Best Ways to Deal With Bully According to Lifehacker Readers
Last week, I asked Lifehacker readers for advice on how to deal with a child bully . After reading your answers, I wished I had a time machine so that I could go back to the days of your youth to hug you all (and kill Bea Arthur).
I’m sorry that this happened to you, but at least you all eventually made it to adulthood, and perhaps your hard-earned bully wisdom will help someone who can deal with the same problem now. Here are some of your best tips.
Don’t entertain your bully
Many of your answers have been about motivating bullies. General takeaway: bullies often expect an entertaining response from their ratings. This is why I think that talking to children about verbal abuse in response to the bully’s insults will not work. It’s probably a hell of a lot of fun for a bully to hear a frightened kid spit out the awkward insults his mom taught him.
LizzieMae summed it up beautifully:
“When I was a child, there was a girl who was cruelly molested. She was not ugly, she dressed like everyone else, there was no obvious reason to bully her. But her reaction was so encouraging that I just wanted to poke at her. She didn’t get upset (outwardly), she just got real cocky and tried to get back to you, but in a strange, too difficult way. “
Instead of trying to outsmart your bully, our readers offer a variety of neutral responses to ridicule and insults, such as this helpful tip from Bassbeast :
“Laugh at them. Whenever they tried to do something, no matter how annoying or painful it was, I just laughed at them. I would say something like, ‘Nice try! You get more creative. But seriously, you don’t get what you want here. Try someone else. “Then LEAVE. Don’t get involved, that meant you had the final say and I HATE the bullies.”
And this is from the Raven Parliamentarian :
“In the fifth grade, our son was verbally bullied, and we taught him to just roll his eyes and say ‘cool stories’ whenever someone starts with him. They gave up in less than a week. “
I love Alex-W » proposal, because it is basically a” do bully job harder. “
“Pretend to be stupid. Act like you don’t understand what they said and treat them with condescension. ‘Hmm? I didn’t listen. Can you repeat that?’ “So what’s your point of view? Ask them to say it over and over again with an explanation. They get upset and look like idiots when explaining a joke. Or they look like a dumbass because they are picking on someone.”
Avoid bullying through submission
Reader Lifehacker Gmoney offered some insightful comments hooligans read that it was almost painful, but once I got over my initial defensive position and honestly thought of my school years, as the Lord of the Flies, it’s hard to argue with their point of view: “You can not stop fun. at school. All you can do is make sure you are not the target, ”wrote Gmoni. “They persecute the weak, the poor, or the weird looking. It messed up. But play is play. “
Gmoney advice? Dress neatly. Shower. Join a sports team. Correspond.
However, this paragraph was a real blow:
“Finally, and this is the cruellest one, don’t hang out with other losers who are bullied. You get into a bunch of associations. “
Other readers have noted that children often cannot help being poor, weird or irregular, which I agree with, but in general – a nail sticking out of their head gets hammered, so this is the best choice for a child. should seem as normal as possible is a solid (albeit depressing) comment on human nature.
Avoid bullying through invisibility
The Platypus Man is probably the only Lifehacker reader who was n’t bullied at school, but not because he was so cool and popular. This is because he was invisible.
“I was so antisocial that I probably avoided the attention of the majority, simply by not ‘showing myself off,’” he wrote. “I didn’t belong to any clubs or organizations, I never tried sports or games, and I rarely tried to make friends with anyone on my own (see friend above), after school I went home and played games while my father came home and made me do my homework. I was happy and I didn’t do it to avoid bullies, rejection or anything else, but it probably worked for that too. ”
Stop bullying violence
Many John Wick-style MFs in our comment section report that they have stopped fist bullying, but almost all of them emphasized that it should be a last resort.
“Practice a little and then challenge them to battle. Even if you lose, if they know you are up against them, they will probably stop anyway. ” This was announced on Twitter by the Reverend Andrew R. Shoppe .
“Reflection seems to have helped,” Claire Reyes writes in gray posts about her daughter. “ I told her that if someone starts a fight, I want her to end it. Her grandfather showed her the USMC hand-to-hand combat skills he taught at boot camp. I wish the adorable little girl didn’t have to fight, but it looks like she should. “
A child who is being bullied should not “win” the fight. Not in this case. Here’s how Karaam A. King posted it on our Facebook page :
“A former child who is being bullied. Here’s what worked for me: FIGHT BACK! Even if you are crippled. I learned that a bully always chooses an easy target. If you push me and I hit you in the face, you will probably hit me back. But next time it will be easier for you to look for someone who will not resist. In many cases, they even respect you. If not, they will move on. It also doesn’t hurt to learn how to fight. “
Another common theme in end-of-violence responses from the contingent is that if you are going to fight, do your best.
“Kick them in the balls, hit them in the eyes and throat, twist their arms until they scream, kick them if they fall to the ground,” suggests Alex V. it’s bad and let the rest of the school know not to mess with you. ”
The most important rule for parents of children who are bullied
Lifehacker commentator Byron noted that as bad as bullying him is, it’s even worse if your parents don’t take you seriously when you tell them about it. So for a parent, “trust your child” may be the most important piece of advice of all.
“My parents didn’t realize until I was an adult how traumatic and terrible the kids in my elementary school were for me,” he wrote. “I was just shouted about sticks and stones and fights. This led to some pretty tough arguments with my parents over their inaction and faith in adulthood. Saying that I believe you, I know it sucks, and sharing with them what you’re trying to do with it in real time will prevent a lifetime of worry and anger about your role in this. ”