I felt the need to expand upon my other bullying post because of observations I have made while watching my son and the other students at his public school from Kindergarten through where we are now, 3rd grade.
Yes, as early as Kindergarten, at the age of 4, I have seen what I believe is the natural instinct in the human animal to bully. I had the chance to watch the students in my son’s class because, for the first half of the school year, parents were encouraged to stay 20 minutes in the morning to read to their children. So, I watched the kids, and also befriended the parents who would later fill in part of the gaps in the information I had gathered.
We call them the “mean” girls. The girls who belittle the other girls to build themselves up. I could not believe this started at so early an age, we have seen the movies, it is supposed to begin in middle school and then blow up in high school. This is a falacy. What I now refer to as girl bullying starts very young. The mean girl of Kindergarten was friends with the mean girl of 1st grade who started to get her friends to exclude another girl because she was a different religion. Supposedly this was not something she got from her parents. And, ours is a very mixed school in regards to religion and ethnicities, so this was unexpected. After watching the children and listening to the parents and writing articles on bullying, I am convinced some of this behavior stems from something natural in our species, the human animal.
We watch a lot of nature shows, we love animals in my house. Many of us have seen the shows where the male lion has to show his dominance over the other male lions if he wants his to be the progney that keeps the species going. Is the human animal performing in a similar way when a larger 3rd grade boy shoulders a smaller 3rd grade boy? Is this form of bullying natural? When I witnessed the larger boy in action I spoke up (loudly!) and then relaized it reminded me of these nature shows. We cannot deny we are animals, and yes, while we are the highest form of animal, is there something in our DNA that requires us to show dominance? Is part of getting to and maintaining status as the “alpha” male or female in the group perfectly natural? I think the answer may be yes and this is the part of the bullying topic that does not get discussed.
This does not in any way condone any form of bullying. It is just to suggest that we need to be realistic in our approach and perhaps, if we realize it is natural and inherent in our species, we can approach it from a different angle, not be in denial of its existence, and find more realistic solutions. After all, it seems the problem is getting worse not better.
And this is only part of the conversation. The entire escalation of bullying in our society is not something I would even dare approach, I do not equate that with the lions who might fight to death for dominance. That is for species survival. In today’s scoiety it has reached a new height of meaness and hatred, something I am far too unqualified to tackle that and I don’t know if blaming it on TV and movies would be enough either.
I was bullied in middle school. I hated it and withdrew into myself. It was not a harsh bullying, I was never hit, I was never yelled at, just some name calling that made me uncomfortable, some perceived me as a “sissy.” Far less hurtful than what we read about today. No social media to escalate the issue. Now I am a large man, partly to overcome my own self image of “sissy.” It is not just an excuse to be an over eater, I feel less scared in society as a husky man, a man who works ut at the gym several times a week (or decades) I have been working on my insides and my outsides to cure my own personal damage from bullying.
Disclosure: This is not a sponsored post. My other post brought up a lot of ideas that I felt needed to be addressed.
I think 100% it comes from the parents and home enviroment. These kids are seeing it somewhere or somehow…maybe the parents aren’t always modeling the behavior but I bet you they are not monitoring the kids TV or media exposure, could be relatives or friends of the family..parents just don’t take time use poor behaviour or ingnorance as a teaching moment. I’ve watched mean girls from early playground and preschool..they do start early…sometimes 3..and the ones who are good at it are really, really sneaky about it…they make sure no adult is watching so it’s 100% she said/she said. The problem that I’ve witnessed with the girls (and boys) is the parents don’t acknowledge the behavior or teach their kids why it’s wrong and how to behave. A lot have the “not my little angel” syndrom. I’ve always had a zero tolerance policy for any kind of bullying from my kid. Thankfully he’s a gentle soul anyhow. Don’t think it will every be a problem, but you never know, so I always use teaching moments to reninforce my beliefs.