Why are we bullied, anyway?

[MadPoet]

I know this is a stupid question.
But why is it that people just seem to want to make your life miserable?
It's honestly hard to believe that people who bully us could care less when we go home and break down because of what they said. But is it honestly true? What compels them to hurt us so much. People I've never done anything rude to just always have to give me a hard time. And my friend, who I was always there for and who I really did care about, why did she have to hurt me? You kind of try to not let it get to you and you act like it doesn't, but when people bully you it really does hurt.

I guess it's just hard for me to imagine why. And I pin it on something being wrong with me. I just don't know why people have to do this ?

[Ivanna_B_Me]

Well not all bullies, bully for absoluetly no reason... I mean some do... But most have a reason... Probably treated very badly at home and that is the only way they know how to vent, is to hurt other people...and if this girl was once your firend I don't think it's necessarily bullying... well what exactly happened? Between You and her???

[MadPoet]

We used to be good friends and then she started ignoring me and I wanted to know why, but every time I talked to her about it she would pin everything on me and blame all the stuff I confronted her about on me. She told me I was bipolar a lot...which I didn't think she meant or anything. So then recently she hurt me a lot because she started ignoring me and just...well you know how sometimes you can just tell someones angry with you or just unfriendly. So I sent her an email and told her I was through being her friend because she only hurt me, and now she talks about me and stuff with her new best friend. So what I was wondering basically is what compels people do stuff like that when I was only there for her about everything..

Sorry to waste anyone's time...

[WingedWolf]

You're not wasting time.
From my experience, many bullies don't know that what they do is a big deal, they don't know it really hurts. Some of them do it to vent, some of them just think it's funny. Some people find it through fear. They are insecure and anxious and scared of what their life is, whether it's abuse, depression or just the responsibility of growing up and puberty, it's fear.
Your friend is probably stressed, and feeling guilty might drive her to try and divert her anxieties away from her, and towards you, she wants to pin it on someone else, to avoid her own guilt. Could that be it?

[brendanmonline]

I can't answer your question. But I can answer another one that you might have, you just didn't ask yet.

Bullys target the 'easy ones' the ones who stand out from the rest of the class, the ones that can't blend in, the ones with fewer friends, the ones with less back-up. They target people they consider 'below' them.

[Lizzie]

I would guess to think that the majority of people who bully are having a hard time dealing with something else in their life. I know a lot of young children who are abused (we are talking elemetry age) take their lack of understand and anger about the situation out on other younger students. They want to feel like they are in control of something, and they find people they can pick on and boss around. This is just coming from my studies as a former teacher with students who were abused. And almost everyone single one of them did this. But then again these are young children (5-10), but I would guess similar situations of frustration and anger could cause someone to take their internal pain out on someone else.

[20 Dollar Nose Bleed]

I think with some bullies it's either Bully or BE bullied.
They might bully just to demonstrait their "power" to people that they're scared of themselves.

Let's say there's the most popular guy in school, i'll give him a random name to make it easier to put. Let's call him Luka.
Then there's the middle guy, the one that's not popular but not unpopular either. Call him Rob.

Rob looks upto Luka and wants to be accepted by him or dosnt want to become one of his jokes or dosnt want to be bullied by Luka himself. So Rob finds someone easy to pick on and bullies them to try to either impress Luka or just make himself look a little less helpless to him as to avoid being targeted.
Make sence?
I saw ALOT of that during my time in school. It's not always why people bully but it's a common one. Especially in my area.

[Gingerbread Latte]

A lot of bullies only bully because they have their own problems and want to make other people feel as bad as them. Also, there's that old saying about people bully because they're jealous, not sure how true that is though.

[wtp]

You would probably do it if you could.

[InSovietRussiaORGASMGotU]

Before I answer, I'll say this: my answers probably will not reflect that of most stereotypical bullies. I do what I do for myself (and on the rarer times because I really don't like a few people), usually not to harm them. To me, it's like everyone is holding a cookie jar with cookies and I want the cookies. Some open the lid easier than others.

I'll answer based on my past and current experience/endevours/whatever other word is better that I cant seem to think of right now of manipulating, crushing, and simply ruining lives of people. Sometimes it's been not much, others I've driven (as indicated in their notes) to kill themselves and some got other disorders.

If I'm to go after someone, it depends on a few things. First, what I want, second, what they have, third, how easy are they for me. I'm very good at seeing through people and profiling them so spotting their weaknesses is quite easy. After all, why go and try to take on some big, strong guy when there's a smaller, weaker guy who can get you the same thing that you want? Although taking on the bigger guys works as a challenge to see how good you are.

I don't consider exactly what I do as bullying. Making them feel bad usually isn't my goal, although for a few that have annoyed me a lot, I do want to have their lives ruined on purpose. But most of the others I simply want something and if they get hurt in the process, that's their problem not mine. Such as getting someone whose very smart to help me may require getting them to leave someone else (so get rid of that person) and you've got the smart one or wanting money so do a bit of lying, etc... .

As for the family part, well, my father did manipulate people pretty much infront of me as well as some of our family. To add, about 3 of my cousins also were fairly good (although not as good) at manipulating. They were especially good for physical stuff, 1 of them in particular was quite good at physical and decent at manipulation.

If I meet a new person, I immediately see through and profile them. Then, we keep talking and if something is clearly a weakpoint to be exploited, I'll consider how much I'll gain. If it's next to nothing then I won't bother, not worth my time and effort. But, let's say this weaker person has some connections to someone else, then I see if the weaker one can help me or not, usually as a stepping stone then get the higher one. If the weaker one gets hurt, usually emotional nonsense, so be it. It's not my goal but if it happens, it happens.

For the physical stuff, which I'm assuming is more of what you meant by bullying, I use that to also get what I want, or if it's one of those few people who I really don't like then to purposely damage them. Usually, it's another means to get something using some of their fear. Other times, I just get angered and they're there to take whatever happens.

Although usually it's just some lying, manipulating, bit of faking the anger to scare them down, etc... . Sometimes also a bit of forging (used that to get one dumb girl to quit bothering me and to make sure I got a high grade, while she got a lousy grade, and I got to get the teacher to give me higher marks a lot easier). Ironically, also was a way to get for myself and then use her to get a guy who had some decent connections and money.

You can however, use manipulation in retaliation to being bullied physically (I had to do a lot of this in highschool, along with a decent amount of physical).