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kengrWhile talking about a number of things with alatefeline last night a couple of things came up.
One was unconscious assumptions. The other was the old canard "it takes two to make a fight".
While reading this article, the two ideas bashed together in my head.
The problem with "it takes two to fight" is the horribly inaccurate assumption it makes about "male" interactions in childhood. Namely that the choice is "fight"/"don't fight".
In reality, the choice is "get beat up"/"try to protect yourself". so it's actually unconscious gaslighting.
I mentioned "male" above because in my experience, it's always the female authority figures spouting this nonsensical piece of "wisdom". I suspect that is because of the differences in "male" and "female" socialization. Boys are expected to have fights. girls are "trained" to attack in less physical ways.
Though come to think of it, "it takes to to have a fight" *should* be equally applicable (and wrong) to the social sniping among girls, which can get *really* nasty by high school.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names can never hurt me" is another horrible example of gaslighting kids and is another bit of "wisdom" that should be stomped on *hard*.
Name calling can do *more* damage than physical assault, Bruises, even broken bones heal a lot faster than the emotional damage those "harmless" words can inflict.
I know I'm far from the only person to have PTSD from *emotional* abuse.
alatefeline last night a couple of things came up.One was unconscious assumptions. The other was the old canard "it takes two to make a fight".
While reading this article, the two ideas bashed together in my head.
The problem with "it takes two to fight" is the horribly inaccurate assumption it makes about "male" interactions in childhood. Namely that the choice is "fight"/"don't fight".
In reality, the choice is "get beat up"/"try to protect yourself". so it's actually unconscious gaslighting.
I mentioned "male" above because in my experience, it's always the female authority figures spouting this nonsensical piece of "wisdom". I suspect that is because of the differences in "male" and "female" socialization. Boys are expected to have fights. girls are "trained" to attack in less physical ways.
Though come to think of it, "it takes to to have a fight" *should* be equally applicable (and wrong) to the social sniping among girls, which can get *really* nasty by high school.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names can never hurt me" is another horrible example of gaslighting kids and is another bit of "wisdom" that should be stomped on *hard*.
Name calling can do *more* damage than physical assault, Bruises, even broken bones heal a lot faster than the emotional damage those "harmless" words can inflict.
I know I'm far from the only person to have PTSD from *emotional* abuse.
Re: Well ...
Date: 2018-12-20 04:54 pm (UTC)When in reality, things would escalate until the victim *couldn't* ignore it.
I'm also fairly certain that a lot of this comes from teachers and staff not wanting to have to sort out who did what when there are conflicting stories.
Especially when parents would come swooping in complaining that their "little angel" couldn't *possibly* have done anything wrong.
Or worse yet, that there was nothing wrong with picking on the other kid, he "deserved" it because [x].
Of course, having enough people to actually *supervise* the kids at recess (and *doing* so!) would eliminate that problem.
Maybe video surveillance (with audio!) might help. But then you have to regulate how long the recordings can be kept. And what *else* can be done with them.
Re: Well ...
Date: 2018-12-20 05:50 pm (UTC)Ignoring the bully has about a 3% chance of success. The most successful tactic against bullies, hiring a lawyer, has a dismal 16% chance of success. In light of there being no effective solutions from the victim's level, no wonder all the advice is bad. NONE of it works.
The best way to stop bullying if from above. If someone with more power physically separates the bully from the victim, imposes sanctions, and if necessary ousts the bully from the group then that is effective.
>>I'm also fairly certain that a lot of this comes from teachers and staff not wanting to have to sort out who did what when there are conflicting stories.<<
Of course.
>>Of course, having enough people to actually *supervise* the kids at recess (and *doing* so!) would eliminate that problem.<<
The best ratio is around 10 or 12 students to one teacher. Plenty of interaction and not much room to make trouble. Also, you rarely have more than one troublemaker in a group. With 35 kids you have 3 or 4.
>> Maybe video surveillance (with audio!) might help. But then you have to regulate how long the recordings can be kept. And what *else* can be done with them.<<
Not in this society. Police cameras are supposed to do that, but they are overwhelmingly used against citizens. Come on, we have video of police slowly strangling a man to death with an illegal technique in broad daylight in front of a crowd, and it was ruled perfectly okay. In a fundamentally unjust society, cameras are useless. They only help when it's widely considered wrong to hurt people -- and then you don't really need them.