Anti-Bully Bully

[OMFG!You'reActuallySmart!]

The title sounds a bit weird but bear with me and you'll understand why I chose it. Since many other users have shared their bullying experiences, I thought I'd toss mine in, perhaps it could help others or just provide an interesting bed-side story. I admit I was bullied but this thread is about how I was a bully and anti-bully bully to others.

In middle-school and high-school, when I bullied it wasn't the "gimme your lunch money" kind of deal. Our school had such bullies around but I was never that kind as I found it rather amusing. I viewed them as playing the role of an aggressive panhandler, which was ironic since their parents were usually fairly wealthy. As a result, getting the few dollars off the targets was pointless and boiled down to fun. You may call me a hypocrite later but I saw those bullies as low-lives, picking on kids who for the most part were from less wealthy parents. In fact, if they couldn't get money off the targets, they'd just pull out their own wallets and pay, so it was clear as day they didn't need the money but were depriving the target of money.

Then you had the more violent bullies who unlike the aggressive panhandler-like bullies, the violent ones would get into fights pretty often. I guess you could best describe them as hot-heads who wanted to seem macho. Usually these bullies also defied teachers and the principal, so it wasn't unusual to see them in detention. I often laughed to my friends by saying those bullies must have their own designated seat because they're in detention so often. I wouldn't lump them in with the stereotypical, "jock" clique because not all the "jocks" were bullies. Some were arrogant but others were very pleasant, pacifist-like even.

Of course, there were the female bullies also. I write with a more negative tone for them because I often viewed them as squabbling ducks or sea-gulls. If you've seen the movie, Nemo, you know exactly what I mean . Although males are often associated with violence, some of these female bullies were a lot more aggressive, not in the form of fist-fighting (or rather cat-fighting). Instead, they were more verbally aggressive and some of them, the "leaders", were oozing with arrogance, more so than the male bullies, including myself. For one in particular I always wondered how her parents can stand to have her in the same house but then I realized, her parents nick-named her "princess". That's right, a female high-school senior student would be called, "princess" by her mother and father. Her case was peculiar because she had an older sister who was almost the complete opposite, however, she carried a reduced arrogance with her. She would interfere with most bullies, female or male, which I thought was quite ballsy of her considering that some of the male bullies would get into pretty brutal fights. Anyway, I'm going on a tangent now ... .

And now we go to yours truly: me. As I said, I wasn't the kind of male bully that pushes people around for the hell of it, dribbles with silly name-calling or demands lunch money. "Cyber-bullying" wasn't something I really engaged in much either because it turned into an online squabble-fest and the "block" or "ignore" button seemed to disappear from the target's conscious. I also didn't frequent myself with cyber-bullying because it's easy as pie for the target to print out the chat transcript, show the endless pages to the principal and the bully(ies) cant deny it. I usually didn't jump in online to stop the cyber-bullying because it was one giant pot of chaos and when I did insert myself into the mix, the chaos swirled my way but any form of reasoning on my part got obscured. If I countered with squabbling, that's exactly what came back at me, more squabbling, so it wasn't helpful for the target. Perhaps they got a morality boost that someone was trying, I'm not sure.

Anyway, so based on what I didn't do, what did I do? I did 2 things. First, I would only target people who would be useful to me, regardless of their popularity or physical strength. If little Johnny was the easiest to target but served no purpose, then I saw no reason to use him, although I would still engage in a friendly chat. Second, I did what I call "anti-bullying". This wasn't holding up a sign and saying, "look, look, this dude killed himself because of bullying so let's all be friends, man", or kindly asking the bully to stop. That's wasted effort. Instead, I'd jump in and either manipulate the bully in some way so he'd lay off from the target or manipulate the target by acting as though she/he did something to piss me off and I wanted to deal with her/him myself. The latter worked because I had one hell of a temper that thankfully I managed to successfully control. Sometimes my temper got the best of me and I'd end up in a fight or end up scaring someone shitless.

