Riven (imported) wrote: Tue Oct 11, 2011 3:15 pm I'm completely with you Tugon. I was bullied at school and had a horrible time. Problem was I'd moved in from another part of the country so my accent set me apart. I was also an insecure child having been separated from my parents when I was 2-3 while my mother had a spell in hospital. I guess the bullies spotted that I was timid and shy and they picked on me. I really hated most of my school days. I think bullying is a very difficult to stop, but any kind of awareness raising is a good thing.

cheetaking243 (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 01, 2013 9:03 am I also had quite the issue with bullying in school.

It never got to the level of physical violence in my case, but there was definitely a LOT of teasing directed at me. I got teased in elementary school for having a girl as a best friend a lot, and then by middle school I got teased because I was a "pussy" or "gay" due to the fact that I still wore short shorts, sang soprano in choir, and acted in a very feminine manner. And in retrospect, the reason why is probably just because I was a VERY easy target. Because when people teased me, I didn't retaliate. I just whined and complained. When I got teased, my reaction was a very passive feminine one, where I just didn't seem to understand the lack-of-compassion mindset that the boys had, and so when they teased me my reaction usually wasn't retaliation, but rather whining "STOOOOP!" Which made me a VERY easy target. And my other most common reaction was telling a teacher about it, but honestly my teachers never did a damned thing about it. They just made suggestions like "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me," and "just ignore them."

I tried pretty much everything. Back in elementary school I actually would try to hit the boys who were teasing me, (and I got in trouble for that a LOT,) but I was a TERRIBLE hitter. I've never had any upper-body strength. So on the rare occasion that I did land a punch, (which I almost never did, because the other kids were too fast for me,) the punches were so pathetic that the other guy usually just ended up laughing at me. In fact, word got out about how pathetic my punches were, and there were actually a lot of boys who challenged me to hit them as hard as I could, because they knew that I pretty much couldn't hurt them with my hands no matter how hard I tried.

My mom and my uncle always told me that the reason other kids were teasing me was because they were jealous... because I was the smartest kid in the school, and because the other kids found that threatening to them. That's why they hated me, they said. And that's why they were always looking for ways to bring me down from my high horse. And I will admit that I deserved some of it. Because I was indeed a bit of a show-off. Whenever I excelled, I always had this big stupid grin on my face because I was so pleased with myself. I always bragged about being in 6th-grade math as a 4th-grader, and bragged about getting the top test scores in the class, and bragged about winning school academic competitions. So in a way, I deserved it. But that still doesn't make it hurt any less.

Now, if we're going to get into the recent anti-bullying movement, I think one of the BIG problems with it is that it's all about talking about how terrible it is to be a bully... but I don't think most kids even realize that they're a bully. Because to them, what they're doing seems rational. They don't introspectively look at their own behavior and realize "shoot, I'm bullying someone," they're just doing what seems natural to them. So I think there needs to be a bit more of a focus on exactly what bullying behavior is... so that kids can realize better that they're doing it, rather than the whole good-versus-evil mindset where "if you're a bully, you're a bad person," but nobody sees themselves as a bully, because every single kid in the world thinks that they're being good, no matter what they do.

Man, this post was all over the place. But whatever. Those are my thoughts.

tugon (imported) wrote: Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:36 am Thank you for bumping and sharing. I can so relate to having a hard time learning when afraid. I am so sorry you had such an untalented and abusive teacher. A skilled teacher would have worked with you in a way that you could learn.

I am glad you are letting those negative words go. It is good that you can look into yourself and know all of what you heard in those days was not true. I think we all internalize the negative things we are told. I played back those negative messages for far too many years.

I wish you and all our bullied/abused members much peace and joy.