Bulling & Victimization
We most often we think of bullying taking place in a school setting. What do you think happens when bullies graduate from one academic level to another – and then out into adulthood? If the tendency goes uncorrected, the individuals keep on bullying and victimizing others.
And what is bullying’s effect on those who have been victimized? How many have learned and accepted living in victimhood for the rest of their lives?
A grandmother shared this story about when her granddaughter was in fifth grade. Her grandmother was picking her up from school. “There was a huge poster just inside the elementary school main entrance saying not to bully. It had a long list of “don’ts.” On the wall throughout the school were “no bulling” signs. The girl had experienced the sadly successful results of these instructions since the first grade.
As they left the building together, the girl nodded at the sign sadly, and said that those signs were teaching the kids how to bully.
This is what happens when we focus on the symptoms of what is wrong, instead of how to be FOR what is right.
On the way home, the young girl and her grandmother discussed what the younger one had observed. They agreed that signs telling people how to be kind and caring, fair and diversity respectful would have had a much better result.
The Living Consciously® program focuses more strongly on the “how to” of being and supporting what is constructive and helpful.
Our society has taught our people to be such good victims that they often go along with or ignore the injustice of bullying, even when the victims far outnumber the bullies!
See also: Breaking the Cycle and Recognizing the Forms of Bullying