that doesn't mean I think that particular religion is "bullshit." However, I do have a problem with a religion that is going to have quotes about homosexuality, when it likens it to a crime, or when it calls it wrong, I have a big problem in calling things wrong and people following that. I absolutely disrespect that..but I believe you can worship a God in your religion and not believe in everything which is there in the text in your religion, it's perhaps controversial to do so because some would accuse you of not really being a believer or a follower of that religion because you haven't immersed yourself into it fully.
I used watch a series called Mahabharat and I can take away a lot of things from that without being immersed in the Hindu religion. Both my parents are Hindu but I know if I said to them, I love my religion they would be proud that I "got it." I'm coming to find that don't agree with A religion period. I believe in God but I'm hazy on what that God might be..I have no desire to find out even what that God is.
I believe I'm lucky to be alive, lucky to live but I also have come to believe life is not a gift. I think giving birth is kind of a miracle when you think about it and some part of me even believes it's God's will, yes I don't know why but I would thank God, but life..I really think of it as a process. I don't fully believe in fate, I believe in it to an extent but I will never follow the fate intended for me. I will always do what I want.
And when someone says you're selfish, I come back to my first paragraph. Like they are someone's disciple and they are special- and I want to say have you ever thought about the other views about why we are here on Earth, one of them just purely science? I abhor the idea that your belief is the only belief. There's a quote, I can't remember it and it's been BUGGING me, it's a little similar to marching to the beat of your own drums but also that that beat is the only beat that exists. I HATE that. And I hate hypocrites. I'm not even going to be diplomatic about it, I think that rebels, which people who march to their own drum and say they hate labels are very keen to label themselves as, are pompous arses who just want attention.
Then there's abortion. In fact it comes down to birth. Birth is a gift to some. I agree having a baby is a special time and mothers are to be respected, are you kidding me, they go through so much, I have so much respect for them. However, this idea that a woman is a not a woman until she gives birth or even that a man doesn't become a man till he has a child and in some cases a son, that I class as bullshit. As if we have to prove ourselves. Childbirth is not some test or gateway to heaven in my opinion. So, if a woman wants to make the choice to abort, I think saying you a pro choice and then turning your nose up by saying that you would never want any loved one or anyone in your family to abort is a hypocritical mess. I'm a human, I will act like one, if abortion makes me selfish, if you think I am doing it for my own convenience, then you think that and I will go ahead and call you a deluded faux disciple. I'm not beating around the bush here. Sometimes a woman will be disowned if she has a child, thrown out and living a poverty and sometimes a woman wants to go further in certain aspects of her life and does not want a child yet. I know that there are signs of humanity in the not yet child she is choosing to abort, it's almost a life and according to some arguments, it is a life. But what has always baffled me is calling it a murder. Let's move past black and white, dictionary definitions. I hate the pro sensationalist, ready to jump on the It's Wrong bandwagon, I liken them to sheep.
I used watch a series called Mahabharat and I can take away a lot of things from that without being immersed in the Hindu religion. Both my parents are Hindu but I know if I said to them, I love my religion they would be proud that I "got it." I'm coming to find that don't agree with A religion period. I believe in God but I'm hazy on what that God might be..I have no desire to find out even what that God is.
I believe I'm lucky to be alive, lucky to live but I also have come to believe life is not a gift. I think giving birth is kind of a miracle when you think about it and some part of me even believes it's God's will, yes I don't know why but I would thank God, but life..I really think of it as a process. I don't fully believe in fate, I believe in it to an extent but I will never follow the fate intended for me. I will always do what I want.
And when someone says you're selfish, I come back to my first paragraph. Like they are someone's disciple and they are special- and I want to say have you ever thought about the other views about why we are here on Earth, one of them just purely science? I abhor the idea that your belief is the only belief. There's a quote, I can't remember it and it's been BUGGING me, it's a little similar to marching to the beat of your own drums but also that that beat is the only beat that exists. I HATE that. And I hate hypocrites. I'm not even going to be diplomatic about it, I think that rebels, which people who march to their own drum and say they hate labels are very keen to label themselves as, are pompous arses who just want attention.
Then there's abortion. In fact it comes down to birth. Birth is a gift to some. I agree having a baby is a special time and mothers are to be respected, are you kidding me, they go through so much, I have so much respect for them. However, this idea that a woman is a not a woman until she gives birth or even that a man doesn't become a man till he has a child and in some cases a son, that I class as bullshit. As if we have to prove ourselves. Childbirth is not some test or gateway to heaven in my opinion. So, if a woman wants to make the choice to abort, I think saying you a pro choice and then turning your nose up by saying that you would never want any loved one or anyone in your family to abort is a hypocritical mess. I'm a human, I will act like one, if abortion makes me selfish, if you think I am doing it for my own convenience, then you think that and I will go ahead and call you a deluded faux disciple. I'm not beating around the bush here. Sometimes a woman will be disowned if she has a child, thrown out and living a poverty and sometimes a woman wants to go further in certain aspects of her life and does not want a child yet. I know that there are signs of humanity in the not yet child she is choosing to abort, it's almost a life and according to some arguments, it is a life. But what has always baffled me is calling it a murder. Let's move past black and white, dictionary definitions. I hate the pro sensationalist, ready to jump on the It's Wrong bandwagon, I liken them to sheep.
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