Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Bully

On a personal note I always tell my son, "no bullying" if he tries to take anything from his sister.  So, it's a household word thanks to the commercials.  And speaking of siblings my son is  that kid who's for the most part naturally uses things correctly, fixed things way more often than he messed stuff up.  But he's bossy to his sister.  If an adult tells her to do something he goes and gets involved.  I keep telling him, "you need to let her listen to me." and "I'm the mother let me take care of my baby".  I guess this issue's off topic from bullying a little bit.  As a kid I didn't play with the other kids as much as I organized them.  I helped raise my sisters and I babysat other people's kids way too young.  
I used to think mom raised me like that to be useful because she needed the help.  Now I see my son correcting, teaching, redirecting my daughter.  I tell him, "leave her alone.  Don't make her cry." so he just got more effective at correcting and teaching her without making her cry.  They still do argue and fight some which I always do stop them.  I'm just talking about for the most part he really has taken it on himself to help her.  I'm starting to think maybe I wasn't "raised like that" to help out as much as I was unrelenting so the adults just threw in stuff like, "don't make them cry".  If that's so then maybe some of the bully behavior would stop if the bullies were given useful responsibilities.  

That sounds like a good groundwork. Hopefully the efforts will pay off soon!

I'm sorry it's so hard. The more you can get her to truly own it before she's a teen, the better, IMO.

DS's team uses the slogan, "it's not my fault, it's my challenge."

DeeDee

The movie opened in our area yesterday. There was a review of the movie in the city paper. Some of the comments were what I expected. Like if your child is bullied you should have them fight back instead of talking to an adult about it. My son has a mild disability that causes low endurance and mild muscle weakness and he wears a scoliosis brace. He would not be able to defend himself very well. He took martial arts lessons last summer but he had to quit when he got the new brace that has to be worn all day. His muscles are getting weaker because he can't exercise in the brace. It angers me when people say kids should just fight back.

Love IT

But Dumbo & Cinderella say that excluding people is bullying.

Social exclusion is a form of bullying and it is condoned by churches in our area. I talked to one of my son's former scout leaders about bullying in our schools. She said it is true that there is a bullying problem here but it is that way everywhere and nothing can be done about it. She grew up in a small town and she was a bully for several years until she became a Christian. When I mentioned the Bully documentary that included a girl who was shunned along with her family for being gay she didn't say anything against it. Social exclusion is practiced by church members against people who are different from them in their thinking or actions.

There is no diversity here. Almost everyone is white. Almost everyone goes to church every Sunday and the football games during football season. Almost everyone loves football. They think you are weird or gay if you can't or won't talk sports. My son and I don't want to talk about sports. I think they make people who are different from them so uncomfortable that they move away. We can't move for family reasons.

I talked to the scout leader about the perception here that all boys in musical theater are gay. She didn't deny that either.

I told her that my son can't do much in the brace and there was no way he could do the hiking or camping so he didn't have a choice but to quit. There was no mention of trying to accommodate his disabilities so that he could at least be around other kids at their meetings. Social exclusion exists in scouting here too.

I don't think anyone will see the documentary. I think they like things just the way they are. My dad said the bullying problem here is similar to what people go through when they are put in prison. They have to find a way to deal with bullies there. I told him it was strange that he should say that because that is what his grandson said it felt like living here--a prison.

My daughter says our family is just like the rest of the community and very judgmental and instead of having Easter dinner with them, she took her little brother to a fast food restaurant. She doesn't think he should have to deal with them and my husband agreed. He enjoyed Easter for the first time in years. He didn't have to deal with the small town football player cousins that ignore him. He really wanted someone to talk to. He didn't want to be stuck with just reading things on his iPhone to get through the monotony of all the sports conversation.

My daughter finally told her boyfriend about our family and why she doesn't want to be around them and he understood.

He is verbally gifted. It is one of the things that made him different from the other kids his age. He would open his mouth and talk like an adult about things that were going on in the news or history or politics, and he did something that you just are not supposed to do here is a town like this. He asked questions. He wanted to know why things are the way they are.

As the Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boy_Scouts_of_America_membership_controversies says,

'The Boy Scouts of America (BSA), one of the largest private youth organizations in the United States, has policies which prohibit atheists and agnostics from membership in its Scouting program, and prohibit "avowed" homosexual people from leadership roles in its Scouting program as directly violating its fundamental principles and tenets. BSA has denied or revoked membership status or leadership positions of youths and adults for violation of these foundational principles.

The BSA contends that these policies are essential in its mission to instill in young people the values of the Scout Oath and Law.'

Is the Boy Scouts organization therefore guilty of "bullying", because it is excluding people? I don't think so. It has certain moral standards that some people disagree with. They are free not to join.

I don't think you're actually responding to her point as stated.

I think that her point needs to be expanded and clarified to see if your response applies.