Unlike many other bullies, I worked alone for the most part. The only time I'd have others help would be if I needed something done that required a hot-head to push someone around. The trick was to get the hot-head to stop and not have a go at the person later when I'm not around. That said, in some years I became "partners" with a few others but again, I didn't want to fight, cause physical damage, engage in name-calling, cyber-bully, etc... . It was business-like, do what is needed for myself. I found it flattering when other students who were bullied would ask me to "deal with" their bully. I became hesitant doing that when bullies asked me to "deal with" other bullies but nonetheless, I ensured whenever I was asked to do that by anyone, it would be unlikely to back-fire.

How This Could Help

Think to yourself, how could 1 person (me) take on several bullies at once and win? I should also say I wasn't the largest kid, I was actually average or a bit below average height, weight, etc... . So clearly, I couldn't muscle my way through. Instead, it all comes down to a few things. First, try to remain as calm as possible. If you're fuming mad, crying out of sadness or whatever else, it's going to be harder for you to sit down and think it through. Second, people are irrational. You may not know why you get bullied around, it may make no sense to you and it may seem irrational because it may very well be irrational. Perhaps it was something you said to someone, perhaps you eyed someone's girlfriend/boyfriend in a certain way, perhaps someone is spreading a lie about you, etc... . Point is, if you try to rationally think your situation through, it's probably not going to work and just confuse you.
Third, bullying someone (other than the way I did) relies on the bully having an audience. You don't want to get rid of the audience, no, you want to keep it there, perhaps get it bigger. The bully in a way feeds off the presence of the audience, so you cut that connection, win the audience over to your side. For example, the bully is pressuring you in front of everyone, so comment to the bully how pathetic he/she is they have to resort to pushing around the least popular student in order to feel good about themselves. The bully robs confidence, so take it back. Yelling "leave me alone" isn't going to cut it, you may just get laughed at. Comment to the bully how he/she needs a bunch of goons because he/she is too much of a coward to face someone they have repeatedly beat in the ground for months/years. If you know damning secrets of the bully, now is the time to tell. The audience indirectly interferes when you win them over.
Fourth, running to the teacher isn't going to be effective. Sure the teacher can give the bully a detention and the bully will agree in the presence of the teacher to leave you alone. However, that's all a lie, the bully is going to return pretty damn mad.
Fifth, talk with other students. The conversation can be about whatever topic, it doesn't matter. The goal is to get them to like you a bit because when they're in the audience, they'll feel guilty about not jumping in to help. When they don't jump in, don't lash out on them, instead make your connection with them stronger. Others will see you hanging out with that person and they'll find it odd, they'll talk, some will be more accepting of you but you may have to initiate the conversation.

The Last and Most Important

Change your appearance. I don't mean the clothing you wear, I mean how you carry yourself. Understand how your body language, facial expressions, vocal tone and initial expressions affect how the bully treats you. If they walk up to you and you cower into a corner, they may beat your ass but if stand up, not affected by them, you throw them off their game. You can even do something odd: laugh and joke around with the bully. If they give a snide comment to you, make a joke of it in return, then move closer to them as though your friends (i.e. putting arm around shoulder). It sounds odd, you'd hate their guts but for a moment, pretend to like them as a friend. It doesn't matter how many comments they say to you, keep doing it. When the audience sees this, you bet they'll scratch their heads wondering what on Earth is going on, have the two reconciled? It puts the most pressure on you but it's your chance to sway the audience and take back the confidence the bully stole from you. Don't get too physical by pushing and shoving, that's only asking for a fight. If the bully pushes you away, keep going and tell a secret or something a bit believable that will become a rumour. As you keep it up, the bully's friends will start to doubt him/her.

This isn't a direct form of manipulation and the reason I haven't advised to manipulate the bully is you need practice. You also need to have the bully know they can trust you and have them know you can back yourself up.

[BDF]

I lost my patience with popularity games and horse-playing at my school ages ago. You said you'd target those useful to you. I pretty much convinced myself that they're all worth fuckall. No games... if they wanted a fight they got it, and eventually people stopped trying. Maybe they "grew up"... whatever. I left school with a handful of friends that I can count on one hand. The rest turned into pathetic fuckass phonies.

When it comes to occasional gatherings I have with my few friends from school, I sometimes see some of those phonies around. It's a good laugh. I act as rude and as arrogant as I can around them, just to provoke and piss them off. They can fack off and leave if they don't like it. Can't do anything to me. Sue me? Fight me? lol... wankers.